When Pat McAfee joined ESPN in late 2023, it was another sign that the brand was leaning more toward the new age.
McAfee isn't like the suit-wearing personalities on ESPN. He's a tank top wearing, curse-laden sports media personality who had a loyal fanbase that found him mostly on digital spaces like YouTube.
ESPN also paid top dollar to license "The Pat McAfee Show," giving him the noon time slot that followed Stephen A. Smith's "First Take," reportedly giving McAfee a massive deal worth $85 million over five years, or $17 million annually. This is a lot more than the reported $12 million annually it pays Smith — though his contract was signed in 2019.
McAfee's show, while still found on YouTube, has done away with cursing — at least during the two hours it's simulcast on ESPN — but has maintained the same type of tone as always. That includes the presence of potentially controversial guests, particularly New York Jets quarterback and open conspiracy theorist Aaron Rodgers.
The former NFL MVP has, for years, been given a platform by McAfee to freely speak about different conspiracy theories like his qualms with the Covid-19 vaccine. And in January, Rodgers threw a jab at late night host Jimmy Kimmel, whose talk show is found on ABC, which like ESPN, is a Disney-owned network.
McAfee was found in the middle of the public bickering between the two, and he tried to be understanding of both sides in the beginning.
"I can see exactly why Jimmy Kimmel felt the way he felt, especially with his position. But I think Aaron was just trying to talk shit."
— Awful Announcing (@awfulannouncing) January 3, 2024
Pat McAfee opens his show by responding to the fallout and threats of legal action coming out of his Tuesday interview with Aaron Rodgers pic.twitter.com/UCv1yAp62Z
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However, Andrew Marchand, a former New York Post columnist who is now with The Athletic, published a story about McAfee that talked about how his ratings were not up to par with that of the SportsCenter show he replaced.
ESPN justified this by saying that McAfee's ratings were much better than SportsCenter when taking into account YouTube and TikTok viewership — but McAfee clearly still took offense to the story.
He came on his show in early January and claimed that one specific executive — Norby Williamson, executive senior vice president of Studio and Event Production — was out to "sabotage" him and his show.
ESPN published a statement the day after McAfee called out Williamson that defended the executive.
“No one is more committed to and invested in ESPN’s success than Norby Williamson,” the statement from an ESPN spokesperson read. “At the same time, we are thrilled with the multi-platform success that we have seen from The Pat McAfee Show across ESPN. We will handle this matter internally and have no further comment.”
McAfee made a few statements a few days later to clarify that his relationship with ESPN is "strong" and ensuring that his message was only about "one particular person at ESPN."
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McAfee speaks out on "All The Smoke."
It's been nearly two months since McAfee's call out of Williamson — and the Super Bowl has come and gone without much between the two sides. But on Feb. 28, a clip from "All The Smoke," the podcast of former NBA veterans and ESPN personalities Matt Barnes and Stephen Jackson, showed that McAfee had more to say.
McAfee first clarified that he answers to a few people on ESPN, particularly the head honchos.
"I'm the executive producer of my show. I report directly to Jimmy [Pitaro] and Bob [Iger]," McAfee told "All The Smoke." "Those are people that could technically be described as my boss."
While McAfee didn't name Williamson, but he said that before ESPN had even signed him, it seemed like Williamson was already against him.
"That guy was not a fan of me or our operation for a long time," McAfee said. "So then, whenever ESPN signs us, and he runs SportsCenter, and our show is now in place of SportsCenter at noon ... there became a war almost from the behind scenes from like SportsCenter people and people that have been at ESPN a long time about us coming in and taking in their jobs and all this other s---, and I didn't see it like that. We were pumped we made it to the big leagues."
McAfee then claimed that it was when he got to ESPN that he saw that there were people from the inside trying to bring him down.
"Immediately it's like, 'This guy sucks. This guy's ruining ESPN.' It's not coming from people outside — it was coming from people within ESPN," McAfee said. "And I did not expect that at all ... So I'm like, okay, 'We're at war.' And then once you start learning about how she is going behind the scenes, things that are being said to people, things that are being leaked, the timing in which they're being leaked. It's like oh, they're trying to kill me like they're trying to make our show impossible to advertise with.
Without saying Williamson's name, McAfee also said that he believes people who worked at the network were in "fear" of the ESPN executive, and that his lack of fear caused many to thank him.
"No less than like 40 people that have worked at ESPN or used to work at ESPN and they're like, 'Thank you for saying what you said,'" McAfee said.
McAfee's candidness came in an interesting interview as Barnes and Jackson have also others — like former ESPN host Rachel Nichols — to air their grievances about their network. The two have also since teamed up with Dan Le Batard, another former ESPN personality who has been a stark critic of the network's practices.
The full episode of "All The Smoke" is set to be released on Feb. 29.
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