Ted Cruz’s ‘College Gameday’ Cameo Puts ESPN on the Hot Seat

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TOP STORY

ESPN’S COLLEGE GAMEDAY — STARRING… TED CRUZ?

Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) showed up at the University of Texas Saturday morning and delivered a nearly ten-minute push in support of the Protect College Sports Act via ESPN and its highly-rated college football pregame show College Gameday. It doesn’t seem like many of our authors would have put the words “Ted Cruz” and “college sports” in the same sentence before that appearance, and that’s something that’s true across the political spectrum.

Cruz did not get a friendly reception from the students in the crowd. But more pertinent to the authors in today’s stack is the question of whether ESPN should have put him on at all — especially without someone from the other side given equal time to provide a counterperspective.

THREE TAKES

The Poynter Report, Tom Jones — ESPN has “several years trying to navigate the delicate balance between discussing sports, politics and social issues,” Jones wrote. That’s something that has resulted in criticism “from both inside and outside the company.” And then, this weekend “one of the network’s most popular shows waded into a political fight over the future of college sports,” he continued. “The result was severe backlash.” The problem isn’t that Cruz came onto ESPN to talk politics, it’s that “critics said the conversation was far from fair and balanced. In fact, it sounded more like advocacy than an informative conversation.” The issue also wasn’t that “ESPN welcomed a divisive political figure,” he wrote, “It was that the show gave airtime to only one side of the college sports argument.” Now, it seems like “the network is pushing for the bill.” ESPN was “irresponsible” in airing Cruz, because the network “has the responsibility to seek out its opponents, especially because finding them wouldn’t be difficult.

Awful Announcing’s The A Block, Brandon Kleen — The segment featuring Cruz “wasn’t for you,” Kleen wrote today. Instead, it was for Nick Saban, “ who helped craft the Protect College Sports Act and has openly pushed for its passage.” It was also for execs at Disney, “who have reportedly lobbied for the bill as well,” and it was for “elected officials looking for a win this fall ahead of the midterms, and for Donald Trump, who could get his ego stroked by being given an appearance on GameDay to sign the PCSA into law.” In fact, the “you suck” chants directed at Cruz are proof positive his appearance had little to do with football fans and everything to do with politics, Kleen added. He also wrote, “To air such a conversation on an important show like GameDay, which still matters a lot to the people on the host campus and millions of loyal viewers, is a major F-U to all of them.”

OutKick, Zach Dean — Outkick could not sugarcoat the reaction to Cruz — who was booed so loudly, according to Dean, that “you could barely hear a word he said.” But the Outkick writer did question the crowd’s motives. “I have no idea why they were booing Ted Cruz. The truth is, they don’t, either,” he continued. “Do you think a bunch of hungover college kids who haven’t slept since Thursday give a you-know-what about the ‘Protect College Sports Act’?” Dean is also unsurprised that “students don’t want politics on a sports show,” but congratulated ESPN on inviting Cruz on in the first place. Dean believes it was a justified act of penance for a network that has — in the eyes of many conservatives — has long skewed left. “Credit to ESPN for having a Republican on its airwaves, though,” Dean wrote. “That’s a big step!”

TAKEAWAY: It’s hard to view this 10-minute interview through a narrow prism — given all the dynamics at play between ESPN’s parent company Disney and the Trump administration. Amid the FCC’s ongoing battle with Disney, it can’t be ignored that Cruz appeared on two of its highest-profile shows — College Gameday and The View — while a James Talarico interview with Jimmy Kimmel was exiled to YouTube. Cruz’s cameo seemed to do little in advancing the legislation he was there to push, but the platform was the point. Conservative critics of ESPN have had a legitimate gripe when they’ve accused the network of getting too political. But if they really want ESPN to “stick to sports,” then it has to work both ways.

📰 TOP SCOOPS & ANALYSIS 📰

SCOOP 🍨 The Free Press, Lucy Biggers —Rising gas prices are thrusting an issue many of us might prefer to ignore to the surface: will the US have the ability to continue to power its future? Biggers spoke to Secretary of Energy Chris Wright about exactly this. For about a decade Americans have conceptualized the conversation as being about two things: “how to lower carbon emissions and wean the country off fossil fuels.” But now, “Reliability, affordability, and abundance are back in the conversation,” and as a result, “Americans have started asking a more basic question: Will the power be there when I need it?” Wright is taking an “all of the above approach” to solving the looming energy crisis, which means he’s been “embracing every source of power.”

SCOOP 🍨 POLITICO Playbook, Will Steakin, Adam Wren, Dasha Burns — Democrats are “as behind on AI as everyone else in Washington,” Playbook wrote today. “They’re working to fix that ahead of 2028.” Some members of the party recently “gathered behind closed doors in Washington to craft a strategy for responding to the technology they sensed will become a defining issue of the 2028 presidential race” at the National Union Building. Rob Flaherty, who worked as Kamala Harris’ 2024 deputy campaign manager, pointed to last week’s “catastrophic AI scenarios” as the biggest reason for the meeting. “This is why we held that meeting,” he said. “This issue is evolving by the minute, and the solutions are going to evolve by the minute.”

ANALYSIS 👀 TheWrap, A.J. Katz — The first Bari Weiss-helmed episode of 60 Minutes aired last night, and it turns out the venerated program simply “changed its look, not its format,” Katz wrote. He added, “The Season 59 premiere was more evolution than revolution.” The episode offered “Lesley Stahl’s investigation of the presidential-clemency business,” which was “classic 60 Minutes,” and the show “mostly passed” its most important test. “The real test was whether it retained the formula that has sustained it for nearly six decades: consequential subjects, deep reporting and correspondents willing to challenge powerful people.”

ANALYSIS 👀 The Washington Sun, Thomas Burr, Evan McMorris-Santoro, Jasmine Wright, Manuela Silva, and Jenna Monnin — Sen. Marsha Blackburn (R-TN) has raised $9 million this campaign cycle, but there’s a little bit of a problem. Blackburn isn’t running for reelection; she’s running for governor. And though federal contributions “can’t be directly used for state-based campaigns,” it still  seems “some of that money is still wending its way toward her gubernatorial campaign.” The Blackburn Tennessee Victory Fund is “helping seed a network of conservative Club for Growth super PACs with millions of dollars. And one of the network’s PACs is now spending millions of dollars to boost Blackburn’s gubernatorial campaign.”

ANALYSIS 👀 CJR’sThe Media Today, Jem Bartholomew —  “There’s trouble in MAGA-media land,” Bartholomew began today. That’s been made crystal clear by the abrupt departure of Maria Bartiromo from Fox News. Media Matters’ Matthew Gertz told Bartholomew that the Bartiromo situation “speaks to the intriguing—and delicate—relationship between the Trump White House and Fox News” and that the network is considered  a “second cabinet of advisers to the president.” President Donald Trump also has “an expectation that everyone at Fox will be maximally supportive of his administration at all times.”

📈BUSINESS OF MEDIA 🎥

Semafor Media, Max Tani — Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent’s relationship with the financial press has grown pretty strained following a confrontation with Bloomberg News. Bessent threatened Bloomberg chief editor John Micklethwait with reduced access after reporters began looking into his principal residence filings. After Bloomberg published the article anyway, Bessent actually followed through, halting appearances on the network and denying credentials to Bloomberg and Wall Street Journal reporters at a G20 meeting. QUOTE 📣 “And in private, Bessent has complained personally to reporters and editors about coverage, and iced out journalists he and his team feel have been unfair.”

The Ankler’s ICYMI, Matthew Frank — This is going to be a wild string of words if you’re not familiar, but bear with us: Paramount Pictures is currently holding back an undated, $100 million musical comedy about slavery reparations from Trey Parker, Matt Stone, and Kendrick Lamar. Insiders point to outsize budget costs, creative delays, and friction over original music as Paramount navigates corporate leadership shifts under David Ellison and its ongoing pursuit of Warner Bros. Discovery. QUOTE 📣  “The comedy revolves around a historical slave plantation museum in the Midwest and a young Black re-enactor who lashes out at tourists and clashes with the town’s hypocritical, racist mayor, played by Parker. People familiar with the film say it also contains original, unreleased music by Lamar.”

Page Six Hollywood, Tatiana Siegel — Director Peter Farrelly’s Sylvester Stallone biopic I Play Rocky overcame unanimous studio rejections—including initial passes from IP-holder Amazon MGM Studios—before head of film Courtenay Valenti helped trim the budget to $30 million and partnered with FilmNation to sell foreign rights. The film received a standing ovation at its Toronto International Film Festival premiere and drew emotional praise from Stallone himself. The movie has had its own Rocky-like journey to triumph—and it’s all getting quite meta. QUOTE 📣 “Courtenay had to really believe in it to fight like that.”

Barrett Media, Dr. Ed Cohen — The NFL has raised formal complaints with Nielsen over the accuracy of audience measurement estimates for live game broadcasts. Media ratings vet Cohen notes that rights holders routinely challenge lower-than-expected estimates, while Nielsen CEO Karthik Rao defended the company’s “Big Data + Panel” methodology as part of ongoing industry refinements. QUOTE 📣  “I have yet to hear anyone in the media business argue publicly that their ratings were too high. Or that Nielsen overshot and the reality is lower. Occasionally, someone at the station level may privately admit that. But complaints about low numbers are as consistent as New York Jets losses.”

OTHER COOL STUFF

Page Six Hollywood — Look out for New York Knicks star Jalen Brunson joining tonight’s Primetime Emmys opening segment to assist his number-one fan and friend, Law & Order: SVU icon Mariska Hargitay.

The Ankler’s The Wakeup — Snoop Dogg has officially been named host for the MTV Video Music Awards on September 27 in Los Angeles.

👀 WHAT GOT MISSED? 👀

Awful Announcing’s The A Block, Brandon Kleen — After a nearly two-month absence, Indiana Fever guard Sophie Cunningham has returned to the podcast world. This time around, she’s launched “No Hesitation” with skills trainer Drew Hanlen. “To announce the changes, Cunningham joined The Volume owner Colin Cowherd on his show and faced a line of questioning around her status as the WNBA’s ‘sex symbol,’” Kleen noted. In a season where Cunningham has been one of the WNBA’s biggest media stars, her new media venture has gotten surprisingly little fanfare.

🏆 NEWSLETTER OF THE DAY 🏆

Semafor Media, Max Tani — In last night’s standout edition, Tani delivered an exclusive look into Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent’s escalating feud with the financial press corps, which is a beefy and solid read for anyone looking to choose just one of today’s newsletters to focus on. Readers also get a fascinating dispatch on the politicization of AI from Ben Smith and media news from around the world. The edition is stacked and, therefore, Newsletter of the Day.

This newsletter was produced by Lindsey Ellefson.