Lee Corso will miss “College Gameday” for a third time in five weeks. Plus: the College Football Playoff is weighing how to schedule its expanded postseason around the NFL; ESPN’s F1 renewal is now official; and more, including LeBron James on Thursday Night Football.
Corso to miss Gameday for third time in five weeks
ESPN “College Gameday” analyst Lee Corso will miss Saturday’s show from Jackson State due to an ongoing health issue, marking the third time in the past five weeks he has been forced to miss the show. In a statement Friday, ESPN said Corso is in “good spirits” and said he hopes to return to the show “soon.” Corso initially fell ill prior to Gameday at Clemson at the start of this month. (ESPN PR 10.28)
CFP weighing NFL conflicts as it plots playoff expansion
College Football Playoff executives are weighing how to schedule the soon-to-be-expanded postseason around NFL games, per recent reports in The Athletic and Sports Illustrated. Under the tentative schedule for the 12-team playoff, first round games would potentially run up against the NFL in mid-December and the semifinals would occur the week of NFL Wild Card weekend. According to those reports — and one by the Associated Press last month — playoff games could end up on non-holiday weeknights to avoid head-to-head competition, a circumstance that was not unusual in the old BCS era.
As noted in both pieces, the NFL’s footprint continues to expand beyond its usual Sunday, Monday and Thursday nights. The league last week officially announced that it will schedule a game for Black Friday next season, with the Amazon Prime telecast airing at 3 PM ET — the heart of what has traditionally been a day of nationally televised college football games. (The Athletic 10.26, SI 10.20, Amazon PR)
ESPN officially announces F1 extension
ESPN officially announced last weekend that it has renewed its Formula 1 rights deal through 2025, a move that was first reported earlier this year by Sports Business Journal. Under the extension, the flagship ESPN network and ABC will carry at least 16 races per season and all coverage will remain commercial-free. The deal also includes some F1 content — presumably including races — on ESPN+. (ESPN PR)
Plus: LeBron-TNF, World Baseball Classic, Rich Eisen
Los Angeles Lakers F LeBron James is set to host an alternate presentation of the November 17 Titans-Packers Thursday Night Football game on Amazon Prime, it was announced Thursday. The presentation will be a collaboration with James’ production company Uninterrupted and branded as an extension of his show “The Shop.” … Fox Sports announced last week that it will carry the entire World Baseball Classic next year, airing games across FOX, FS1, FS2, Fox Deportes and — in a first for live sports — the streaming service Tubi. Rights to the event were previously held by ESPN and MLB Network. … NFL Network host Rich Eisen will call the Seahawks-Buccaneers NFL International Series game from Germany next month alongside his NFL Gameday Morning colleagues Steve Mariucci, Michael Irvin and Kurt Warner. Eisen said on his radio show this week that it will be one of three games he calls this season. (Amazon PR, Fox Sports PR, Eisen/Twitter 10.21)
