• The show brought in 1.7 million total reach per show across all platforms in month of December – up 21% from September
• Viewers averaged 55.5 minutes of watch time per day
• Produced the most-watched college football alternate telecast since 2016 with Field Pass at the Rose Bowl
• The show is simulcast from noon – 2 p.m. ET on ESPN, ESPN on YouTube and ESPN+, with the final 2 – 3ish p.m. hour airing on ESPN+ and The Pat McAfee Show channel on YouTube presented by ESPN

The Pat McAfee Show, the highly successful and innovative weekday sports talk and discussion program, has gained even more popularity since the show launched on ESPN platforms in September. In December, the show garnered 886,000 average viewers per episode during the live airings across all platforms (ESPN, YouTube, TikTok) through the show’s innovative live simulcast options.

ESPN’s linear audience alone has ballooned by 20% since the first four weeks (Sept 7 to 29) now averaging 332,000 viewers per episode in the month of December, while the YouTube audience averaged 403,000 concurrently. Combined, it marks a 35% year-over-year increase from the noon to 2 p.m. time slot in 2022.

“It’s been a wild ride this season with ESPN. We’ve had the phenomenal opportunity to do what we love on a scale that we’ve never done before,” said Pat McAfee. “Day to day it certainly feels like a lot of folks are watching our program, but I genuinely try not to focus on numbers too much because you’re only as good as your last show. Everything can change at any given moment so we try and work hard and be good people. We’re insanely lucky that we have found ourselves in this position, we know that. We appreciate that. We try and do it right.

“So many cool moments happened this year because of our relationship with ESPN. Jimmy Pitaro has been incredibly hospitable and motivating. Burke Magnus has continued to be a strong ally. Senior vice president Mike Foss and Julie McKay have helped us do things we’d never been able to do as an independent operation.”

The average minute audience for the show jumped from 570,000 in the first four weeks to 735,000 across linear and YouTube in the month of December – a 29% increase, and averaged 55.5 minutes watched per show across all platforms, up from 44.5 average minutes viewed during the first four weeks.

“Pat and the boys have grown their audience every month since joining ESPN and have been an incredible addition,” said Mike Foss, senior vice president of studio and digital production, ESPN. “The first three months have been a tremendous success across every platform regardless of how you add it up.”

All segments, clips and social audience of the show reached 298 million total views during the month of December – a 23% increase since the inaugural month. The Pat McAfee Show brought in 1.7 million total reach per show during the month, an increase of 21% from the first four weeks and saw its biggest episode to date on Dec. 26 bringing in 902,000 viewers across linear and YouTube.

“We evolved some things to try and appease the linear watchers, and I think certain numbers would say that we’ve won some folks over but our show being accessible to folks that aren’t necessarily in front of televisions in the middle of the afternoon (or morning depending on where you live, obvi) is a real weapon for us,” said McAfee regarding the show’s unique and innovative live offerings. “Our YouTube audience, who we LOVE, has only grown. They’re the only reason we exist. I’m very thankful for them and I genuinely thought our overall number might drop with an addition of another platform but our daily concurrents have actually added 4% every week this entire season.”

The Pat McAfee Show’s digital audience soared in the month of December with TikTok alone totaling 107 million views. The show’s YouTube total brought in 49.3 million views with 7.6 million hours watched.

“The addition of TikTok Live has been fun this season,” said McAfee. “It’s become a wonderful community of young folks who love sports. It’s been a phenomenal effort by Casey Tok Hamel, Bill Tubes McComas, Evan Fox, Gumpy and Mitt McMahon.”

ESPN’s licensing of The Pat McAfee Show is an expansion of McAfee’s current multiplatform role as a college football analyst on ESPN’s College GameDay Built by The Home Depot and as a host of alternate presentations of ESPN college football telecasts.

McAfee’s second full season at the GameDay desk finished as the show’s second-most watched season since 2011, trailing only to 2022’s record year, and featured his team regularly joining GameDay locations for live Friday shows, drawing large, passionate audiences.The most recent Field Pass with The Pat McAfee Show delivered the largest audience for any college football alternate telecast since 2006 with 1.4 million viewers from the College Football Playoff Semifinal at the Rose Bowl Game Presented by Prudential.

“We had the incredible opportunity to do the show LIVE on Fridays in beautiful towns across the country and talk to folks that spend time with us every day from home, work, school, the hospital, war zones, the ship and wherever else folks access our show from. It was stupendous,” said McAfee on the traveling shows.

In addition to McAfee himself, The Pat McAfee Show features co-host A.J. Hawk, Connor Campbell, Ty Schmit, Tone Digs, Darius Butler, A.Q. Shipley, Coach Chuck Pagano, Evan Fox, Zito Perez, Nick Maraldo, Phil Mains, Casey “Tok” Hamel, Matt “Bruce” Brown, Michael Girdy, Bailey McComas and Mitt McMahon, among others. The show also has a robust slate of weekly recurring guests, including NFL quarterback Aaron Rodgers (Tuesdays), former NFL defensive end J.J. Watt (Wednesdays) and Alabama football head coach Nick Saban (Thursdays).

“Watching the boys get their shine and more folks realize their greatness has been a nice fulfilling bonus to this season with ESPN as well,” added McAfee. “Boston Connor, Ty Schmit, Tone Digs, and Darius Butler have brought it every single day. The back room of Foxy, Zeety, Frank, Gump, Dirdy, and Bruce have showcased world class talent while operating a show that would normally need 20 people to do the same work.

“We’re gonna continue to try and cover sports in a comedic informative way for as long as our people will have us. I/we don’t always get it right but, everyday we’re trying to unify the world thru the celebration of sport and laugh a little along the way.

“We’re excited to continue alongside the Worldwide Leader and are very grateful for the opportunity.”

The show is simulcast from noon – 2 p.m. ET on ESPN, ESPN on YouTube and ESPN+, with the final 2-3ish p.m. hour airing on ESPN+ and The Pat McAfee Show channel on YouTube presented by ESPN, and will be live from the College Football Playoff National Championship Presented by AT&T on Monday, Jan. 8, in Houston. Following the show, Field Pass with The Pat McAfee Show returns for the title game kicking off at 7:30 p.m. on ESPN2.

About Pat McAfee
A college football All-American at West Virginia and All-Pro NFL punter with the Indianapolis Colts, McAfee has established himself as one of the most entertaining figures in sports media since retiring from football. In addition to hosting The Pat McAfee Show, McAfee has worked for a variety of media companies in various roles, spanning Wrestlemania to ESPN.

McAfee was selected by the Colts in the 2009 NFL Draft following his college career at West Virginia as a kicker and punter. A four-year starter (2005-08), McAfee finished with 384 points and accumulated more than 5,500 punting yards for the Mountaineers. He was named an All-American his senior year and finished his collegiate career as the all-time scoring leader at WVU. During his nine NFL seasons, McAfee was one of the league’s best punters. He was named an All-Pro (2014), a Pro Bowler (2014, 2016) and twice nominated for the NFL Hall of Fame (2022, 2023). A native of Plum, Pa., outside Pittsburgh, McAfee retired after the 2016 NFL season.

-30-

Media Contact:
Julie McKay, ESPN Communications – [email protected], @McKay_Julie