The schedule’s set-up for both teams to be undefeated AND week five doesn’t appear to have much better games outside of Bama/Ole Miss!
People get a clue the Ohio St game will be on Fox at 11:00am..
Fox wouldn’t let this game sleep away for their time slot..
Does the early fox kick get first choice of big ten games now? What idiot from the big 10 agreed to that?
And that matters why?
Fox has first tier rights and gets first choice of games each week
So, what does that have to do with ESPN Gameday making it to Lincoln?
Game day is rarely at a game that starts at noon est. that might be more of a product of previous television contracts placing the best games at night, but I think it also creates logistical issues..namely they want fans in the backdrop of the set at the end and not already being in their seats. Additionally, espn tends to favor promoting their abc night game with game day as opposed to hyping a game that will be on a different network. I think it’s a reasonable conclusion that it will be difficult for big ten teams to get game day to come to their campus moving forward with noon kicks for the best game of the week. AD’s across the big ten should be furious with this and should be working to get it changed. Night games in prime time are great for everyone involved....except fox apparently. Because they don’t think a conference with 5 blue bloods can compete in the television market head to head with Clemson at Syracuse. The loser here is the big ten.
I provided a list from 2018 season that showed that 1/2 of the regular season games were played on a network other than ESPN/ESPN2/ESPNU/ESPNNews or ABC.
As you mentioned, the 12 noon Eastern time is new, but it is the marquee matchup for Fox. So this is uncharted waters, and there is no precedent one way or the other on whether or not Game Day will make it.
As far as the fans go, there will be plenty of fans from 9am to 11am and if GameDay is here, there will be plenty of fans that don't have tickets to the game that can serve as a backdrop. You think that the fans serving as the backdrop during the 9-12 GameDay slot of a 8pm game in Tuscaloosa or Eugene all have tickets to the game? Come on.
Fox also has a contract with the PAC12, so putting them on at 9am local probably wouldn't fly. Regardless, Fox wanted their own slot, all the others were taken, so they went with the noon game.
I imagine the idea behind a big game at 12/11 is because they are a forgotten network for football. By getting people to turn in early, they’ve got a better chance of keeping viewers around. Not a bad idea from a network perspective.
Fox has first tier rights and gets first choice of games each week
Not each week.