On Thursday morning, Andrew Marchand of The Athletic reported that ESPN NFL Insider Adam Schefter was banned from making appearances on The Pat McAfee Show stemming from an incident during an ESPN2 broadcast free agency special on March 12. However, McAfee refuted the report on his program Thursday afternoon, calling the report “bulls**t” and labeling Marchand as a “rat,” as Schefter made an appearance during the program as a guest.
Later that day, in closing his program, McAfee took aim—without naming names—at ESPN management, following a compliment directed at ESPN President of Content Burke Magnus for his statement to Marchand in The Athletic.
“There’s somebody in ESPN, and we know who it is. He knows we know who it is. He knows, you know, we all know. Everybody knows who it is. Listen up, you little rat. This is the future, I think, of what people who are much more important to the company than you are, are thinking,” said McAfee. “We are just trying to be an additive to sports media. If you just continue to s**t stories out of context, so many missing parts of things, just to try to make us look bad. Three years into this, like come on.”
Meanwhile, Magnus stated on Thursday that The Pat McAfee Show is thriving at ESPN and that the company is very pleased with the partnership signed back in 2023. Furthermore, the ESPN executive said in his statement that the recent report of Schefter’s ban from the program was just the latest example of those “seemingly obsessed with wanting to see Pat fail on ESPN.”
ESPN signed an agreement with McAfee in 2023 for a multi-year deal reportedly worth $85 million. This brought the budding sports media personality’s program to the network. Importantly, it should be noted that as part of the agreement with McAfee, ESPN does not have any creative control over the program’s content. As a result, this has allowed several names from other networks to have a presence on the McAfee program—for example, NFL Network insider Ian Rapoport.
McAfee discussed how he feels every day when he wakes up, saying he sees a new thing about himself “being a piece of s**t.” He then specified that there are still members within the network whom he feels are working against the product the show puts out.
“There’s this level right below, probably a couple, maybe a little bit low, that they all think they’re somebody. Y’all motherf*****s are dinosaurs, bro. You are about to get run the f**k into extinction,” said McAfee. “You know it, and it’s only a matter of time for everybody else does. With that being said, let’s f****ng enjoy this life.”
Notably, this is not the first time McAfee has mentioned having issues with some ESPN management. The program famously called out former ESPN Head of Event and Studio Production Norby Williamson for attempting to “sabotage the show” back in January of 2024. Williamson left ESPN in April 2024 and has since landed at Main Street Sports Group to oversee production for FanDuel Sports Network.
At this point, it remains unclear who exactly McAfee was targeting at ESPN in his closing remarks following Thursday’s program.
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