What the SEC Network is trying to do is akin to attempting to launch a food truck that sells specialty burgers in the parking lot of a McDonald’s that’s run by your father.
This is where SEC Nation finds itself, a seemingly impossible task of running up against the unquestioned monopoly of Saturday morning college football viewership.
Last season, FOX tried its hand at the morning pregame market to disastrous results. A weekly audience that averaged 73,000 people was a mere drop in the bucket to ESPN College Gameday’s 1.83 million. It’s one of the reasons FOX is out of the Saturday morning market after only one season. But SEC Nation has three things FOX didn’t have.
The first is the unquestioned support and backing of ESPN, the SEC Network’s parent company. Imagine if that food truck you set up was cooking with McDonalds’ fries and was managed by someone who ran some of the Golden Arches’ most successful restaurants.
Stephanie Druley is that person, the SEC Network’s Vice President of production who runs the ship on SEC Nation and comes from Sunday/Monday Night Countdown which she was a part of for 16 years.
They travel from city to city like Gameday does, and in the process drum up interest on campus that translates to viewers the may tune in for few minutes.
If the product is good people will buy into it, but SEC Nation’s largest task is just getting you to notice them on your way into the drive thru. When you associate SEC Nation with College Gameday, you strike a chord with viewers. Students can and did camp out for SEC Nation, something they couldn’t for FOX’s pregame show.
SEC Nation is on your campus, so the hope is that you’re going to tune in for just a little bit and that’s when SEC Nation hopes to sink its hooks into your eyeballs and reel you in with its second advantage.
Plain and simple, the show’s got talent and that talent has chemistry in droves.
Former defensive lineman Marcus Spears landed there with a tweet to Druley, asking for a simple follow.
From there, Spears direct messaged her in order to get an audition, which he nailed on his way to being the most polished analyst on SEC Nation’s set. He also has this odd-couple relationship with fellow-analyst Paul Finebaum that is downright hilarious to watch play out on set. A 315-pound former NFL defensive end and a gangly balding 59-year old man is high comedy. Host Joe Tessitore brings his cachet and experience to the show as well, steering it back on track when it gets off the rails like his counterpart in the timeslot Chris Fowler. Tessitore is seasoned and he has a recognizable voice.
Of course, they pale in comparison to Tim Tebow, the one analyst the average fan could name off the top of his head with ease before they read this story. He needs extra security wherever he goes, just your run of the mill polarizing sports rock star.
Both Tebow and Spears digest tape to prepare for Saturday mornings with the zeal they once did for Sunday afternoons. They don’t attack opponents anymore, but inform a populace. They do this with the pressure of Gameday as merely an idea, but not a concrete fact backed up by hard numbers.
Yes, as I’ve already stated, College Gameday dominates Saturday mornings with close to 2 million eyes, we’ll never know by how much SEC Nation lags behind as it goes through its first season because SEC Network isn’t being rated.
Initially, the decision was to not rate the network for an entire year, but for now it’s an indefinite abdication of the metric by which television shows are judged. So while the SEC Network’s new food truck must compete with McDonald’s, they don’t have the external pressure of knowing exactly how far they lag behind the giant, something FOX dealt with in its pregame show launch as well.
You’d taste the burger, you’d watch the show and you’d know that both are different from the monopoly that has a chokehold on the market each is trying to enter. I took an in-person bite of SEC Nation Saturday morning and liked what I ordered, but the problem is I like McDonald’s too. That’s where SEC Nation exists.
Delivering a similar product that’s very good, but to a consumer base that may not be inclined to switch their taste buds consistently.
Follow Richard Johnson on Twitter @RagjUF
SEC Network's Joe Tessitore (left), Tim Tebow (center) and Marcus Spears (right) on the SEC Nation set located on UF's Plaza of the Americas on Friday.
