Pat McAfee’s role at ESPN has been expanding, and there’s no denying that. Apart from The Pat McAfee Show, College GameDay, and his alternative broadcasts, the network had already added him to Monday Night Countdown for the 2026 season. And now, as ESPN is all set to broadcast its first Super Bowl next year, it is also bringing McAfee’s field passes for the Super Bowl and select Monday Night Football games.

“There was a little bit of a pipe dream that maybe, if we have a little bit of success with this field pass with college, maybe with the relationship that ESPN has with the NFL, we could do some field passes for NFL games, Monday Night Football games,” said McAfee on his show. “One thing led to another; I got a chance to chat with the commissioner a couple of different times, got a chance to explain what we would try to do, how we would try to do it.

“There were some articles written about it potentially happening, and we have breaking news. We will officially be doing a field pass for the Super Bowl this year. Outrageous. So thankful to everybody that helped make this happen. At the league office, there had a lot of conversations and a lot of thoughts and a lot of explaining for what the hell is happening. We’re gonna let guys stand on the sideline to the boys. I think you’ve done such an incredible job at all this.”

Pat McAfee joined College GameDay as a full-time analyst in September 2022 and expanded his alternative broadcast work through ESPN. Subsequently, Field Pass developed into a recurring part of ESPN’s college football MegaCast, using McAfee’s sideline presence and a conversational crew to provide an alternative to the main telecast.

ESPN subsequently expanded the format across multiple College Football Playoff games, with McAfee, AJ Hawk, Ty Schmidt, Darius Butler, among others. While McAfee handles the play-by-play, Hawk and Butler take care of breaking down the action from the sidelines.

Now, ESPN will bring the Field Pass with The Pat McAfee Show to Super Bowl LXI. At the same time, it will also feature select Monday Night Football games during the season, starting with the Washington Commanders vs. the San Francisco 49ers on October 19.

McAfee revealed that while Hawk will remain with College football, he’s bringing former NFL quarterback Dan Orlovsky for the NFL’s Field Pass broadcasts.

“AJ (Hawk) will still be with us for the college one. Dan Orlovsky, NFL quarterback, we’re picking up for the NFL field passes,” McAfee added. “Select Monday Night Football games will also be happening. Washington Commanders at San Francisco 49ers is our first one. There will be others, and then obviously culminates at the Super Bowl.

“I’ll head over to the toxic table at Boston Corner and at Ty Schmidt. Con Man, pretty absurd that we’re gonna get to do this. We had a rehearsal run-up in Chicago just to see if the NFL liked what we were able to do. I had a blast, and it’s an honor that we were even considered for this Con Man.”

The development around Pat McAfee’s involvement in ESPN’s first Super Bowl broadcast gained traction after his Field Pass had already demonstrated an audience for alternative broadcasts. The Alabama-Indiana Rose Bowl edition of Field Pass averaged 2.4 million viewers, according to Awful Announcing.

Meanwhile, ESPN has continued investing in the format through its College Football Playoff MegaCast. For the 2026 national championship, the Field Pass broadcast averaged 1.2 million viewers, making it the fourth-most-watched college football alternative broadcast on record at the time, according to ESPN.

That said, with McAfee now bringing Field Pass to the NFL, the move could open the door for ESPN to experiment further with alternative game presentations, considering the network will broadcast the Super Bowl later in 2031.