It’s clear that ESPN is committed full-stop to helping Jason Kelce’s post-football media career become a success.
The problem is the network may be alienating some of its fan base in the process.
Kelce, a seven-time Pro Bowler and retired Philadelphia Eagles center, was a popular player until his retirement this season, and after signing a multi-year, multimillion-dollar contract with ESPN, he was thrust into appearances on “Monday Night Countdown” and he made guest appearances on “College GameDay” as well as filmed multiple commercials that air on ESPN throughout the day.
In fact, it’s rare for a sports fan to turn on ESPN and not see Kelce’s face at some point. ESPN even went as far as to give the 37-year-old his own late-night talk show called “They Call It Late Night With Jason Kelce,” which airs at 1 a.m. ET on Saturday morning.
Though ESPN had high hopes for the program, the ratings for its debut episode seem to indicate the network may be oversaturating the market with its Kelce content. The show drew just 290,000 viewers, well below the 436,000-viewer average for the typical ESPN broadcast.
Initial reviews of Kelce’s first show indicate it failed to deliver on comedy and sports insight, and fans took to social media to let ESPN know exactly why the show is off to a whimpering start.
ESPN NFL analyst Jason Kelce.
Jay Biggerstaff-Imagn Images
“Bc they’re force feeding him to the sports world. It’s like as soon as he retired they put him in every commercial and ad and then threw him on primetime NFL tv. And I’m trying to figure out when anybody cared about Jason Kelce LIKE THAT? It’s forced,” quipped one fan.
“We all have the Jason Kelce fatigue,” a second chimed in.
“He’s been shoved down our throats on ESPN and every other commercial. Only so much people can take before they get tired of it. Jason is WAY better than Bert Kreischer but use him as an example. He was everywhere two years ago, now look at what people think about him,” argued another fan.
“Why are they (ESPN) so desperately trying to promote this guy?” one user asked.
“Sick of both Kelces,” remarked another user.
“Everyone is done with attention seeking Kelce family,” one fan stated.
While ESPN will likely continue to promote Kelce’s show and use him as a guest on some of its others, the network at least now knows there is such a thing as too much Jason Kelce.
