Say bye-bye to ABC, Michigan football fans

This might’ve gotten swept up under the rug a little bit, maybe with everything else going on in college football, fall camp, recruiting, etc., but a major change has occurred in terms of channeling going into the future for Michigan and just Big Ten fans alike.

For over 40 years, ESPN has held the exclusive rights to broadcast Big Ten games, basketball, and football. Well, according to multiple sources, that will no longer be the case after this upcoming season concludes.

ESPN just rejected a massive offer by the Big Ten to keep scheduling their games. Here’s the tweet from John Ourand:

Moving forward, the Big Ten will be broadcast by NBC, Fox, and CBS. So, fans will need to get used to new commentary from new commentators, which will take at least a little adjustment period.

According to Andrew Marchand of the New York Post, Fox would get the noon kickoff, followed by CBS at the 2:30 or 3:30 time slot (formerly 3:30 if it was on ABC), with NBC pulling up the rear in the prime time/evening time slot.

The Big Ten’s late afternoon game on CBS will replace the SEC one, and the SEC is moving to ESPN starting in 2024 as well. Basically, the Big Ten and SEC are flip-flopping networks, as ESPN (ABC) gets the SEC, and Big Ten gets CBS.

What does this have to do with Michigan football?

So, Michigan football fans, unfortunately, have to say goodbye to Sean McDonough and Dan Orlovsky. In turn, Michigan fans will need to get accustomed to Brad Nessler and Gary Danielson calling their games on CBS. That also comes with new sideline reporters as well. Say goodbye to your favorites.

NBC will probably have some combination of Mike Tirico along with somebody like Doug Flutie for select Michigan football games.

Obviously, NBC is mainly known for being the sole channel for Notre Dame games, so it will be really interesting to see whether Notre Dame might now want to join the Big Ten.

To be honest, it was trending more towards this move for the longest time. For me personally, yes, it was a little shocking that the move finally happened, but I knew it was coming eventually. ESPN has partnerships with various SEC flagship channels anyways (mainly talking about The Paul Finebaum Show). The partnership was pretty obvious if you look deeper into it.

Also, we can’t forget college football expansion. I’m sure that had to be the biggest culprit in negotiations with ESPN for the Big Ten. All of these networks knew they had to get a new tv partnership going in time for when all of these new teams come into the Big Ten and SEC, respectively.

For the Big Ten side of things, CBS has wanted to get their hands on Big Ten games forever. Every year, CBS does strong for viewership with their biggest rivalry games like Alabama-Texas A&M, Florida-Tennessee, Alabama-Georgia, Arkansas-Ole Miss, etc, but every year, they are out viewed by the Big Ten (mostly due to the Michigan-OSU rivalry game on Fox) so for them to finally get a piece of the “pie” is a big win for them.

I’ve only discussed football on here so far, but as I mentioned above, this also affects basketball too. No longer will Michigan be playing on ESPN for their games, instead on CBS and Fox (which they already pretty much were doing before but it’s officially official now).

You may be asking what happens with Big Ten Network and them showing games. Well, BTN is owned by Fox, so those games will continue on like normal.

I believe the only way the Big Ten can be shown again on ESPN for football is during the CFP, if Michigan or some other Big Ten team were to make it there again, then ESPN would show their game. That is the only way though, moving forward.

So, depending on who you ask, this will be a tough pill to swallow for some fans, but good riddance for others. I happen to fall in the indifferent category. I’m just really happy the Big Ten is keeping Fox around because I like Gus Johnson and Joel Klatt the most.

We’ll all miss those noon ESPN kickoffs though, that’s for sure. College GameDay can still come and travel to and from Ann Arbor, and every other Big Ten team’s campus, but the actual game broadcast will not be the Big Ten games, which stays the same as it was.

Unfortunately, this also means no Kirk Herbstreit or Chris Fowler (unless CFP game), so say goodbye to their commentary as well.

Get used to some wacky or unusual new time slots for football and basketball games moving forward. CBS and NBC are known for that kind of stuff. Also, get used to the new stations with different graphics and visuals and all of that. Doesn’t mean a lot to some, but it does to others.

Michigan football fans, and Big Ten fans in general, what do you guys think of this new TV partnership? Sound off in the comments below!