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SEC Sports
ESPN's front-facing talent during college football broadcasts this season will look a good bit different the network announced on Monday, revealing its team of analysts and their respective roles this fall.
Several of these hires, promotions and resignings have been reported this summer, but the Worldwide Leader didn't make them official until this week. SportsCenter's Matt Barrie, a longtime morning anchor, will be in the lead chair for ESPN's Saturday college football game breaks and updates this season, sharing his valuable expertise on the sport and warm quirkiness with viewers.
Barrie replaces Adnan Virk, who was fired in February after reportedly leaking confidential company information and failing to fully cooperate with an investigation into possible sensitive information leaks to the media. Virk was most popular with college football fans and routinely anchored the national desk on Saturday afternoons during game-breaks.
He has more than 100,000 followers on Twitter and is active on social media.
From ESPN's press room:
Matt Barrie and Kevin Connors will assume new roles during college football’s 150th anniversary season, as Barrie will anchor ESPN’s studio coverage and Connors will undertake the same role on ESPN2. Further solidifying both studio teams, ESPN has re-signed analysts Jesse Palmer and Jim Mora to new contracts, with Palmer teaming up with fellow analyst Joey Galloway on ESPN and Mora reuniting with Emmanuel Acho on ESPN2.
For Barrie, Galloway and Palmer, in addition to their traditional Saturday studio wraps, the new team will also work on the network’s Thursday and Friday football coverage throughout the season. On Saturdays, the trio will cap their days with College Football Final, as the one-hour show highlights the day that was in college football at the conclusion of the night’s games.
In addition to Barrie and expanded roles for Galloway, Acho and Palmer, the network also added former NFL quarterbacks Mark Sanchez and Ryan Leaf to their arsenal as well as former NFL punter Pat McAfee for behind-the-mic roles.
Sanchez, a former BCS national champion at USC and longtime NFL vet landed with ABC-ESPN as one of the conglomerate’s lead college football studio analysts, where he will join Kevin Negandhi and Jon Vilma. He replaces Mack Brown, who left his broadcasting job to coach at North Carolina.
ESPN is pairing Leaf with play-by-play man Clay Matvick to call games on ESPN2 and ESPNU. Leaf, who called games for the Pac-12 Network and SiriusXM last season, is a former Heisman Trophy finalist who went No. 2 in the NFL Draft before his career was derailed by drug addiction.
McAfee will help anchor ESPN's "Thursday Night Football" coverage this fall alongside former Colts teammate Matt Hasselbeck, Adam Amin and Molly McGrath. Since retiring as a player after the 2016 season, McAfee has worked as a radio host, analyst for Barstool Sports and made appearances as a commentator for WWE.
His television broadcast debut came in 2018 when he worked a Baylor-Texas Tech matchup and later, an NFL game as a color analyst for Fox Sports.