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Over the summer, Barstool Sports announced that in addition to becoming the new sponsor of the Arizona Bowl, the college football game will be broadcast exclusively on the Barstool website, app, and social media platforms.
The multi-year deal was seen as a big step forward for the controversial sports media company, although the reasons they eventually became the game’s broadcaster also seem to have something to do with their reputation and the lack of interest from ESPN and other broadcasters associate with them . Barstool CEO Erika Nardini said this in a Sportico article announcing the deal:
“It became clear that our title sponsorship would have an impact on where the Arizona Bowl would air,” said Nardini.
Internal coverage of the Arizona Bowl didn’t solve all of their problems, however. In August, the Pima County Board of Supervisors voted 4-1 to withdraw nearly $ 40,000 in funds from the Arizona Bowl and to request that the county’s name be removed from the game’s website. According to Tuscon.com, the board’s decision was largely based on “a series of inflammatory statements and tweets from Barstool founder Dave Portnoy”.
This was well before the last round of bad publicity for Portnoy and Barstool, which emerged from a Business Insider article that contained allegations of multiple women of sexual violence and intimidation. To whitewash his name, Portnoy used a variety of intimidation tactics to prove these allegations were unfounded.
Bowl season is just around the corner, and that means it won’t be long before we find out which two teams will be playing at the Arizona Bowl. The game currently has ties to the Mountain West Conference and Mid-American Conference and it’s not uncommon for one of the MWC’s top teams to end up here.
The Aztecs of San Diego State are in a pretty good place right now. They are 9: 1 on December 4th to play for the Mountain West title. This season, the MWC winner will automatically play in the first Jimmy Kimmel LA Bowl at SoFi Stadium, provided they don’t find their way into one of the New Years Six bowls instead.
However, if SDSU gets stuck at some point, there’s a good chance they’ll end up at the Arizona Bowl surrounded by coverage from the Barstool brand and basically working with that brand ahead of the game. And according to Krik Kenney of the San Diego Union-Tribune, this is one place the school may decide it doesn’t want to be.
“I would say that what they claim and who we are are two very different things,” said SDSU AD John David Wicker. “We will work with the conference to be in the right place.
“We’ve definitely had some employees who have expressed their very strong opinion that they don’t appreciate bar stools in any way, shape or form. The way they talk about women and things like that. I would definitely have to agree with many of their opinions. “
Kenney asked Wicker directly if the Aztecs would refuse to play in the Arizona Bowl if they were selected, and the AD declined an official response.
“I can’t comment on a hypothesis at this point, so we’ll work through it one by one,” said Wicker. “The most important thing is that we take care of our children in the field and give them the opportunity, and we will see where that leads.”
When the Business Insider article was published last week, the Arizona Bowl issued a statement saying they are “closely monitoring the situation.” In the past, Kym Adair, executive director of the Arizona Bowl, has defended Barstool, saying, “We felt like this is a company that is growing and developing, and we have felt very comfortable connecting with them. “
[SDUT]
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