Disney Theme Parks, ManningCast, KidsCast: ESPN Super Bowl Plan Starts Now

SAN FRANCISCO — Sports media insiders have joked about how long ESPN’s pregame show would last if it ever lands the Super Bowl. Try 371 days.

In what ESPN is branding as “Year of the Super Bowl,” the sports media giant and its parent company, Disney, will go all out this year to promote the network’s first Super Bowl telecast on Feb. 14, 2027.

On Wednesday, ESPN is announcing a yearlong series of programming and marketing initiatives to promote Super Bowl LXI from SoFi Stadium in Los Angeles. Here’s what we know about the road to ESPN’s first Super Bowl:  

• Simulcast: ESPN will simulcast the Big Game on the main ESPN cable network and sister broadcast network ABC. Troy Aikman and Joe Buck will be in the broadcast booth. Lisa Salters and Laura Rutledge are expected on the sidelines. Aikman and Buck previously called six Super Bowls for Fox Sports. 

• ManningCast: Omaha Productions’s popular alt-cast with Super Bowl–winning brothers Peyton and Eli Manning will offer viewers its own version of the game on ESPN2. The Mannings reached out to Pope Leo XIV, a Bears fan, to no avail this season. But he’d be a great get. As Eli Manning recently told Front Office Sports: “What guests do you get for a Super Bowl? Try figuring out that one.”

• 61 stories: ESPN will highlight 61 players from Super Bowl history as it focuses on the people and plays that have defined the Big Game. They’ll be featured in a weekly series dubbed I Scored a Touchdown. Jeremy Schaap will also host a weekly video podcast called The Biggest Game, chronicling six decades of memorable moments. Plus, Disney Parks and ABC Entertainment will offer their own Super Bowl programming and themes. Look for more announcements throughout the year. 

• The Handoff: Right after the gun sounded ending Super Bowl LX on Feb. 8, ESPN rolled into The Handoff. Stationed at Levi’s Stadium, NFL broadcast legend Chris Berman symbolically passed the baton to Monday Night Countdown host Scott Van Pelt at SoFi. The 24-hour programming block continued Feb. 9, with appearances by First Take superstar Stephen A. Smith at Disneyland and additional coverage via ABC News and Jimmy Kimmel Live!

• KidsCast: Look for the Mouse House to create an animated KidsCast in the same vein as CBS Sports and Nickelodeon’s Super Bowl LVIII Live From Bikini Bottom in 2024, which featured characters from SpongeBob SquarePants and slime cannons.

• New ads: On Monday’s Good Morning America, ESPN debuted a yearlong ad campaign called “We’re Going.” The ads reimagine Disney’s 40-year marketing effort in which the Super Bowl MVP declares, “I’m going to Disney World.” Look for cameos from 60 personalities in the ESPN/Disney universe.

That’s not all. Among other ambitious ideas being considered, say sources, are a Super Bowl Field Pass with The Pat McAfee Show, similar to the popular alt-cast during the College Football Playoff. McAfee and his cast-mates set a record for most-viewed alt-cast across any sport, by pulling in 2.4 million viewers for the CFP’s Rose Bowl quarterfinal. McAfee tweeted saying any block to doing this is “very hurdle-able.”

The animated KidsCast, meanwhile, could be driven by Disney IP such as Star Wars, Family Guy, The Simpsons, and Cars. ESPN already aired an animated Simpsons Funday Football alt-cast of Monday Night Football in 2024 and a Monsters Funday Football version in 2025. Pixar’s Cars inspired a themed area at Disneyland, with another on the drawing board for Disney World. So there could be a tie-in with theme parks. But sources caution these ideas face numerous rights approvals, so they’re not a done deal. ESPN declined comment on McAfee and Star Wars.

Since its founding in 1979, ESPN has dreamed of televising a Super Bowl. Disney’s ABC last showed the Super Bowl in 2006. But that was under the aegis of the old ABC Sports, which treated ESPN as its inferior cable cousin. So a frustrated Disney has been effectively shut out of the Super Bowl rotation for 20 years, while NBC, Fox, and CBS hoovered up hundreds of millions of viewers and ad dollars.

A year ago, ESPN named 30-year veteran Andy Tennant to the new role of vice president of Super Bowl production. His job: Wake up every day thinking how ESPN and Disney can produce a Super Bowl for the ages.

“It’s the opportunity of a lifetime for all of us. So many of us didn’t think we’d ever have the opportunity to work on an ESPN Super Bowl. So the fact that it’s coming—and objects in the rearview mirror are a lot closer than they appear—we are so excited about this opportunity,” Tennant told FOS. “It’s been amazing feeling the creative energy and enthusiasm in conference rooms and hallways. From Bristol to Burbank, it’s been infectious.”

As a former Disney executive himself, ESPN chairman Jimmy Pitaro has wisely called on the power of Disney to add muscle to ESPN in the TV marketplace. With the game taking place in Disney’s backyard, ESPN’s first Super Bowl will be as much about Disney as the four letters. To remind his troops what’s at stake, Pitaro and president of content Burke Magnus have installed a countdown clock at the Bristol campus.

“With the full strength of The Walt Disney Company and in collaboration with the NFL, ESPN has embarked on a year-long Super Bowl celebration,” Pitaro said in a statement. “This fan-focused initiative unites our company’s beloved brands with industry-leading storytelling and technology to showcase football’s greatest stories, heroes, and moments like never before. Across our platforms, screens, and parks, we’ll build momentum throughout the year toward Super Bowl LXI—a monumental event for sports fans everywhere and for ESPN.”