College football fans have held out hope for an NFL-like RedZone since it was announced ESPN would acquire the NFL Network and the RedZone Channel on Aug. 5.
NFL RedZone brings football fans seven hours of uninterrupted coverage of redzone attempts and scores across the NFL every Sunday during the NFL regular season. NFL RedZone has been a wild success for the NFL Network, with Scott Hanson bringing in viewers each week.
Hanson suggested he would be open to hosting a College RedZone.
‘As for College Football RedZone, which is the big one people are talking about, if Bob Iger (Disney CEO), Jimmy Pitaro (ESPN chairman), Burke Magnus (ESPN president of content) want to him me up, I love college,’ Hanson said on the ‘Rich Eisen Show’ on Monday, Aug. 11. ‘I love college every bit much as I love pros.’
While college football fans may drool over what a full day of college football ― usually starting at noon Eastern and ending after midnight on Saturdays ― would look like, Hanson went on to throw water on his idea due to various logistics.
‘There’s a lot of dynamics,’ Hanson said. ‘If you were to do college football redzone, first of all, ESPN doesn’t have rights to every contract. Second of all, the kickoffs are not all synchronized. Yeah, you get a good batch kicking off at noon Eastern, but they are not all synchronized; they come at different times. The games go throughout the day.
‘But here’s the other thing, if your favorite team is the New York Giants, fine, you know the New York Giants. You can probably still name the other 31 starting quarterbacks in the NFL. If your favorite team is the Alabama Crimson Tide, you know the Alabama Crimson Tide, but you cannot name me 30 other quarterbacks in college football.
‘You might be able to name the rest of the SEC, maybe, or some of the bigger opponents. So, college is not as accessible to the frontal lobe of the American sports fans as it is in the NFL.’