The ESPN playbook
Siddharth When I was younger, I couldn’t wait to go home and turn on ESPN. It was a daily ritual, one show after another.
ESPN’s main guy, Stephen A. Smith, has been doing literally the same exact show on First Take for 14 years.
If you think about it, every single person at ESPN is running the same few formats, over and over, and that playbook has permeated throughout the rest of the content world.
Timers → Beat-the-clock videos PTI puts a countdown clock on screen for every topic. When time runs out, they move on. Your brain pays more attention to something that’s about to end.
Scoring → Tier lists Around the Horn scores panelists live. The host can mute you mid-sentence. Once there’s a score, you stop listening to opinions and start tracking who’s winning.
Predictions → Picks and parlays Every Saturday, Lee Corso picks a winner on College GameDay by putting on a mascot head. You have to watch the game to see if he was right.
Debate → Hot takes First Take puts two people on opposite sides of every topic. Once you pick a side, you keep watching to see your person win.
Personality → Creator-led shows Pat McAfee covers the same topics as every other sports show. People tune in for him and his crew, not his takes.
These worked in 2001 and they still work in 2026.
