“What creative director approved this?”: CFB fans left highly unimpressed by the SEC on ABC anthem

The SEC football games will air on ESPN and its sister network ABC in the 2024 season as a new media rights agreement kicks in. ESPN sealed a 10-year deal worth $3 billion with the conference in 2020, which ended the long-term partnership with CBS.

On Monday, ESPN unveiled the "How It’s Done" marketing campaign for the SEC on ABC, spotlighting a dynamic rendition of “Fly Away” by Quavo and Lenny Kravitz. This will serve as the intro music of the conference games on the network for the upcoming season.

Used to what CBS had offered over the years, fans were left unimpressed with the rendition in the “How It’s Done” campaign. There were a lot of expectations regarding the delivery of the conference content on ESPN, but some aspects have seemingly fallen short. Here's a look at some of the reactions online.

"The VO and song do not go together at all what creative director approved this?," one fan wondered.

"Sec on cbs so much better," one fan lamented.

"Will take a minute for me to get used to it. I still like the old school CBS crew," a fan admitted.

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More fans slammed the new anthem.

"SEC on CBS>>>>>>," one fan said.

"This sucks. Buy the song from CBS," another fan said.

"This blows. I will admit I am negative to everything outside of SEC on CBS, but this is terrible and an F- intro to the best conference in the land. This belongs with the Pac-12 or Big 10," one fan ranted.

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SEC on ABC offers more exposure and flexibility

ESPN’s media contract includes its sister network, ABC, broadcasting some of the conference games, continuing a longstanding tradition between the two. This approach brings significant advantages to the television contract, offering the desired level of coverage to the league.

“With all the conference’s games under the ESPN umbrella and adding ABC and ESPN+ to our distribution channels, ESPN will have complete scheduling flexibility, resulting in maximum exposure and adding significant benefits for SEC schools and fans,” ESPN Chairman Jimmy Pitaro said in 2020 (h/t ESPN).

ABC will air a significant amount of top games in the conference every season. ESPN already released the first seat of games to feature on the network with further updates coming soon.

ESPN creating new marketing campaigns for 2024

ESPN is partnering with a diverse lineup of well-known artists to create anthems for marketing campaigns across its platforms, aiming to energize fans for the 2024 college football season. This is something the network believes will excite fans.

“After listening to the collection of great artists like Luke Combs, Shaboozey, Quavo, and Lenny Kravitz within our marketing campaigns, how can you not be excited for the upcoming college football season?” said Curtis Friends, ESPN Vice President of Sports Marketing.

“Their music brings a fresh and dynamic sound to the promotion of the sport while reinforcing ESPN’s commitment to serve fans by celebrating the passion college football brings. Now we’re just waiting for kickoff!”

The SEC Network is partnering with country superstar Luke Combs, while the ACC Network is collaborating with multi-platinum recording artist Shaboozey. Meanwhile, ABC is establishing itself as the new home for the Southeastern Conference with a campaign featuring Quavo and Lenny Kravitz.