‘Who’s bright idea was it’: ESPN puts ‘Kill Tony’s Tony Hinchcliffe on College Gameday and lives to rue the day

ESPN’s College GameDay used to be known for its expert analysis, passionate fans, and occasional celebrity guests. Now, it will be remembered for the stupid decision to give Kill Tony’s Tony Hinchcliffe a mic.

Hinchcliffe is an American stand-up comedian, writer, and podcast host known for his edgy and often controversial style of comedy. He gained popularity as the host of the live comedy podcast Kill Tony, where amateur comedians perform one-minute sets followed by critiques from Hinchcliffe and guest judges. Hinchcliffe is also recognized for his work as a writer on Comedy Central’s Roast series and his 2016 Netflix special One Shot.

Hinchcliffe’s controversial reputation stems from several incidents, most notably a May 2021 performance where he used a racial slur and mocked Asian stereotypes after being introduced by Asian-American comedian Peng Dang. This incident resulted in Hinchcliffe being dropped by his agency and losing several scheduled performances.

Despite these controversies, Hinchcliffe has maintained a significant following and continues to tour and perform. Nevertheless, his appearance on ESPN’s College GameDay, a popular Saturday morning college football preview show, was unexpected and raised eyebrows a lot of eyebrows. Well, what people feared came to happen as Hinchcliffe used his live mic to do the worst thing he could ever do — be himself.

Tony Hinchcliffe’s appearance in ESPN’s College GameDay was a disaster, of course

Hinchcliffe was featured on ESPN’s College GameDay for their Week 8 broadcast in Austin, Texas, which covered the game between No. 1 Texas and No. 5 Georgia. Specifically, he participated in Pat McAfee’s kicking contest segment. In this segment, a student gets the chance to kick a field goal for a prize. 

As a comedian, Hinchcliffe was expected to joke around with the audience and add some fun to the competition. In reality, Hinchcliffe took only a few moments to call someone a “brokeback Bob the builder” and “prepubescent lesbian.”

The worst thing about Hinchcliffe is not that he’s “provocative,” a term he waves around to justify his latent hatred for minorities. Nope. The worst part is that he’s not even funny. So, if ESPN was trying to look cool for young people, they missed the mark by a mile. With so many talented comedians to be found on YouTube or TikTok, they chose one who immediately turned the sport’s brand into a laughing stock.

The cherry on the top of the cake was host Pat McAfee, who could not hide his despair every time Hinchcliffe opened his mouth. While he did his best to keep the show going, McAfee was visibly uncomfortable during the whole segment, probably wishing time could move faster so he could escape the hellish situation.

ESPN has yet to make any official comment on Hinchcliffe’s offensive remarks or explain the dumb decision to give the comedian a stage for him to vomit homophobia. Still, considering how bad the online repercussions of Hinchcliffe’s partnership with ESPN are, it wouldn’t be surprising if someone would get fired for this obvious mistake.