Hello from New Orleans! Here's our special Super Bowl pregame edition, plus a roundup of the weekend's media headlines. Fly Eagles Fly 🦅
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The Super Bowl, in so many ways, symbolizes American culture, from the combat on the field to the consumerism of the $8 million commercials. No wonder this is where President Trump wants to be tonight: It's the biggest show in the world.
Seeing the NFL machine up close is incredible. And I'm just a first-timer here; I keep meeting football junkies who make this pilgrimage annually. Some people have been here for more than a week already. The hotels are sold out. The skyscrapers have building-size billboards. In an age when almost everything in media is shrinking, the NFL is still growing – but every year people wonder if the growth will continue.
>> CNBC's Alex Sherman interviewed NFL chief media and business officer Brian Rolapp about the league's "media strategy to stay on top..."
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Sports TV experts say this year's game is likely to set a viewership record. Awful Announcing's Drew Lerner thinks it's a certainty: "Between the number of simulcasts, Nielsen's methodological changes, and the popularity of the Chiefs, Fox will set a viewership record," he writes. Sportico's Anthony Crupi is more skeptical. It's a rematch, after all. For Fox to set a new record, a lot has to go right. The game has to be close and the streaming platforms have to hold up...
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The cable pregame shows are already underway. The official Fox broadcast starts at 1 p.m. Eastern. The Puppy Bowl starts at 2 p.m. on Discovery. Trump's interview with Bret Baier airs on Fox in the 3 p.m. hour. And kickoff is at 6:30. CNN's Lisa Respers France has an excellent preview of Kendrick Lamar's halftime show here.
🔌 Immediately after the game, when roughly 100 million US viewers are suddenly up for grabs, CNN will be live with postgame coverage, with Coy Wire and Andy Scholes live from NOLA.
📺 And what show is getting the coveted postgame spot on Fox? "The Floor," a trivia show hosted by Rob Lowe, which I admit I've never heard of. Evidently tonight is the Season 3 premiere.
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>> "New Orleans' pre-Super Bowl scramble was like a last-minute, city-wide house cleaning before company arrives," Keith Spera writes on the front page of this morning's Times-Picayune. And it worked: The city is shining. (TP)
>> "For many, it will be the only football game they watch this year," Tom Wright-Piersanti points out. "If you're among that group, good news: This is an ideal matchup for casual fans." (NYT)
>> Get to know the quarterbacks: Kyle Feldscher penned a fantastic pair of pieces about Patrick Mahomes and Jalen Hurts. (CNN)
>> Tom Brady will be calling his first Super Bowl game as an analyst, and everyone has an opinion about it. (The Guardian)
>> "If Kendrick Lamar plays his Drake diss track 'Not Like Us' ... he'll have to tone it down to avoid violating FCC standards," Artur Galocha notes. (Wash Post)
>> Speaking of... "Please no wardrobe malfunctions," FCC chair Brendan Carr says. (X)
>> Taylor Swift is in town, keeping the paparazzi busy. (People)
>> Some of my sightings at the Taste of the NFL fundraiser last night: James Brown, Sarah Huckabee Sanders, Omarosa, Carla Hall, and "Reliable Sources" reader Andrew Zimmern.
>> And here's a fresh view from inside the Superdome this morning, courtesy NFL PR boss Brian McCarthy:
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Record # of accredited media here
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NFL PR tells me that 6,414 members of the media are accredited to cover the game and all the related events here – the most ever for a Super Bowl.
For comparisons' sake, the last Super Bowl in NOLA, in February 2013, had 5,205 media types on site.
At "Radio Row" inside the convention center, more than 150 media outlets have been broadcasting live this week.
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I'm out with a new analysis for CNN.com this morning titled "Trump is making himself inescapable."
By becoming the first sitting president to attend a Super Bowl, he is turning the NFL's biggest spectacle into another episode of "The Trump Show." The show has been on seemingly 24/7 since the inauguration last month, and it takes many forms: news conferences, contentious announcements, AI-generated memes and all-caps Truth Social posts. All of it makes Trump the proverbial main character.
Think about it: A year ago you could go days without seeing or thinking about Joe Biden. Now you’re lucky if you can go hours without thinking about Trump. And that’s just how he likes it. White House aides have indicated the president's ubiquity is partly a strategy to impress Republican voters and disorient Democratic opponents. It also satiates his own ego.
>> Democratic strategist and NOLA resident James Carville says Trump being "white hot" will ultimately redound to the Democrats' benefit: Citing Muhammad Ali’s famous "rope-a-dope" tactic, Carville said of Trump, "just go ahead and punch yourself out the first five rounds." Read on...
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Sitting down with Bret Baier |
Fox released a clip from Trump's pre-game interview with Bret Baier this morning. The two men sat down together on Saturday at Mar-a-Lago. In the clip, Trump praised Elon Musk, saying "I wonder how he can devote the time to (DOGE). He's so into it."
After a portion of the interview airs this afternoon, the rest will air on Baier's "Special Report" program tomorrow night.
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Clay Travis on the 'major vibe shift' |
For Trump's fans, his ubiquity feels like nonstop "winning." I asked Clay Travis, the conservative radio host and founder of OutKick, who's also here in NOLA, about the meaning of Trump's trip.
He said Trump's attendance is three-fold: "He wants to honor the Bourbon Street terror attack victims from last month;" he "genuinely loves big sporting events and has for his entire life, long before he was a politician;" and he's "aware of the major vibe shift and knows the owners, many prominent execs and lots of players voted and support him."
"It's night and day between what we saw with sports in 2017, when many athletes openly attacked Trump," Travis added. "I expect Trump to be cheered in the stadium and for USA chants to break out." His view, which aligns with OutKick's anti-woke brand, is that "sports fans are way past ready to be proud of America again. Interestingly, this is more of a return to where we used to be, and the left-wing woke sports era from around 2014 to 2024 increasingly feels like an aberration, and where we are now feels like a return to normalcy."
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"Humor and celebrity cameos are in at this year's Super Bowl, while gambling and cryptocurrency are out," CNN's Jordan Valinsky wrote here.
"The trends so far? Nothing controversial, as you would expect, but also — and perhaps for associated reasons — very little creativity. It's a bad year for ads," NYT critic Mike Hale opined. Right now, on his ever-evolving ranking of the best spots, the NFL's "own feel-good promo," titled, "Somebody," is #1. He said the ad's "implicit endorsement of diversity and inclusion offers a muted contrast to the league’s decision to forgo the 'End Racism' end-zone slogan." Check out the rest here.
>> I'm especially intrigued by Bud Light's new ad, an "almost cartoonish celebration of masculine excess," since the brand is still trying to recover from backlash to Dylan Mulvaney's promotional video in 2023.
>> The NFL "will have a two-minute spot after the halftime show directed by Peter Berg... calling for girls flag football to become a varsity sport nationwide."
>> A scoop from Whitney Wild, Jamie Gangel and Elizabeth Wagmeister: The Secret Service is airing a recruitment ad from Hollywood director Michael Bay.
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A platform for promoting Fox News |
Fox's in-house ads during the game will include a "Fox News brand advertisement and two commercials for Fox Nation shows," plus two spots for Tubi, The Hollywood Reporter's Alex Weprin wrote. The brand ad bills Fox News as being "for all America." |
Several entertainment industry giants are said to be sitting out the game. Still, "Hollywood is expected to have a significant presence" during the commercial breaks, The Ankler's David Lidsky wrote in this column pleading for more inspired ads from studio creatives.
Expect to see trailers/sneak peeks for Universal's "Jurassic World Rebirth," "M3GAN 2.0," and "How to Train Your Dragon" ... Disney's "Thunderbolts," "The Fantastic Four: First Steps" and Pixar's "Elio" ... and Paramount's "Mission: Impossible — The Final Reckoning," "Smurfs" and "Novocaine." Vulture compiled all the trailers here...
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Fox is printing money today |
"Even ads around the Super Bowl telecast have gotten more expensive," Variety's Brian Steinberg writes. "Thirty seconds of ad time in Fox’s late pre-game coverage have gone for as much as $4.5 million... compared with $2 million in the past. A 30-second ad in Fox’s post-game coverage might go for around $4 million... compared with between $2.5 million and $3 million in the past."
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Did you catch this split-screen moment on Friday? As Trump fielded Q's at a joint presser with the Japanese prime minister, CNN showed the USAID sign literally being removed from its HQ building: |
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Political media notes and quotes |
>> The NYT editorial board's message this weekend: "Don’t get distracted. Don’t get overwhelmed..." (NYT)
>> Trump tried to dismiss TIME's provocative cover showing Elon Musk behind Trump's desk, Liam Reilly writes... (CNN)
>> Meanwhile, both Trump and Musk attacked journalists by name and "demanded that individuals be fired" the other day, Katie Robertson notes... (NYT)
>> Another challenge for Paramount-Skydance: "A Delaware court ruled that Paramount must produce records that could lay the groundwork for more lawsuits from investors..." (THR)
>> New from Joe Flint: How "60 Minutes" chief Bill Owens "ended up at the center of Trump's fight with CBS News..." (WSJ)
>> David Enrich has a new look at how Trump's lawsuits, no matter how meritless, "are proving effective at harassing the press." And "more of them are probably on the way..." (NYT)
>> Related: "Trump's blueprint for bending the media has Nixon written all over it," Jim Rutenberg writes... (NYT)
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Pentagon scores political points with 'rotation' |
On Friday night, the Pentagon doubled the number of news outlets impacted by its "media rotation program." The press office said The Washington Post, CNN, The Hill and The War Zone will all lose workspace while The Washington Examiner, Newsmax, The Free Press and The Daily Caller will all gain space.
Beat reporters suspect that new Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth is trying to score political points and penalize tough-minded news outlets. (His longtime employer Fox News is keeping its workspace.) Friday's announcement was confusing, though, because as ABC's Matt Seyler noted, Breitbart and the Examiner "have had dedicated space for years in the Pentagon," while The War Room has never had space to begin with, and Newsmax was already moving into a workspace.
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'We will not be deflected' |
The changes only affect workspaces, not credentials, so journalists from CNN et al will not lose access to military officials and press briefings. "CNN's mission to report on the Department of Defense, US military and Trump Administration will continue regardless of office arrangements," the network said in a statement. "We will not be deflected from our duty to hold all three fairly and fully to account." |
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Kanye's disgusting X account |
CNN's Elizabeth Wagmeister writes: "The fact that Kanye's X account has not been pulled down is outrageous. In what world is it okay to praise Hitler, proudly call yourself a Nazi and post swastikas? He should not be afforded a platform to spew a nonstop stream of antisemitic, racist, disgusting vulgarities."
Figures like David Schwimmer are calling on Elon Musk to suspend Kanye's account.
Wagmeister's broader point: The media shouldn't be giving oxygen to his dangerous rhetoric, and X is a major media platform. "I truly hope he gets the help he needs," she adds...
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