College football fans are upset that ESPN went with Jelly Roll for College GameDay’s celebrity guest picker?
ESPN’s flagship college football pregame show is headed to the campus of the University of Georgia for the highly anticipated matchup between the Bulldogs and the undefeated Ole Miss Rebels. College GameDay will be down south for the weekend, and all signs are pointing towards them leaning into a theme of country music.
The likes of Kirk Herbstreit, Rece Davis, Desmond Howard, Pat McAfee, and Nick Saban will be set up to break down all things college football and predict the biggest games of the weekend, with the marquee matchup being No. 9 Georgia’s home game against Lane Kiffin’s talented No. 5 ranked Ole Miss squad.
Luke Combs and Bailey Zimmerman will be putting on a live performance during College GameDay, which will air live from the University of Georgia’s campus. If you’ve ever wanted to take in a high-energy, Luke Combs concert before the clock even strikes noon… here’s your chance. Seeing Luke Combs (and Bailey Zimmerman) that early in the day will probably be enough to replace one of your Saturday morning cups of coffee:
And country music’s presence will continue to be felt when College GameDay gets around to its beloved game-picking segment.
ESPN always brings in a celebrity guest picker to each location, and they usually go with someone that has some sort of connection to the school (or one of the teams) they are in town for. This time will be an exception though… because they just announced that Jelly Roll will be the celebrity that will pick against and alongside the panel of college football experts.
It seems like it would have made more sense for the rapper-turned-country-artist to participate in an episode of College GameDay that featured Vanderbilt, since he hails from Nashville, Tennessee. But Jelly, whose real name is Jason Bradley DeFord, must have been available for this matchup between Georgia and Ole Miss, and was evidently willing to take on the opportunity.
Fans of College GameDay have taken to social media to share their displeasure with ESPN’s celebrity guest picker selection for this weekend. They feel as though the college football pre-Saturday-slate program is losing the script a bit, and going away from what they should be doing: Bringing in celebrities that have some sort of affiliation with the university that the show is there for.
Here is just some of the discourse on the matter, with one fan pointing out that Jelly Roll was just in Neyland Stadium last weekend cheering on the Tennessee Vols, and another even posing another country music star that would have been the perfect fit for the guest picker role:
Yeah… was Megan Moroney not available? She’s a diehard Georgia Bulldogs fan, and attended the university prior to becoming a country music star. Moroney graduated from the school in Athens, Georgia in 2020 with a degree in marketing and a certificate in music business, and she’s all about THE DAWGS.
So that fan is right in saying that ESPN “robbed” us of having a country music star that’s also a Georgia Bulldogs faithful as the guest picker…
