Forward of Tremendous Bowl LIX on Sunday, the NFL and YouTube are webhosting a cultural crossover match at the gridiron — a flag-football recreation that can mash up big-name YouTubers with track stars, professional soccer legends and different athletes, streaming completely on YouTube.
The NFL and YouTube’s Writer Flag Soccer Sport, going down Saturday, Feb. 8, in New Orleans will pit two seven-player groups towards every different. The squads might be led by means of widespread creators and livestreamers IShowSpeed (aka Darren Jason Watkins Jr., who has 35.9 million YouTube subscribers) and Kai Cenat (7 million subs). Retired NFL stars Michael Vick (Group Pace) and Cam Newton (Group Kai) will take rate as quarterbacks — see the entire rosters underneath.
This yr, YouTube joins as the primary authentic spouse of the yearly Tremendous Bowl flag soccer recreation. The flag-football recreation will kick off Saturday at 9 p.m. ET on the Play Soccer Box on the Tremendous Bowl Enjoy backed by means of Panini, the NFL’s interactive soccer theme park on the Ernest N. Morial Conference Middle in New Orleans. The sport might be livestreamed free of charge at the YouTube channels of the NFL, IShowSpeed and “The Wealthy Eisen Display” podcast.
The sport “will function high-energy performs, hilarious rivalries and unforgettable moments and convey the entire pleasure of a recreation day fueled by means of the larger-than-life personalities and aggressive hearth of its famous person avid gamers,” the NFL and YouTube mentioned Wednesday in saying the groups.
Avid gamers taking the sphere come with track artists Latto, Teyana Taylor, Quavo and Sexyy Crimson; YouTube creators Deestroying, Mark Phillips, Khaby Lame, Adam “Adam W” Waheed and MMG; and athletes together with Olympic gold medalist Jordan Chiles, faculty soccer famous person Shedeur Sanders and Diana Flores, quarterback of Mexico’s gold medal-winning Ladies’s Flag Soccer Nationwide Group.
What’s at the back of the YouTube and NFL collab? It’s largely concerning the NFL proceeding in its efforts to have interaction more youthful audiences and selling the logo as being at the leading edge of sports activities and tradition. As well as, with flag soccer set for its Summer time Olympic Video games debut in 2028, the NFL needs to spotlight the game’s accessibility and inclusivity.
“This recreation is a testomony to how we’re bringing in combination the most productive of sports activities, leisure and writer tradition to ship an unforgettable enjoy for fanatics,” mentioned Ian Trombetta, the NFL’s senior VP of social, content material and influencer advertising and marketing. “Partnering with YouTube lets in us to show off the personalities that pressure nowadays’s media panorama whilst celebrating the joy and accessibility of flag soccer for everybody.”
Angela Courtin, YouTube’s VP of hooked up TV and inventive studios, mentioned the partnership with the NFL is all about “bringing fanatics nearer to the motion and amusing.”
“By means of combining YouTube creators, NFL legends, celebrities and artists, we’re developing really distinctive reports and get admission to that fanatics can most effective get on YouTube,” Courtin mentioned. “This underscores our dedication to pushing the bounds of sports activities leisure, development neighborhood and turning in recent, enticing content material to a much broader target audience than ever sooner than.”
YouTube and the NFL are having a bet on huge target audience tune-in — the 2024 writer flag-football recreation at Tremendous Bowl LVIII generated over 100 million video perspectives throughout platforms. The NFL first hosted a writer flag-football match at 2022 Tremendous Bowl LVI in Los Angeles.
The NFL and YouTube had been media companions for years, however they stepped it up beginning with the 2023-24 season when YouTube changed into the unique U.S. store for the Sunday Price ticket out-of-home bundle. Beneath the seven-year Sunday Price ticket deal, Google is reportedly paying the NFL upwards of $2 billion according to yr.
For this yr’s flag-football contest, NFL Community commentator Wealthy Eisen and particular visitor Jason Kelce, former Philadelphia Eagles middle, will kick off the display. Different notable members come with NFL professional Andrew “Hawk” Hawkins and sports activities broadcast journalist Taylor Rooks calling the sport; comedian-actor Druski (Drew Desbordes) as head referee; and Chanen and Juwan Johnson and Kristy and Desmond Scott reporting from the sidelines.
Sportscaster Kay Adams will kick off the night time with a pregame display, streaming completely at the NFL’s YouTube channel, beginning at 8 p.m. ET on Feb. 8. Adams will take audience at the back of the scenes with the avid gamers, “shooting trendy arrivals, locker room interactions and candid moments.” Particular visitor YouTube creators Monet McMichael and Carter Kench will sign up for Adams at the pregame.
Listed here are the present group rosters, with skill matter to modify:
TEAM SPEED
Group Chief: Pace (#7)
Quarterback: Cam Newton (#1)
Avid gamers:
• Mark Phillips (#21)
• Adam W (#23)
• Latto (#777)
• Quavo (#91)
• Sexyy Crimson (#4500)
• Plaqueboy Max (#5)
• Khaby Lame (#00)
• Diana Flores (#33)
TEAM KAI
Group Chief: Kai Cenat (#3)
Quarterback: Michael Vick (#7)
Avid gamers:
• Duke Dennis (#34)
• Deestroying (#11)
• Jordan Chiles (#23)
• Shedeur Sanders (#2)
• Teyana Taylor (#10)
• Cole Bennett (#21)
• MMG (#4)
• Ki’Lolo Westerlund (#1)
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