By Chris Marler
My all-time favorite TV show is The Office, and while it’s been over a decade since the finale ended I still find myself watching it multiple times a week, laughing at the same jokes and cold opens from episodes I’ve seen a million times.
I tuned in every week when it originally aired. It was a Thursday night tradition in college, and it would later become my current nostalgia. It wasn’t perfect, but that show was a staple appointment viewing for me for over a decade. It tapped into so many relatable topics, emotions, and heartstrings.
As great as it was, that series had such an odd and frustrating ending. After Steve Carrell left at the end of season seven the last two seasons became a struggle to watch as the writers struggled to land the plane. Pam and Jim almost broke up, Andy went through eight midlife crises, and the show looked like a shell of its former self.
There are so many parallels to that show and College Gameday even though one has been on for forty years and the other ran out of “that’s what she said” jokes in under a decade. I, like nearly every rabid college football fan, have watched College Gameday every Saturday since I can remember. I started watching when Chris Fowler was the host, Kirk Herbstreit didn’t have kids, dogs, or grey hair, and the show itself was just 30 minutes long. Not the three hour extravaganza it is now.
I’ve watched that show since, well, forever. I mean when Nebraska was relevant, when Nick Saban was still coaching in the Big Ten, and before Big & Rich ever put pen to paper to write the pure poetry that is “And we’re coooommmiiiiin to yooo cittaaaaay.”
A lot has changed over the four decades College Gameday has been on our collective televisions. The one thing that never changed, though, was Lee Corso. Every fall Saturday for 38 years I have turned on my tv and flipped to ESPN, and every fall Saturday for 38 years that guy was staring back at me. Sometimes in Athens, Georgia, sometimes outside of the Horsehoe in Columbus, Ohio, and sometimes in through the poked out holes of a mascot head he had to borrow from the Junior Poly Sci major and mascot for whatever school on whatever campus they were visiting that week.
Watching Lee Corso dress up in mascot cosplay, drop a “not so fast, my friend” to celebrity guest pickers became as much a part of the game day experience as tailgating and singing the fight song. He was the glue. He was the star. And, now he’s moving on and retiring.
Over the past few years, it’s been no secret that Lee Corso’s health has declined, affecting his performance on the show. His speech grew slurred, he often appeared lost, and more than anything, he simply looked his age. That’s natural at 89 years old. Still, it felt like the change came suddenly, not because it actually did, but because none of us were ready to imagine the show without him.
Watching him on Saturdays became difficult for fans—not out of criticism or lack of empathy, but out of a protective instinct for someone we had all come to love like a friend or family member. That’s what he became to us. It sounds dramatic, but Lee Corso has become woven into the fabric of college football traditions and icons like Bear Bryant or Touchdown Jesus.
On Thursday he announced his retirement. He’ll do one more show this Fall during the Week one installment of Gameday and then call it a career.
Over the past several years, most of the conversation around Corso’s name has centered on his declining health. Fans often took to social media asking when enough would be enough, questioning why he still wanted to do the job at 89. Now, we’ve gotten our answer. And it sucks.
There’s a line from the series finale in The Office, that my least favorite character Andy Bernard says five minutes before the final credits rolled.
“I wish there was a way to know you’re in the good old days before you’ve actually left them.”
Me too Andy, me too.
