Tony Kornheiser and Michael Wilbon are approaching a quarter-century on ESPN, and the network intends to celebrate the milestone.
On Tuesday, ESPN began advertising a 25th anniversary special of Pardon the Interruption, which is set to air at 5 p.m. ET on Thursday, Oct. 22. The episode will presumably run for an hour, preempting the 30-minute SportsCenter that typically begins at 5 p.m., and running through PTI‘s normal 5:30 p.m. timeslot.
Kornheiser and Wilbon, the former Washington Post sports columnists that turned their newsroom bickering into one of the most beloved and influential sports television shows of all time, still hold the title of the highest-rated daily show in ESPN’s portfolio. PTI averaged 794,000 viewers during the month of September, up 18 percent versus the same month last year, and good for the show’s best September since 2015.
According to Wilbon, it’s all happened without the same level of promotion ESPN gives its other studio programs. Wilbon recently expressed his frustration at ESPN’s lack of promotion for PTI as compared to shows like First Take and Pat McAfee on a podcast with sports media writer Jimmy Traina.
“You watch a lot of promos of this network, of all the shows in this network, and you’ll never see mention of this show,” Wilbon said about PTI.
It’s a testament to what Kornheiser and Wilbon have built over 25 years and more than 3,000 episodes that the show is so successful and the audience is so loyal that ESPN doesn’t even need to promote it for people to tune in. Sports fans know that if it’s 5:30, Tony and Mike are on.
Even if ESPN doesn’t feel the need to promote PTI, the network clearly values the show. Last year, Kornheiser and Wilbon both agreed to three-year extensions with ESPN that will see PTI continue into at least 2028.
Further details about the 25th anniversary episode next week were not immediately available.
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