Barstool’s Big Cat thinks Fox partnership will have much different feel than ill-fated ESPN show

When Barstool Sports brings its brand of sports talk to Fox Sports, it will “get to be Barstool,” Dan “Big Cat” Katz said during Thursday’s “Barstool Yak” on Thursday. 

Katz was discussing the new partnership between Fox Sports and Barstool that was announced this week, combining the two household names in sports around the network’s college football programming and a new FS1 studio show. 

The latter show, in particular, is the second go-around for Barstool when it comes to working with a network on a linear program, and its first since the ill-fated “Van Talk” that lasted one episode in 2017 before it was canceled by ESPN.

Katz expects that the new deal and studio show will be a better opportunity than the ESPN partnership for “Van Talk” ended up being because “the world’s changed.” 

“[FS1] realizes, whenever Barstool Van Talk got canceled, 2017, look, [Pat] McAfee’s thriving,” he said. “Shane Gillis just did the ESPYs last night. I think the world is changing, I think people understand entertainment is entertainment.”

NASCAR Cup Series driver Ryan Blaney speaks with Barstool Sports Dan “Big Cat” Katz on set of “The Yak” at Barstool Sports Chicago on February 27, 2024 in Chicago, Illinois. Getty Images

“Van Talk” ended abruptly due in part to previous comments made by Katz and Barstool founder Dave Portnoy about then-ESPNer Sam Ponder, and former-ESPN president John Skipper later said that the network wasn’t able to distance itself from the Barstool brand as much as it wanted. 

Katz feels the new Fox partnership will allow Barstool to remain true to what it does best.

“I think it’s going to be a lot of our audience tuning in,” Katz said. “And I think it’s going to be a lot different than the ESPN deal we did back in 2017, where I think Fox is a very willing partner that reached out to us, you know what I mean? So it feels different in that they want us, not we’re asking them, ‘Please, please put us on at 1 in the morning.”

Dave Portnoy, wearing an Indiana Fever hat, poses for a photo while attending a WNBA game between the Indiana Fever and the Connecticut Sun on July 15, 2025, at TD Garden in Boston, MA. Icon Sportswire via Getty Images

Barstool and Fox Sports announced the deal Thursday, and it will include Portnoy becoming a regular contributor on “Big Noon Kickoff. It will also feature appearances by a number of Barstool Sports personalities, including Katz. 

“The Barstool College Football Show” will also be on location with “Big Noon Kickoff” for select games during the season. 

The daily studio show will air for two hours Monday through Friday