A list of 50-ish better options for Saturday’s ESPN College GameDay guest picker

ESPN College Gameday announced earlier today that Florida Panthers forward (let me check my notes here) Matthew Tkachuk will the the guest picker for the Miami Hurricanes vs Florida Gators matchup on Saturday. Hmm. Okay.

My first reaction after reading the above tweet was a soft chuckle. It’s cool the Panthers are back-to-back NHL Stanley Cup champs. That said, I am a born-and-raised Floridian. I grew up playing soccer while watching football and basketball. I don’t follow the NHL in the least. If Matthew Tkachuk walked into my living room with his jersey on, I would not know who he is. Sorry Matt, but we can do better.

I thought I would make a wishlist of people who would make better guest pickers than (checking notes again) Matthew Kachuck, I mean Tchachuk, sorry, Tkachuk. (Sigh).

Let’s knock out the former Hurricanes football players and coaches:

Ed Reed, Ray Lewis, Ken Dorsey, Jon Vilma, Vince Wilfork, Frank Gore, Clinton Portis, Willis McGahee, Andre Johnson, Reggie Wayne, Santana Moss, Antrel Rolle, Greg Olsen, Warren Sapp, Edgerrin James, Najeh Davenport, Jarrett Payton, Jessie Armstead, Michael Irvin, Bernie Kosar, Gino Torretta, Jim Kelly, Butch Davis, Jimmy Johnson, Mark Richt. That’s an easy 25. Good Lord this is sad how many options there are here.

Former Hurricanes basketball players:

Jordan Miller, Isaiah Wong, Bruce Brown, Jack McClinton, John Salmons, Jimmy Graham (I’m putting him here because I wanted to keep the above section at a nice round 25), Darius Rice, Tim James, Guillermo Diaz (one of my all time favorites), and of course, Jim Larrañaga. That’s a solid list of guys!

Other Miami athletes:

Dwayne Wade, Dan Marino, Lionel Messi (unlikely, but it’s a wishlist, what do you want from me?). Also, Dan Marino would be awesome. Freaking ESPN. Oooh, what about Udonis Haslem? Miami Heat legend, but Florida Gator alumni. Actually no, scratch that. He’d pick Florida.

South Florida Musicians:

Pitbull, Flo Rida, Trick Daddy, Gloria Estefan, Enrique Iglesias, Shakira, Ricky Martin, Jennifer Lopez, Kodak Black, Luther Campbell. Damnit! How is it not Luther Campbell?!? Ugh. I’m getting more mad as I come up with more names.

South Florida celebrities:

Sylvester Stallone, Patti Stranger from Millionaire Matchmaker (she’s alumni), Al Pacino as an octogenarian Scarface. Now that would be pretty great. I tried creating several AI pictures of an 85-year old Tony Montana with specific descriptions and the results were terrible. I knew AI was a scam.

You might notice I have not mentioned Dwayne Johnson. This will be the only time I do. I wouldn’t be able to take all the fake laughing and scripted takes. Plus, he already went to Colorado a couple years ago. Lame.

Non-South Florida celebrities:

Dana White (was at ND game as a UM fan), Jeff Bezos (same). They’re both rich and bald, I don’t know. Sydney Sweeney (because of course), Austin Butler (I googled “biggest young actors” and he came up). All are better options than Matthew However-the-hell-you-spell-his-last-name.

I am still thinking about an 85-year old Al Pacino going full Tony Montana next to Nick Saban. Incredible.

Internet famous Hurricanes fans:

Coach Coop, Alex Donno from Locked On Canes, the Cavinder twins, Billy Corben. Coop, Corben, and Donno are die hards, while the Cavinder twins would probably boost ratings for the last twenty minutes of the show.

Hurricanes fans with the last name Schiffman and live animals:

Me (obviously), my two-and-a-half-year-old who would at least be cute to look at. Hell, I’d take an Ibis as the guest picker. And no, I’m not talking about the Miami mascot. I am saying a real life Ibis.

The Winner:

While any of the 49 or so names listed above are an improvement, there is one person who rises above them all. He’s a huge Canes fan and well known in Miami: Nevin Shapiro. Oh yeah! It would be so so good.

Did you know Shapiro has a podcast? I definitely did not. It recently came up on my Recommended feed on YouTube with me watching more Miami Hurricanes content during football season. I started laughing out loud when I saw it. Needless to say, he’s not raking in the views. I am not one to judge, and I don’t know any more about him than what was shown in The U Part 2. But come on, having Nevin Shapiro making the entire ESPN cast and crew terrified of what he might say would be must-see television. He could talk about paying players, pressuring coaches on who to play, his pyramid scheme, drop and f-bomb or two, maybe make fun of Desmond Howard (I’d pay for that). And you know he would talk shit to Nick Saban. Shapiro wouldn’t be able to contain himself. Saban might physically assault him. This sounds better and better the more I think about it.

Despite not being Canadian, Tkachuk (I have to check the spelling of his name every time I write it!) is probably a very nice guy, most hockey players are. He’ll understand if he gets bumped.

It’s not too late ESPN. Get Nevin Shapiro on the phone now. I guarantee he is available.

GO CANES!

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