“It won’t be a surprise if some other network programs an alternative halftime show headlined by Greenwood and featuring other performers who will appeal to the anti-rabbit demographic,” Florio wrote.
PublishedOctober 10, 2025 5:53 PM EDT•UpdatedOctober 10, 2025 5:53 PM EDT
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Due to backlash over the NFL’s choice of Bad Bunny for the upcoming Super Bowl halftime show, ProFootballTalk blogger Mike Florio floated the idea of another network producing an alternative halftime program to counter NBC.
“It won’t be a surprise if some other network programs an alternative halftime show headlined by Greenwood and featuring other performers who will appeal to the anti-rabbit demographic,” Florio wrote on Thursday.
Florio is referencing country singer Lee Greenwood, whom House Speaker Mike Johnson suggested this week would be a better halftime performer.
Greenwood agreed. “I agree with Speaker Johnson,” Greenwood told the New York Post. “I would make a great performer for any Super Bowl show.”
As Florio noted, a rival network airing an alternative halftime broadcast wouldn’t be unprecedented. In 1992, Fox presented a live episode of “In Living Color” to counter Super Bowl XXVI’s halftime performance on CBS, which featured a celebration of the winter season and the Winter Olympics.
“The episode attracted more than 20 million viewers and forced the NFL to revamp the halftime experience, beginning with a Michael Jackson performance the next year,” Florio explains.
NEW YORK – Bad Bunny attends The 2024 Met Gala Celebrating “Sleeping Beauties: Reawakening Fashion” at The Metropolitan Museum of Art on May 06, 2024. (Photo by Kevin Mazur/MG24/Getty Images for The Met Museum/Vogue)
Now, none of the NFL’s existing partners — Fox didn’t become a league partner until 1994 — is going to run a counterprogram to the Super Bowl. If they tried, the NFL would almost certainly hold it against them in upcoming broadcast negotiations. That rules out any channel owned by Disney, Paramount, Fox, Netflix, or Amazon. So don’t expect CMT, a Paramount property, to get involved.
But another channel could try it. A performer — Greenwood or someone else — could also go live on social media during halftime. If promoted properly, Florio estimates the right person could “vacuum upwards of 30 percent of 130 million viewers who will be looking to make a statement” against Bad Bunny.
He has a point. In today’s climate, one side of the political aisle will always be unhappy with the Super Bowl choice. If the NFL ever selected a conservative performer, the other side would be seeking an alternative.
We can’t recall the last time Mike Florio made a good point. Yet here he is laying out an opportunity for networks and musicians to capitalize on the culture war.
Let us know at robert.burack@OutKick.com who you’d like to see perform against Bad Bunny somewhere else during the Super Bowl.