Your favorite mid-day background noise is going away soon.
At its annual upfront presentation for advertisers, ESPN revealed that the popular radio show SVP & Russillo, featuring, obviously, Scott Van Pelt and Ryen Russillo, will soon go away, and the network will give Van Pelt his own late-night SportsCenter.
While details at this point remain foggy, Van Pelt's SportsCenter will be different than the show we've all seen over the last 30-odd years. For one, he'll be solo. More importantly, the just-the-highlights format will be scrapped in favor of something one may expect to see on CBS, NBC or ABC - without the monologue.
In theory, a live event would bleed into the traditional 11 p.m. ET SportsCenter, which would then give way to SVPCenter at midnight.
For the many SVP fans out there - of which I am one, and you should be, too - the move is bittersweet. SVP & Russillo is the best thing ESPN Radio has to offer by greater than the distance between Ohio State and Bemidji State. But a TV show with SVP wrapping up the days events? That may just be what the late-night SportsCenter - a brand that has seen better days - needed.