AOL launches 2 Point Lead today, a daily comedic video show that will air on AOL Sports’s website and mobile app. 2 Point Lead brings together sports and satire. Each new episode will be available at 2 p.m. EST every day.
The shows will run between 90 seconds and three minutes and features sports and comedy’s biggest stars. Viewers can expect a blend of comedy sketches, interviews and man-on-the-street clips.
“One of the really cool things about 2 Point Lead is that it is so different from every sports show you see out there simply because we have such a fun mix of famous comedians and pro athletes and different kind of public figures that are really anxious to help us in this fun and playful space,” Brian Fitzsimmons, sports editor at AOL.com, told SportTechie. “In this first week you will see Michael Rapaport who is a very well-known actor. We’ve enjoyed a lot of time with Alonso Morning, Derek Jeter, CC Sabathia, Matt Harvey – the list goes on.”
The new show was created to appeal to a younger crowd, and AOL intends to engage with their viewers through social media.
“2 Point Lead is part of our continued focus to bring innovative sports content to AOL across devices,” said Dermot McCormack, president of AOL Video and AOL Studios. “2 Point Lead gives us the opportunity to engage with our social media base and the robust conversations that are happening around sports and create a show that is uniquely our own.”
2 Point Lead will be hosted by Comedy Central comedian Yannis Pappas and regularly feature Nick Creegan, winner of #AOLSportsSearch.
“Over the last couple months in trying to build AOL sports from the ground up we really wanted to double down on video, and tap into us producing our own original stuff,” Fitzsimmons said. “The groundbreaking way we did that is to start the #AOLSportsSearch. Combine American Idol and sports broadcasting. At first we didn’t know how it would turn out, but it ended up a major success. After three days Nick Creegan was our lucky winner, ever since he has been here with our video and studio team making sure that 2 Point Lead is going to be as great as we want it to be.”
Yannis Pappas, who tours the world as a stand-up comedian, was the former host of MSG’s sports fan show The Bracket.
“As a stand-up comedian, I know that sports and comedy work so well together,” Pappas said. “Sports fans have been waiting for something like 2 Point Lead, and I’m excited to bring them a totally new type of sports experience – one that will surprise and entertain them every single day.”
AOL’s efforts come at a time when users are switching to mobile device to access their specialized content.
“85 percent of AOL Sports users engage with a smartphone every day to consume sports content,” Fitzsimmons said. “We are really catering to our loyal and eventual new fans by putting out a product that is strictly mobile focused. We deliver a concise message. In this day and age a lot of people want to be entertained in a shorter amount of time and not have to wait to get that satisfaction. This is really an exciting place for us to hit that market and will get the same entertainment and satisfaction factor as they would from watching a half hour TV show or hour and a half movie.”
One of AOL’s goals with 2 Point Lead is to bring together several sports communities, not just the die-hard statisticians.
“We are really going to grab people’s attention,” Fitzsimmons said. “Not just by the topical things, but more of the fun evergreen things that are really going to come alive by some of our special guests.”
2 Point Lead will be available on AOL.com, AOL’s mobile application and its 16 OTT integrations. AOL’s mobile app is available on both Android and iOS devices.
