Pat McAfee is joining ESPN at an interesting point in the network’s history. Earlier this year, McAfee confirmed he would be on College GameDay in 2023 with his “Pat McAfee Show” also joining ESPN on a deal that is reportedly worth up to 8 figures annually.

Unfortunately, ESPN is also conducting widespread layoffs this weekend. Those cuts began on Friday with some of the network’s prominent on-air talent being let go.

That list of cuts consists of David Pollack, Jalen Rose, Todd McShay, Keyshawn Johnson and a number of others. From that group, the reaction to Pollack being let go was critical, particularly as a member of the College GameDay crew.

As the dust began to settle Friday evening, McAfee reacted to the string of layoffs with a lengthy statement on Twitter. He claimed to be “getting murdered on the internet” throughout Friday.

McAfee also included that the “Pat McAfee Show” is pumped to join ESPN and has a goal of preventing mass exits from ever coming up again. Here is McAfee’s full statement:

Built on stone.

I did a lot of reflecting about our show’s journey while I was getting murdered on the internet today (hell yeah).. all roads lead back to how honored I am to be the leader of such a talented group and how lucky I am to be a part of this team (a few missing from pics and a couple I couldn’t tag)… We do our thing. We enjoy ourselves. And we never blink… Basement, box truck, world stoppage.. you name it.. the show rolls on

We’re very pumped to be joining ESPN and our goal is that “Mass exits” are never a thing again.. we hope to help that.. obviously that’s a lofty goal but, that’s how I truly look at life… I wish we could’ve worked alongside a lot of the folks that got released today. Some absolute legends, that we all respect, in the sports media world were trending today for losing jobs. That sucks.. no matter how you slice it.

We’re gonna continue to control the things we can control.. try to do daily sports coverage in an entertaining and informative fashion.. and be thankful for all of the opportunities that have been earned thru a lot of hard work and commitment from the group of dudes I get to call coworkers.

Have an incredible weekend.

We’ll see how the future of ESPN shakes out after some major moves for the network, but it looks like McAfee will indeed be a key piece for the immediate future.