Alex Cooper heads to Peacock, where her Gen Z fanbase will “watch us watch the Olympics”

i’m going to have a live show on peacock. the show, how i started to think about it was, i understand the intensity and the determination and all that goes into these big moments but as a viewer at home it’s a completely different experience you want too have fun you want to chill you want to be eating and drinking and schmoozing and so I thought how do i bring that to a show. the show is really going to be me watching with celebrities and comedians and friends and people can write in and you can watch us watch the olympics. it’s ok if you don’t watch sports it’s ok if you have no idea what’s happening i may not either but it’s ok we’re going to have fun

NBCUniversal is turning to Alex Cooper to up its credibility among Gen Z. Cooper, the entrepreneur who hosts the chatty podcast Call Her Daddy, will cover the 2024 Summer Olympics across a series of star-studded Peacock broadcasts.

Cooper sat down with Hoda Kotb on NBC’s Today to discuss the gig she’ll host live from Paris. The Pennsylvania-born 29-year-old is a former Division I athlete herself, and in her Olympics coverage, she’ll mix insights from her soccer days with the relaxed vibe she brings to her work as a podcaster.

“I understand the intensity and the determination and all that goes into these big moments,” Cooper told Kotb. “As a viewer at home, it’s a completely different experience. You want to have fun, you want to chill, you want to be eating and drinking and schmoozing, so I thought, ‘How do I bring that to a show?'”

On Peacock, Cooper will be joined by celebrities, comedians, and friends. Together with those guests, Cooper will watch the Olympics, and her viewers will “watch us watch the Olympics.” The result, Cooper hopes, will be a broadly appealing show that appeals to both diehard fans and people with no sports knowledge.

This will not be the first time the former college soccer player has forayed into the world of sports media. Before Cooper’s chart-topping podcast made her a household name, she was affiliated with Barstool Sports, which served as the original distributor of Call Her Daddy.

Cooper has harnessed her exploding popularity to launch ventures like Trending and its subsidiary The Unwell Network, the latter of which has inked deals with some of the biggest stars on social media. Watch with Alex Cooper, as her Peacock Olympics coverage has been dubbed, will give her a foothold on a major streaming service. She has prepared for the gig by welcoming gold medalists like Simone Biles onto her podcast.

Peacock is counting on Cooper to bring in the young audience that increasingly enjoys the world’s biggest quadrennial sporting spectacle. During the previous Summer Games in Tokyo, YouTube viewers watched 200 million hours of Olympics content. With more athletes providing their perspectives and more viewers catching onto the trend, deals like this one will only become more common in the coming years. In Paris, Cooper (and participating athletes like rugby player Ilona Maher) will get her chance to set the tone.