How Nickelodeon’s ‘Slime Cup’ aims to drive a younger audience to golf

Fire up the Slime Cannons! It’s time for another Nickelodeon sports broadcast.

The children’s network announced the development of the latest iteration of its kids-focused sports programming, a made-for-TV golf special called the “Slime Cup.” Justin Thomas, Jon Rahm, Collin Morikawa and Lexi Thompson are among the pros who will participate in the event, which will premiere on Nickelodeon later this year and is beginning production at Riviera on Tuesday.

The announcement marks the latest in a series of sports broadcasts for the network aimed at introducing popular sports to children. In its coverage of NFL Wildcard games, Nickelodeon drew rave reviews (and massive ratings) from both diehard and beginner sports fans. Viewers swooned over the broadcast’s educational elements and intentionally hokey graphics (like the “Slime Cannons”), which many felt lowered the barrier to entry for viewers.

In the time since the NFL’s maiden voyage in 2021, other sports leagues have investigated similar ideas. The NBA went as far as to do their own “KidsCast” on Nickelodeon, leveraging many of the same ideas as the NFL’s original broadcast. In golf, Nick appears to be ditching the “live broadcast” concept, choosing instead to create a pre-produced special that will air during primetime hours.

In addition to Thomas, Morikawa, Rahm and Thompson, the broadcast will also include cameos from NFL stars Saquon Barkley and Justin Herbert, as well as actor Terry Crews.

According to a release distributed by the network, the competitors will form four teams that will compete against one another in a three-round tournament. The tournament venue will be virtual, with holes inspired by popular Nick shows. True to its professional counterpart, the Slime Cup will have a cutline after two rounds of play. The final round, called “The Unfairway,” will determine the victor, who will win — you guessed it — a slime-green jacket and the honor of getting slimed.

To execute its vision for the show, Nickelodeon has brought in two key stakeholders from The Match — producer Bryan Zuriff and Excel Sports — who will be responsible for rekindling some of the made-for-TV event’s spectacle on Nickelodeon. The PGA Tour’s level of involvement in the Slime Cup is unknown, and its name was not mentioned in the release distributed by Nickelodeon. It’s also unclear if Nick will have to pay a rights fee to broadcast the event (as Turner Sports did with The Match) since the network is owned by ViacomCBS, which owns roughly half of the PGA Tour’s broadcast rights.

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Still, the announcement marks a significant moment for golf, whose viewership is the oldest and among the least diverse in American sports. The Slime Cup, alongside the PGA Tour’s new Netflix series, represents a significant investment in bringing golf to new audiences. There’s still lots more work to be done — particularly at the youth level — but it’s hard to fault golf’s stakeholders for trying their hand at reversing the trend.

On the talent side, Nick has placed an emphasis on hiring younger on-air talent, morphing its own personalities (Naveah Green and “Young Dylan” Gilmer) with up-and-coming sports broadcast stars (analyst Nate Burleson and play-by-play man Noah Eagle) in an effort to meet kids at their own level. Full broadcast details have yet to be announced for the Slime Cup, though it’s likely viewers of previous KidsCasts will recognize familiar faces at the Slime Cup.

Nickelodeon has yet to announce an official premiere date for the Slime Cup but said it is expected to be “this summer.”