Fall Out Boy will be all over ESPN’s College Football Playoff coverage

If you live on sports Twitter, over the past year and a half, you’ve seen a joke, or a variation on a joke. You’ve seen the word “mups” used again and again to describe something or to make fun of something. You may be baffled or confused by it.

Mups are a play on the Fall Out Boy song “My Songs Know What You Did in the Dark.” Released last year, the songs chorus goes:

Light ’em up, up, up
Light ’em up, up, up
Light ’em up, up, up
I’m on fire!

People jokingly said that it sounded like lead singer Patrick Stump was singing “light a mup, mup, mup.” And a Twitter joke was born, one that has lasted as long as that song lasts in arenas and stadiums. So… forever.

Fall Out Boy announced a new song yesterday and released it to the world, “Centuries” (Yes, that is a “Tom’s Diner” sample. Yes, you are old.). Given that it was so soon after the band’s most recent album (Fall Out Boy’s last album came out in May 2013) and how obviously tailored to a sports montage, I joked that the band was “clearly after that NHL on NBC” check on Twitter, referring to how the song was the theme of NBC’s 2013 Stanley Cup Playoffs coverage.

I was a little off. This year, Fall Out Boy will be headed to the big leagues, as ESPN is going to use the song for its College Football Playoff coverage.

Here’s how “Centuries” will be deployed, according to a press release:

ESPN will use the song in various capacities, including highlight packages and transitions in and out of commercial breaks during the network’s coverage of the New Year’s Eve and New Year’s Day tripleheaders – the “New Year’s Six” – showcasing the semifinals and four additional premier bowls and the first-ever College Football National Championship on January 12.

The song will also be a central part of the regular-season marketing efforts to promote the top college football matchups across ESPN’s networks each week. ESPN began using an instrumental version of “Centuries” on August 25 in advance of the opening weekend.

 

Fall Out Boy and ESPN will also collaborate on a video for exclusive use in the game telecasts. The video will feature the band performing “Centuries” and college football highlights relevant to each College Football Playoff matchup.

I gotta tell you guys, I grew up in New Jersey during the mid-00s — i.e. when emo was happening and when Fall Out Boy became a phenomenon out of that — and I would’ve thought you were crazy if you’d told me 10 years ago, they’d be doing songs that ESPN licenses for college football.