Paul Finebaum will take calls during the Iron Bowl on SEC Network

As ESPN gets ready to broadcast its first Alabama-Auburn Iron Bowl game in seven years, another opportunity to watch has emerged.

While Brent Musberger will be on the call on ESPN, Sports Illustrated’s Richard Deitsch reported that Paul Finebaum will be live on the SEC Network taking calls during the game. They’re calling it the Finebaum Film Room: Iron Bowl Live and will feature not only the bespectacled radio host, but also fellow SEC Network analysts Greg McElroy, Marcus Spears and others. Here’s the announcement from ESPN:

SEC Network will carry a complimentary viewing option to ESPN’s game coverage in which Paul Finebaum watches the game with analysts in the SEC Network studios as it plays out.Finebaum Film Room: Iron Bowl Live begins at 7 p.m. and will include analysts Marcus Spears, Greg McElroy, Cole Cubelic and Booger McFarland discussing the game and breaking down plays.

The Finebaum broadcast, which will have the game and the analysts in a split-screen, may be more exciting than the normal game broadcast. It will mimic sitting in a bar with the most passionate fans, especially with the overreactions of either fan base with any action in the game. Hopefully Paul’s producers have backups to the backup phone lines because his phones have a tendency to melt down any time Alabama and Auburn are involved in something significant. The Monday following last year’s “Kick-Six” Iron Bowl, he could barely get a phone line for his guests to call in.

Finebaum has always been a sort of Southern football psychologist, present to broadcast the airing of severe, sometimes misguided grievances, but putting him on the air during the Iron Bowl itself is brilliant.

So, if you want to hear a few dozen drunk people yell about football, you can do so safely from your own home and tune into the SEC Network on Saturday night.

[ESPN]