Yes, There Really Is a College Football Player Named ESPN

Pardon the interruption, but there’s a football player for Bowling Green State University and his name is ESPN. Well, Gideon ESPN Lampron.

Gideon, 21, got his middle name — written in all caps, exactly like the network — when his dad, Marty Lampron, snuck it onto his son’s birth certificate while his wife Jennifer was recovering from giving birth.

Marty, a massive sports fan, originally wanted to name his son after his favorite basketball player, Larry Bird, which was a non-starter with Jennifer. Instead, he settled for the unique middle name, pronounced ESS-pen.

“It was a big gamble,” he told the Toledo Blade in a story published Wednesday July 2, “because I could have ended up liking instruments and being in the band, or something.”

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He got lucky. Gideon, a LaGrange, Ohio native, was an Ohio Mr. Football finalist in high school and later an FCS All-American at Dayton University. He transferred to Bowling Green, which plays FBS football, after last season.

“I didn’t fully realize until I got Gideon’s social security card and there it was, in all caps,” Jennifer said. “I couldn’t believe it. This couldn’t be real.”

Still, Jennifer had to admit that her son’s name suits him.

“I’m so proud of him,” Jennifer said. “I told him as he was growing up, if you want to change your name, you can. I told him multiple times. He always said, ‘I love it.’”

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The original plan was for Jennifer to pick the first name and the couple agreed on Xavier as a middle name.

“But … he talked about ‘ESPN’ nonstop,” she said, “and I remember saying, if we have to, at least put a ‘y’ in there.”

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She joked that if his name was Espyn, they could at least pretend it was Nordic. ESPN in all caps leaves little room for interpretation.

“You should be happy I spelled Gideon correctly,” Marty told Jennifer — and yes, the two are still married.

Gideon, for his part, embraced the name. In college, he added his middle name to his X account and Bowling Green has added it to its official roster.

Bowling Green is a member of the Mid-American Conference, which has a TV contract with ESPN. That means the Falcons will play most of their games on ESPN’s family of networks or they will stream online via ESPN Plus.

Come the fall, Gideon is excited for ESPN on ESPN.

“I’m looking forward to MACtion,” he said.