A Different Kind of Walk-On: Sport Social Work Themes and Concepts in the Television Show Chad Powers

Abstract

 Chad Powers is a new television show that gives a comedic and insightful commentary on sport culture, identity, and access within competitive athletics. What started out as a sketch for Eli Manning’s College Football show Eli’s Places has transformed into a full fledged comedic series with actor Glen Powell playing the title character. Manning dressed with hair and makeup to go undercover as an older walk-on quarterback during Penn State’s walk-on tryout day. Manning and others developed the concept to become a tv series with back story and depth. The show engages with several concepts in sport social work, including athletic identity, power dynamics in sport systems, mental health, team cohesion, and role transition after sport. This paper applies a sport social work lens to examine how Chad Powers reflects and critiques the social, psychological, and systemic dimensions of contemporary athletic environments.