Is Sports Content Ready for the AI Video Era?

In December 2025, ESPN aired a documentary titled “Boo-Yah: A Portrait of Stuart Scott“, chronicling the life and legacy of sportscaster Stuart Scott before his death in 2015. It’s a well-done ode to an icon of sports media, filled with tons of archival footage from Scott’s home video footage.

The documentary starts with a disclaimer that feels indicative of the times that we live in. It notes that the footage used was archival from Scott and that none of the visuals were generated using artificial intelligence (AI). The mere existence and need for such a disclaimer is indicative of the landscape of the arts in 2026, where the lines are becoming blurred between what is real and is computer generated. In the space of sports content specifically, we are now running into a crossroads moment that could define the way that we view storytelling in the future.

The AI Video Revolution

In September 2025, OpenAI unveiled Sora 2—a text to video model that creates short clips in a style that would be seen on TikTok or Instagram. Sora has plagued by copyright issues and was used to create problematic deepfake content of notable personalities, including OpenAI CEO Sam Altman. This moment ushered in a world where AI generated video had improved over the original versions of the technology that featured a crude visual of Will Smith eating pasta.

In those days, it was easy to identify whether a video was AI-generated, but it’s not as simple today. Google expanded upon Sora 2’s improvements with its Nano Banana Pro model, unveiled in November 2025. Many of the pitfalls of AI video in the past, such as poor text generation and erratic movements, were remedied—leading to videos that weren’t immediately recognizable as AI.

The use of the technology has permeated beyond social media fodder and has now entered the world of advertising as well. Coca Cola and McDonald’s, two companies with no shortage of resources, released advertisements this holiday season created entirely with AI.

The Coca Cola commercial used 70,000 different prompts to create and was stitched together to create an ad that was intended to be an approximation of the companies iconic Christmas advertisements that date back to the 1930s. Those ads are coveted pieces of Americana that featured hand drawn illustrations, animated polar bears, and custom-built illuminated trucks. The commercials were a celebration of art, a showcase of the craft.

Coca Cola, of all companies, leaning that deeply into the world of AI-generated video gives the medium immediate legitimacy. It sends a message that the idea of “AI Art” and “AI Artists” is not a farce. The ad, unsurprisingly, drew the ire of the creative community with a barrage of comments on social media.

Coca Cola is merely a microcosm of the acceptance of AI photos and video. Every day it seems, there is a new controversy on X with users abusing Grok’s video generation capabilities and creating disturbing visuals. It seems that there is constantly a new image generation trend that goes viral on ChatGPT, further normalizing the use of AI to create art.

In the sports world, this development is especially relevant for online fans that are looking to capitalize on engagement bait that will garner millions of views. With tools like Nano Banana and Sora, there is a world where a user could create a video of a player doing a crime or saying a salacious comment without knowledge of it being authentic or not.

The Specter of Deepfakes

Consider for a moment, the proliferation of “parody” accounts on X that often share fake trade reports with the sole purpose of getting fans angry and pushing out a reaction post in their rage. These accounts are designed to farm engagement, to catch fans off guard and invoke a reaction. And it is often successful, as we see those posts infiltrate other social networks like Facebook.

The arrival and competency of AI-generated video take the appeal of parody accounts to the next level. What’s to stop an account posing as Shams Charania to create a video using ChatGPT or Grok of Shams announcing a trade that never happened.

The fear is already implanted in our minds; it’s only a matter of time before it’s acted upon. When Luka Doncic was traded from Dallas to Los Angeles, many assumed it was a Shams parody account, because the notion seemed so outlandish. The video component would create even more confusion and uproar.

If someone created a realistic looking video using Nano Banana or Sora of Shams announcing that Anthony Edwards was traded to the Detroit Pistons, it would instantly generate views, clicks, and reactions. But it would also create a situation where we are unsure of what is real and what is parody. It’s a slippery slope in the way that we consume sports media, fueled exclusively on shock value and fabrication.

Shock Value & Fractured Storytelling

When I was in college, I took a marketing class, and we were discussing business recommendations. My professor made an observation and challenged us to think about when we mention a business to a friend or family member. Most of the time, we will tell them about a terrible experience as a way of warning, but seldomly tell them about a great experience because it’s not as pressing.

That logic applies to the way that people have used AI video in recent months. Generating something pedestrian doesn’t garner views, but something controversial does. In the music space, we have seen people use AI to generate songs from deceased artists without the permission of their estates. This is controversial and gets attention, so people will do it.

In the sports documentary space, what’s stopping a filmmaker with questionable ethics from generating a fabricated clip of a deceased subject. Could the technology become so good that they would insert game footage that was generated because they didn’t have the rights to license actual footage from the NBA or the NFL. In a sense, AI video opens Pandora’s box for clickbait content—diluting the sense of what is real in the process.

With a decaying idea of what is genuine, we are on the precipice of an age of skepticism when it comes to video properties in the sports space. It is an area of societal culture that is already rampant with speculation with jersey swaps and leaked quotes, adding a video generation component can only further muddy the waters.

The tools are here today that could forever alter our perception on what is authentic in sports. It’s an element of the content world that should be treated with care, but likely will be abused. The use of a disclaimer in the Stuart Scott documentary is sadly on the path to being standard practice to verify the authenticity of a project. It’s a reality that all feels so dystopian in an incredibly low stakes way. But it appears that it’s the future that is in front of us, whether we like it or not.

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