In addition to her duties on College Gameday, Ponder has been the regular sideline reporter for ESPN's Thursday Night College Football with Rece Davis, Jesse Palmer, and David Pollack since August 2012, replacing Jenn Brown on the sidelines.

Rumors about the possible coupling sprouted in part because of Ponder's Twitter activity.Ponder was the host for the 2016 season of Battle Bots.Born in Phoenix, Arizona, Ponder attended Central High School in Phoenix.Vikings quarterback Christian Ponder is having himself quite the breakout 2012 in Minnesota.ESPN sideline reporter Samantha Steele has also stepped into the spotlight.He played college football at Florida State University and was the Seminoles starting quarterback from 2008 to 2010.Ponder was born in Dallas, Texas and grew up in Grapevine, Texas. That’s actually all I thought about: not making mistakes. Draft history is littered with busts at the NFL’s most vital, pressure-filled and hard-to-evaluate position. I wasn’t able to relax and not worry about mistakes.Christian Andrew Ponder (born February 25, 1988) is an American football quarterback who is currently a free agent.He was drafted by the Minnesota Vikings with the 12th overall pick in the 2011 NFL Draft and started the majority of games for them from 2011 to 2013.After leaving Liberty in 2009, she worked for Fox Sports Net and Fox College Sports as a sideline reporter for Pac-10 and Big 12 college basketball and football games.On July 7, 2011, ESPN's Longhorn Network announced that it had hired Ponder as a sideline reporter. Ponder’s mind was a mess partly because he kept reading that the Vikings had drafted him too early after an injury-plagued, just-OK senior season.After his confidence-shattering start, he believes he now possesses the mind-set to succeed. He’d been unemployed for eight months and was doing yardwork at home in Phoenix when the 49ers surprised him with a call.