I Shared a Daily Wire Writer’s Content on My Instagram

How innocent sports content can be used to indoctrinate people with the Right’s politics.

I have a confession to make. I accidentally shared a Daily Wire writer’s content on my Instagram.

To be fair, it was about Vanderbilt Football, which is near and dear to my heart. However, this goes to show that even the most politically engaged people can fall victim to the Right’s marketing funnel. It also showcases a much more sinister reality: innocent sports content can be used to indoctrinate people with the Right’s politics.

@lyndenblake

Lynden Blake Balyo on Instagram: "This is so Vanderbilt🤣🤣. @p…

This was objectively a funny video, and as an alumnus, I can confirm this is the most Vanderbilt thing ever. However, Lynden Blake is not even a Vanderbilt alumnus. She is a Daily Wire writer and former OutKick commentator, and she is capitalizing on the hype around Vanderbilt Football to build a sports audience that she microdoses with right-leaning politics.

Before I continue, my name is Katey Parham, and I am a Gen-Z political content creator based in Texas! [Subscribe to Katey For Change]. In Unfortunately Not a Sound Bath, we talk about how folks on the right use casual cultural topics to attract audiences into their world.

A little backstory on Vanderbilt

To fully understand the ingenuity of this marketing strategy, we have to talk a bit about Vanderbilt Football and their newfound media hype— one of my favorite subjects. In the early 2020s, Vanderbilt Football was one of the worst teams in the SEC. My Freshman fall at Vanderbilt, we went 0-9. After that losing season, Coach Lea was hired in 2021 and has since turned the program around.

Enter Lynden Blake, a micro-influencer on Instagram that has recently started posting sports reels and Vanderbilt Football sideline videos. Her first post at a Vanderbilt Football game was just over a year ago, which is when her husband was hired to be the Assistant Coach for Cross Country and Distance. The 2024 season was notable for Vanderbilt Football as the program started to get recognized as a legitimate competitor in the SEC. In other words, this was when Vanderbilt Football started getting significant media (new and traditional media) for their “underdog/comeback” story.

Although Vanderbilt Football’s fame is new, Lynden Blake is not new to the sports industry. According to her LinkedIn, she has worked for local news organizations and has done some freelance sideline reporting. However, things took a political turn when she started to work for OutKick in March of 2025. More on OutKick in a bit. She is using her access and proximity to Vanderbilt Football in one of their best seasons to build a following of football and sports lovers. Her audience is likely there for her Vanderbilt Football coverage, but they are also getting politics every now and then. That is the lesson we need to learn on the left.

Seemingly, starting in November, she started writing for the Daily Wire, a far-right “network” based in Nashville, TN, so stay tuned to see how that impacts her future content.

Now, about Outkick

I do want to take a moment to discuss OutKick because I found their strategy interesting. OutKick is owned by Fox Corporation, and according to the website, “OutKick is the antidote to the mainstream sports media that often serves an elite, left-leaning minority instead of the American sports fan.” They utilize a flood the zone strategy, meaning they put out lots of sports content. On November 21st, they posted 14 posts on Instagram. Of those 14 posts, 12 were focused solely on sports commentary. One was a paid partnership, and one was an explicitly political video. If you’re a percentage person, only 7% of their content on November 21st was political. Similar to Lynden Blake, people are coming for sports and, in the process, getting an occasional far-right political post. This is what I call “microdosing politics.” These accounts lead with culture and drop political content every now and then. This strategy exposes their audience, who are not necessarily politically engaged, to biased political content.

In terms of structure, only a couple of OutKick’s commentators have over 100k followers. By doing collab posts with those accounts, those larger accounts are likely helping grow the main OutKick channel. On the other hand, several of their commentators have under 10k followers, so I am curious to see if their accounts grow with time. I bring up the structure to highlight the larger ecosystem they have built through this platform. Not all of the content creators who are utilizing their platform are macro-creators or national figures. Instead, they have a diversity of size of the creators, and they are using their resources to build up smaller creators.

Lastly, I want to highlight how OutKick is using common styles of sports posts. For example, do you see the similarity of style between this post from SportsCenter and this post from OutKick? This is extremely smart because consumers recognize this style of content as sports. Use the branding that works to camouflage political content in a non-political niche.

So the big question: What can the left learn from Lynden Blake and OutKick?

1. Start investing in sports. Start investing in culture.
   It’s still early enough (in my opinion) to find talent to talk about sports and, every now and then, talk about liberal politics, but at the very least, we need to invest in a group of creators that primarily talk about culture. Whether it is talking about Reality TV, sports, or travel, we need to find a way to lead with culture and insert politics every now and then.
   

2. Every industry has a distinct style of post. Use it.
   Don’t reinvent the wheel, and instead use what works. For example, look at the similarity between OutKick and SportsCenter feeds. Consumers recognize the branding, so it is easy to disguise your slightly political account in that industry. There are already conversations about this in the political space, so let’s take them seriously! (Check out Keith Edward’s Substack post about it)
   

3. Build each other up.
   It’s important we amplify each other’s work. Invest in smaller creators to help grow their accounts. We are better when we work together. The Right has figured that out, so let’s do the same!

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In 2025, Democrats have made huge strides online. However, there’s still more work that can and needs to be done. Let’s continue the momentum we have built in 2025 and continue to win online. The next two election cycles might be the most consequential in our lifetime (I know we say that about every election cycle, but I think we all know what’s at stake in 2026 and 2028), so we need to make quick investments to win online.