Michelle Beadle and Colin Cowherd host "SportsNation," premiering at 4 p.m. Monday on ESPN2.

Probably the best way to describe the inspiration for ESPN2's new weekday interactive program, "SportsNation," is a line Matt Dillon spoke in the Farrelly brothers' 1998 gross-out comedy "There's Something About Mary": "What the hell is Brett Favre doing here?"

Indeed, the idea behind the hour-long show, which premieres at 4 p.m. Monday, is a complaint many fans expressed about ESPN and other media outlets after Favre first announced his retirement following the 2007 season and drew what many thought was a disproportionate amount of coverage, so much so that ESPN was jokingly referred to as "the Favre Network." So ESPN listened and decided to create a show where the fan drives the agenda.

The program, hosted by Colin Cowherd and Michelle Beadle, invites viewers to weigh in on the topics "SportsNation" covers via e-mail, text, Twitter or phone. So, for example, if those who respond say they want to talk about last night's Lakers game, that's what the show will cover. They can also interact with the hosts, producers, athletes and coaches who are interviewed on the show, and with one another.

"I think the idea or conceit of SportsNation.com," says executive producer Jamie Horowitz, "was that that would be the place where the fan's voice would lead the conversation. And we've sort of taken that idea and made it into a TV show.

"I remember when I first started trying to create this show almost 18 months ago, watching the afternoon block on ESPN and seeing how different shows talked about different stories in their A block. And so it was a realization of, 'Oh, right, there are producers in a room and talent weighing in deciding what is most important for the sports fan.' What if we reversed the paradigm and we said, 'Fans, what do you think is most important?'

"Then we'd get an honest answer on how much Brett Favre talk is really needed, how much people really wanted to hear about the Yankees and the Red Sox, how much people really cared about the Cowboys or Lakers or Notre Dame. And if the answer is that is what they really want, that is what we'll talk about. If the answer is it's not what they want, then we'll go in a different direction."

Of course, going into airtime with 75 percent of your content still to be determined can be scary for the hosts, but Beadle says that's the whole point.

"If you're not a little bit scared, then I think we're doing it wrong, and that's what we've been told, so it should be interesting," she says. "Like, we should feel a little nervous as far as what we're putting out, and we just want it to be a little different, and we definitely want to bring in the fans because sometimes they don't get a voice.

"We want to be something that's completely different that you're not seeing anywhere else, because otherwise we're just regurgitating what's already been done, and that's definitely not what everybody's on board to do here."

Cowherd, however, likes that the fans drive the show, as he thinks it takes the pressure off the hosts.

"My radio show (ESPN Radio's "The Herd With Colin Cowherd"), there's enormous pressure for me to deliver," he says. "People listen to the show, and one of the reasons is I'm the host. When you listen to a game, you're not going to go to a game because of a play-by-play announcer, rarely. You're going to watch the game. ...

"But on this television show, I have a co-host; the 'Nation' largely does a lot of the work. So I come on the show and I know the Nation's opinion is as valuable as my opinion. So really, it lessens the burden for me to have to carry a show. With a great co-host and the Nation, they have to carry some of it."

Also carrying the show is the technology that keeps the producers, hosts and guests connected with the viewers, about which both Cowherd and Beadle admit they're less than savvy.

"I'm 45," Cowherd says, "so getting my up-to-the-minute thoughts, to me, is not that compelling. I mean, who really cares what I'm doing at 10:45 a.m.? ... But for the use of the show, I'm all for it. ...

"I have my own Web site, which I do, theherdsword.com, and I do that, and that's about 40 minutes a day I put into it."

"I'm a texter," Beadle says, "but that's about it. I've never had a blog, which is why I'm kind of looking forward to this, because I read this stuff all day. I mean, it's part of our jobs kind of to know everything that's going on. But I've never personally authored one, and I've definitely never tweeted.

"But I like the idea of it," she continues. "I think we're going to have the kind of access where, you know, if somebody doesn't like something I said that day, they can actually get on the Twitter and talk right at us instead of bad-mouthing us somewhere else. Just tell it to our face, and we'll go from there.

"I think it actually is kind of a good idea because how many times do you watch TV and you want to say something, and you can't reach that person?

"So it could be interesting," she says, laughing, "and highly censored."