There's been live commentators for chess for longer than there's been live media. It's just that chess had always been Your Dad's game so it was thoroughly unsexy. With chess getting popular on streaming platforms (mostly because most high level chess players don't make much money playing chess, but make a lot of money streaming) there's a lot more hype and personality to it beyond "wow you play chess you must be IQ".

Honestly though, it's a board game.