It was not easy to watch last night’s Eagles-Bears game and not think about the news that while ESPN has re-signed Joe Buck to a new contract, Troy Aikman hasn’t been inked to a new deal. Aikman discussed the fact that is contract with ESPN is up after this season with Richard Deitsch last week.
Buck and Aikman make up the best booth in the NFL. No broadcast crew on any network gives off “big feel” for a game like Buck and Aikman. They arecsmoother than any other crew. They have more chemistry than any other crew. And they’ve been doing this together for 20-plus years.
Why on earth would ESPN not doing everything it could to make sure Aikman remains at the network? Why would ESPN, which had many years of a substandard “Monday Night Football” booth before bringing over Buck and Aikman from Fox five years ago, even consider breaking up the best broadcast partnership in the league?
Something is fishy here.
Usually, whenever there is a case like this, the answer is always money. The case of Aikman, however, does not seem like a money issue.
ESPN has given Stephen A. Smith a $100 million contract. ESPN pays Pat McAfee $60 to $65 million per year. And, according to the Athletic’s Andrew Marchand, ESPN just gave Joe Buck a $108 million contract extension.
Guess what? ESPN can pay Troy Aikman whatever he is asking for. That’s why this seems fishy to me. Something doesn’t add up here.
I speculated on Monday’s Traina Thoughts Podcast that maybe ESPN wants to make a play for Fox’s Greg Olsen when his contract expires after this season? Or maybe ESPN wants to make a pitch for Travis Kelce if he retires after this season.
While I understand the appeal of those scenarios (Olsen is fantastic analyst who is very popular and Kelce is married to the most famous woman on the planet), it still makes no sense to me that ESPN would consider breaking up Buck and Aikman.
Another layer of weirdness here is that ESPN/ABC will broadcast this season’s Super Bowl. Making Aikman a free agent going into the network’s biggest broadcast of all time is just bizarre.
Hopefully the folks at ESPN come to their senses and get Aikman re-signed sooner than later, but the vibes with this whole thing sure feel like something is off.
Other Stuff
• Charles Barkley gave another interview on Monday in which he stated he will be retiring from “Inside the NBA” after this season. Barkley has said this for many years now, so who knows if it will happen or not.
• I give Mike Tomlin credit here. I didn’t think the former coach, who likley wants to beome a head coach again, would go after coaches in his new role on NBC’s studio show, but he pulled no punches in criticizing Cowboys coach Brian Schottenheimer for botching the end of the Dallas’s heartbreaking loss to Baltimore on Sunday.
• Here are the broadcast crews for the MLB wild-card round that will air on NBC and Peacok this week.
Phillies-Braves, NBC: Matt Vasgersian, John Kruk, C.J. Nitkowski, Joey Votto
White Sox-Astros, Peacock: Tom McCarthy, Steve Stone, Geoff Blum, Adam Ottavino
Red Sox-Yankees, NBC: Jason Benetti, Lou Merloni, Joe Girardi, Anthony Rizzo
Cubs-Padres, Peacock: Dave Flemming, Jim Deshaies, Mark Grant, Clayton Kershaw
• Among all the controversy, the WNBA generated their best regualr season ratings ever for ESPN.
• If you’re a wrestling fan, you’re gonna want to check out this new show from Jim Cornette, who is a must-watch no matter what he does. Nobody is more entertaining while talking about anything related to wrestling than Cornette.
The Traina Thoughts Podcast
On Monday’s edition of “The Traina Thoughts Podcast,” I talked about the latest sports media news and covered what took place in college football and the NFL from the past weekend.
Topics discussed include a fantastic call by a college football ref; a must-year call from the Iowa student radio station after the Hawkeyes shocking win against Michigan; why this could be a big week for Tony Romo's future at CBS; what's going on with Troy Aikman and ESPN; Jim Nantz and J.J. Watt had their best broadcast of the season with Nantz delivering a great call at the end of the Ravens thrilling win over the Cowboys; NBC takes over the MLB wild-card round; the trailer for the new John Madden movie and much more.The show closed with a Mailbag segment in which I answered listener-submitted questions.
You can watch the podcast on YouTube or listen to it below.
In Closing
This made me laugh out loud.
