When Mike Tirico left ESPN in 2016 for NBC Sports, it was a seismic move in the sports broadcasting industry. It signaled not only Tirico\u2019s value as a broadcaster but also NBC\u2019s plan for the foreseeable future.<\/p>\n
NBC had an embarrassment of riches in sports broadcasting talent even before Tirico showed up. Bob Costas commanded the Olympic host chair, among many other roles, while Al Michaels was the voice of NBC\u2019s Sunday Night Football coverage. While both were approaching the twilight of their storied TV careers, it would still be years before either stepped away from their primetime pulpits.<\/p>\n
However, here came Tirico<\/a>, who\u2019d made his mark as ESPN\u2019s voice of Monday Night Football while calling The Open, The Masters, the FIFA World Cup, and Wimbledon, just to name a few. His arrival coincided perfectly with NBC\u2019s acquisition of\u00a0the rights to Thursday Night Football, which it was then splitting with CBS.<\/p>\n With Michaels busy calling SNF, the logic followed that Tirico would become the new voice of TNF. Sure enough, reports started dropping that he\u2019d be paired with Cris Collinsworth<\/a>, giving NBC a one-two punch of NFL broadcasting booths.<\/p>\n However, somebody forgot to check with the 800-pound-gorilla in the room: The NFL.<\/p>\n On August 20, 2016, weeks before the\u00a0season began,\u00a0The New York Daily News reported<\/a> that the NFL preferred\u00a0a network\u2019s \u201cA\u201d team to call Thursday Night Football. So when NBC presented its plan to the league, they pulled rank.<\/p>\n \u201cThey (Michaels and Collinsworth) are (NBC\u2019s) number one team. So are (CBS\u2019 Jim) Nantz and (Phil) Simms. We like the idea of having the same booth announcers from Sunday night and Sunday afternoon to carry over to Thursday,\u201d Brian McCarthy, the NFL\u2019s VP\/Communications, said. \u201cWe\u2019re hoping for that same magic Sunday Night Football has with Al and Cris to carry over to Thursday night.\u201d<\/p>\n Our statement on NBC & Thursday Night Football pic.twitter.com\/7rSeJvngLn<\/a><\/p>\n \u2014 Brian McCarthy (@NFLprguy) August 20, 2016<\/a><\/p>\n That was news to NBC, which had clearly had its plan in the works for some time.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s a full-time job to do one game a week. It\u2019s not just adding a three-hour broadcast. It\u2019s a substantial amount of work,\u201d NBC Sports Group President Mark Lazarus said earlier that year. \u201cNobody raised their hand and said, \u2018I really want to do double the workload.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n What the NFL wants, however, the NFL gets<\/a>. And Tirico, who had been ESPN\u2019s top NFL voice, suddenly found himself without a marquee broadcast to call his own.<\/p>\n \u201cI thought I was going to be doing the Thursday games, but still, to this day, I don\u2019t know how it all played out. But NBC was great about it,\u201d Tirico told Awful Announcing last year<\/a>. \u201cAs a matter of fact, it became one of the best things that ever happened for me because it allowed me to do the Notre Dame games.\u201d<\/p>\n It\u2019s true that while Tirico suddenly found himself firmly on NBC\u2019s \u201cB\u201d team, he made the most of it. Along with\u00a0calling Notre Dame football<\/a>, he was able to check off a few other dream opportunities, including hosting NBC\u2019s Triple Crown horse racing, Indianapolis 500 coverage, and the U.S. Open and Open Championship.<\/p>\n Ironically, Tirico did end up calling a few TNF games<\/a> that season and even called a few SNF games later in the season<\/a>, all of which were magically okay with the NFL.\u00a0And the whole silly ordeal ended less than a year later, when the league reversed course and gave Tirico the green light<\/a> to be the full-time TNF play-by-play voice.<\/p>\n \u201cWhat was supposed to be was just the Thursdays; it didn\u2019t turn out to be that,\u201d Tirico said last September<\/a>. \u201cThe pivot to Notre Dame ended up being life-impactful for me, and I still got the chance to do games on Thursdays and Sundays with Cris [Collinsworth]\u2026 The whole thing could not have worked out better. I\u2019m glad it did, because otherwise, I wouldn\u2019t have had that Notre Dame experience that I cherish to this day.\u201d<\/p>\n All\u2019s well that ends well for NBC and Tirico, one of the most dependable announcers working today<\/a>. After waiting patiently, Tirico slid into the studio host role for Football Night in America and officially took over as the primetime host of NBC\u2019s Olympics coverage, before finally becoming the voice of SNF in 2022.<\/p>\n This past year was the culmination of Tirico\u2019s 10-year run with NBC so far<\/a>, becoming NBC\u2019s new NBA voice<\/a>, hosting the Winter Olympics<\/a>, and finally calling a Super Bowl<\/a> (as well as being inducted into the National Sports Media Association\u2019s Hall of Fame<\/a>).<\/p>\n Not too shabby, especially after such an inauspicious start.<\/p>\n \t