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Tampa Bay Rays’ ace Chris Archer will join ESPN’s Baseball Tonight as a guest analyst for on-site, pre-game and post-game shows during the 2016 MLB World Series. Baseball Tonight presented by Chevrolet at the World Series will generally air at 7 p.m. ET and either midnight or 1 a.m. on ESPN2 and WatchESPN.
Archer is scheduled to appear on Baseball Tonight for Games 1 and 2, and if necessary, Games 5, 6 and 7. He will join a cast of commentators, which will include Karl Ravech, Jessica Mendoza, Eduardo Perez, Buster Olney, Tim Kurkjian and Chris Berman. This marks the second consecutive season that Archer will contribute to ESPN’s World Series coverage.
Archer will also contribute to ESPN Radio’s national broadcast coverage of the World Series on the same dates – Games 1 and 2, and then Games 5, 6 and 7, if necessary. He will join play-by-play commentator Dan Shulman and analyst Aaron Boone in the booth for an inning each game.
Additionally, Archer is expected to appear as part of the SportsCenter on the Road powered by Ford World Series coverage. More details will be announced soon.
Many current players have made brief appearances on studio coverage during postseason broadcasts, but not all of them have staying power. Archer showed strong potential last year, though, and it makes sense to bring him back given that he already has some broadcasting experience under his belt. From the release, it certainly sounds like they’ll get a fair bit of work out of Archer across all these different platforms. It could set him up for the future, too; at just 27, Archer will likely be pitching for a while yet, but broadcast work might be a good post-career option for him. We’ll see how his second stint goes, but the first one was generally well-received, and there’s potential for Archer to again be a valuable part of ESPN’s postseason coverage.
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