Tony Romo’s shaky Wild Card performance opens door for Ian Eagle, J.J. Watt in CBS top booth

It’s hard to believe that Tony Romo has spent nearly nine full seasons in CBS’s top NFL booth alongside play-by-play partner Jim Nantz.

His broadcasting journey has been one filled with peaks and valleys, starting with some of the highest praise ever bestowed upon a game analyst, showcasing his oracle-level knowledge of the game by predicting plays before they happened. That special ability early in his career earned him a contract more lucrative than the majority of active NFL players, completely resetting the market for other top NFL broadcasters in the process.

But recent seasons have been much less kind to the former Dallas Cowboys quarterback. Romo’s once-prescient commentary has grown more generic. And as other young analysts like Greg Olsen and J.J. Watt have made the transition from the field to the booth, bringing with them new-age knowledge of the game and its current crop of players, Romo’s analysis has grown stale by comparison.

Sunday’s Wild Card game between the Buffalo Bills and Jacksonville Jaguars could mark the beginning of the end for Romo’s career as a No. 1 broadcaster. The veteran analyst spent much of the game generating more confusion than clarity for viewers, and fell into the same tropes that he’s become increasingly known for in recent years.

First, Romo opened the broadcast comparing the Jaguars, who entered Sunday’s game as a small favorite, to the Carolina Panthers, who entered their Saturday game against the Los Angeles Rams as 10-point underdogs.

“Today’s going to be very telling, though, because Jacksonville is a complete football team. Carolina did that yesterday. They earned the respect, almost won, but they didn’t,” Romo said as he teed up the game. “Jacksonville is in that same situation. They could do it, this could be a major upset. Even though it’s really not an upset, because the Bills are actually the underdog. But they’re the overdog. We’ll see today.”

Romo off to a hot start….This could be a major upset like Carolina yesterday even though they are favored…. pic.twitter.com/e8pX4K5v5D

— Dave Portnoy (@stoolpresidente) January 11, 2026

Strike one.

Shortly after, he and Nantz failed to fully acknowledge a possible injury to Josh Allen after a third-down rush that sent the star quarterback to the blue medical tent. Instead, the booth spent their time digging further into a kicking storyline featuring 19-year veteran Matt Prater and cannon-for-leg kicker Cam Little of the Jaguars. Viewers were left in the dark on Allen until after a commercial break, when sideline reporter Tracy Wolfson reported Allen had undergone and cleared the concussion protocol.

Strike two.

Then there was Allen’s rushing touchdown late in the second half, which Romo bizarrely called into question, citing confusion among the officials on the field, despite no indication from the broadcast’s footage that there was any question about the score. Moments later, the Bills were lining up for an extra point, and there was no explanation until after a commercial, when CBS rules analyst Gene Steratore clarified what happened on the play.

Strike three.

These are all small, seemingly innocuous, individual moments. It’s easy to nitpick any broadcaster in this way. But Romo’s blunders have become consistent. Even he admitted that some criticism was warranted. CBS took the extreme measure of staging an “intervention” of sorts with Romo before the 2022-23 season, after outside noise reached a fever pitch.

That intervention hasn’t had the desired effect in the years since. Romo continues to take incoming from all angles. During arguably the biggest regular-season game of the year between the Bills and the Kansas City Chiefs, Romo found it opportune to have conversations with himself, make some of his signature weird noises, and praise Patrick Mahomes for throwing balls in the dirt. Prominent sports media critics like Andrew Marchand have written about how Romo and Nantz have regressed as a team.

Romo’s shtick has grown tired. At the same time, fans have become enamored with the likes of Olsen and Watt, both of whom bring a level of charisma and preparedness that makes Romo seem like yesterday’s news.

When listening to a game called by either Olsen or Watt, viewers are treated to substantive analysis paired with just the right amount of lightheartedness. Romo, on the other hand, offers little in the way of substance, using signature catchphrases like “Here we go, Jim!” as a crutch.

As the Wall Street Journal‘s Joe Flint noted during Sunday’s broadcast, Romo has a tendency to make any old third down in the first quarter feel like a do-or-die moment in a game when, in reality, it isn’t. In the absence of analysis, Romo falls back on hyperbole. And after years of stagnation, the act has grown stale.

For the first time, it feels like there is real momentum towards a change in CBS’s top NFL booth. In just over two years, CBS will broadcast Super Bowl LXII. The network is officially on the clock when it comes to deciding who it wants in that Super Bowl booth.

Sitting in the network’s No. 2 slot are arguably two of the most beloved NFL announcers calling games today. Ian Eagle and J.J. Watt finished ahead of Nantz and Romo in Awful Announcing’s annual NFL announcer rankings, as voted by our readers. Eagle and Watt have only grown more comfortable with each other throughout Year 1 of their partnership, and there should be an expectation that they continue to improve in Year 2 and beyond. On the other hand, Romo continues to regress, and even Nantz’s Hall of Fame broadcasting credentials aren’t enough to keep the booth at the level a top team should be operating at.

Complicating matters is Romo’s contract situation, which runs through 2030 at the hefty price of $18 million per year. The idea of demoting your highest-paid broadcaster and leaving someone of Nantz’s stature on the bench for a Super Bowl seems borderline unthinkable. Yet, it’s far from crazy to think that by 2028, Eagle and Watt could be seen as the far superior team.

It’s worth noting, CBS will have an opening on its studio show come next season, as Matt Ryan recently departed to serve as president of football for the Atlanta Falcons. CBS has a history of moving top NFL analysts from the booth to the studio, having done so with Phil Simms to make way for Tony Romo in 2017. Perhaps that’s a potential way forward should the network decide it’s time to move on from Romo in its top booth.

It’s also worth noting that a Romo demotion wouldn’t necessarily mean moving on from Nantz as the network’s top NFL voice. For one, Nantz could easily have stipulations in his contract guaranteeing his spot atop CBS’s NFL roster. Maybe the network would be more likely to simply pair Watt with Nantz and backfill the No. 2 analyst spot alongside Eagle. There’s also the likelihood that Prime Video’s Thursday Night Football job becomes open following the 2026-27 season if 81-year-old Al Michaels retires. That could hypothetically provide a soft landing for Nantz if CBS decides it wants to elevate the Eagle/Watt duo.

Whatever the case, CBS Sports president David Berson will have a very tough decision on his hands in the next 24 months if his No. 1 and No. 2 teams continue to trend in their current directions.