ESPN’s Chris Fowler is pulling some serious double duty this weekend.
On Friday, Fowler was on the call for the U.S. Open men’s semifinal between Ben Shelton and Frances Tiafoe. After that, he jumped on a private jet to get to Texas, where he called the Longhorns’ epic comeback against No. 1 Ohio State on Saturday night.
The Ohio State-Texas finish, with ESPN’s Chris Fowler and Kirk Herbstreit on the call for ABC. 🏈🎙️ https://t.co/oSizdt3Lpi pic.twitter.com/IH3pWWIecb
— Awful Announcing (@awfulannouncing) September 13, 2026
Now, on Sunday, he is back in New York preparing to call the men’s final, where Shelton will look to take down Alexander Zverev and become the first American man to win a Grand Slam in two decades.
That’s a busy weekend, but Fowler knows it’s the type of busy that makes for a career highlight.
“They are my two favorite sports and I get to call the championship events in them,” Fowler told Greg Rajan of the Houston Chronicle on Saturday between his first two assignments of the weekend. “So that’s a dream job. I live in the dream I had since I’m 10 years old.”
“Probably nothing [before compares] to the one-two-three punch of these days. Probably not equal to that.”
That praise came before Saturday night’s drama in Texas, and with a potential barnburner of a tennis match on Sunday with history on the line, the weekend could get even more thrilling.
As Fowler explained, the packed schedule does force him to change his preparation, and to compartmentalize the sports from each other in his mind.
“I don’t have one eye on tennis and one eye on football. You have to have both eyes on exactly what you’re doing because it requires that, right? So there’s no thought of football during [Tiafoe-Shelton].”
But once the tennis match came to a close, it was straight to work on football.
“On the ride to the airport, I got the chart out on the plane last night. I’m not sleeping. I’m looking at Texas State versus Texas [last week]. I hadn’t had a chance during the week to watch tape, and that’s essential. So that that got pushed to Friday night in the wee hours, and I’m looking at my 38-page analytic report. Every aspect of this matchup dissected and it;s a tremendous mountain of information that you don’t want to smother the game with, but it’s good to know it.”
Sunday’s tennis match is set to start at 2 p.m. ET, in the middle of the first full slate of the NFL season, a baseball schedule loaded with postseason implications, and the gold medal match of the FIBA Women’s World Cup, just to name a few. But even with all of that going on, it’s likely no broadcaster is as busy as Fowler this weekend, and it sounds like he wouldn’t change a thing.
About Tyler Lauletta
Tyler is a editorial contributor at Awful Announcing, with previous stops at Sports Illustrated and Business Insider during his career covering sports in digital media. He is, begrudgingly, a Truster of the Process and general Philly sports sicko.