After years of saying he can’t waste time thinking about Tom Brady the broadcaster, it’s now finally time for Kevin Burkhardt to start thinking about Tom Brady the broadcaster.
Burkhardt has known Tom Brady was going to be his eventual partner in the booth for nearly two years now. But in those two years, Burkhardt largely deflected questions about Brady’s looming presence by remaining focused on working alongside Greg Olsen for Fox. Now that their season is over, Olsen is out, to no fault of his own, Brady is in, and Burkhardt is no longer deflecting the topic.
Burkhardt joined The Rich Eisen Show on Tuesday and during the interview, the Fox play-by-play voice was asked about what he expects from Brady as his new broadcast partner and how they’re already preparing for next season.
Next season, lead @NFLonFOX voice @kevinburkhardt will have a new broadcast partner and a very famous one at that — @TomBrady will join the booth for 2024:#NFL #SuperBowl pic.twitter.com/OSP8cvYeLF
— Rich Eisen Show (@RichEisenShow) February 6, 2024
“You have to have the relationships for it to work…You have to a friendship, a relationship, a trust, all of that in both avenues otherwise it just doesn’t fly,” Burkhardt said, which is something he had with Olsen. “Of all the things, we’ve had a couple rehearsals, it’s been fun, working on the craft, but also just getting to know…I know Tom the football player, but getting to know what makes him tick off the field is going to be important for us.”
Burkhardt explained that a lot of times great players have a hard time recognizing something seemingly common to them can be interesting for the audience. “It’s almost making them realize, ‘That is awesome to everyone at home. Maybe to you it’s common, but not to me.’”
“There’s a lot to draw from. And there’s a lot to relate to,” Burkhardt said of Brady. “I’m going to be interested to see how he sees it in real time. Because that’s the one thing that we’ve never seen. Talk to him pregame, postgame, spend a lot of time in production meetings with him, but how does he see it in real time as it’s happening? That’s going to be fascinating.”
After years of speculation surrounding Brady’s $375 million contract with Fox and whether he would ever call a game for the network, everyone is now buying into the fact that he will be their lead NFL analyst next season. How well he performs, especially in the wake of Olsen’s popularity, is going to be fascinating indeed.
About Brandon Contes
Brandon Contes is a staff writer for Awful Announcing and The Comeback. He previously helped carve the sports vertical for Mediaite and spent more than three years with Barrett Sports Media. Send tips/comments/complaints to bcontes@thecomeback.com