Al Michaels says Howard Cosell turned ‘bitter’ at the end of his career: ‘Very difficult to work with’

Howard Cosell’s outspoken, provocative, and oft-polarizing style redefined sportscasting, but Al Michaels remembers it also making him difficult to work with at the end of his career.

Michaels joined The Dan Patrick Show on Thursday morning to preview this week’s Thursday Night Football matchup on Prime Video. During the segment, Patrick asked Michaels about the challenge of building chemistry with an analyst in the booth, which led to a question about dealing with Cosell’s ego earlier in his career.

Michaels recalled Cosell being a lot of fun to work with at first because you would always walk away with a great story. And he has a million of them to tell. But toward the end of Cosell’s career, working together became less fun and more challenging.

“He got – toward the end of his career and life – just became bitter,” Michaels told Patrick. “And it became very, very difficult to work with him in 1984 and 1985, and finally, that was the end of Howard’s broadcasting career.

“In the 70s and early 80s, I did a couple of World Series with him as well; he was fun. I would go home and have five stories from the night before. And then after that, he just grew tired of everything at the end, so it wasn’t a pleasant departure.”

Cosell made a career out of telling it like it is, and he inspired a generation of sportscasters and journalists to follow suit. Ironically, Cosell didn’t take criticism well, contributing to what was an unceremonious end to his sportscasting career.

His deteriorated relationship with sports was well-documented. In his book, I Never Played the Game, Cosell detailed his changed view of sports after a decade in the industry, noting he gave his all to ABC and “they’ve made hundreds of millions of dollars out of my efforts.” That same book also caused ABC to pull Cosell from their 1985 World Series coverage because of things he wrote about colleagues.

Cosell’s sportscasting career ended in 1985 at 68 years old, and he was just 77 when he died. Michaels is now 80 and in his 40th year of calling football in prime time, an impressive feat. And say what you want about Michaels losing something off his fastball, games still feel special when he’s on the call.