Cris Collinsworth has been a part of the NFL media ecosystem for 35 years. He’s been the lead analyst for NBC’s Sunday Night Football since replacing John Madden all the way back in 2009. Before that he was a longtime fixture in the studio and broadcast booth for Fox, HBO, and his original run at NBC. And he’s not stopping anytime soon.
According to a report from Andrew Marchand at The Athletic, Collinsworth is about to sign a new contract extension with NBC that would keep him as the lead analyst for Sunday Night Football for many years to come. Collinsworth’s new contract could take him all the way to NBC’s broadcast of Super Bowl LXIV in early 2030. That would mean a tenure of over 20 years in the SNF booth when he would be 71 years old.
Top NFL analyst jobs are incredibly hard to find. In fact, there’s only five of them in the industry – Fox, CBS, NBC, ESPN, and Amazon. And they often come with an incredible amount of job security because of the investment networks make in these personalities. Only in very rare circumstances has someone been pulled from that position because of performance (Jason Witten) or in the case of Greg Olsen, being replaced by Tom Brady.
And as luck would have it, Collinsworth’s upcoming extension at NBC probably effects Olsen the most.
Ever since being leapfrogged by Brady, Olsen has been the ultimate professional. He’s spoken highly of his relationship with Brady, how supportive he is of their work together at Fox, and how excited he is to work with Joe Davis. But Olsen has also spoken openly about his desire to be a #1 analyst at a major network again, whether it’s at Fox Sports or elsewhere.
“My goals and aspirations, if anything, have even gotten more committed to I want to call top games. I want to call games in front of 57 million people and dive into the biggest moments…where that is, how that is, when that is, I don’t know. There are so many moving parts out of my control. But my goal is to be a top A broadcaster again. I’m gonna do everything in my power to achieve that.”
Olsen deserves that opportunity. He’s literally the Sports Emmy winner for Best Game Analyst and it’s hard to argue with that honor. The only issue is there are no opportunities available.
Each network that televises the NFL now has their lead analysts locked in for multiple seasons. The only one that hasn’t been publicly reported is the length of Kirk Herbstreit’s Amazon deal. However, when he signed a contract extension at ESPN, Herbie made it very clear that he intended to keep pulling double duty to cover the college game for ESPN and the NFL for Amazon for the foreseeable future.
ESPN: Troy Aikman signed through 2027 season.
NBC: Cris Collinsworth signed through 2029 season.
CBS: Tony Romo signed through 2030 season.
Fox: Tom Brady signed through 2033 season.
Where can Olsen slot in? NBC was thought to be the next opening possible with a pending Cris Collinsworth retirement. The network was clearly planning for Collinsworth’s successor when they hired Drew Brees a few years ago, but Brees’ television career ended after one season thanks in large part to his poor performance calling an NFL playoff game with Mike Tirico. And Brees has yet to return to TV to this day. But Collinsworth’s form hasn’t slipped yet, so the network must be thinking that if his partnership with Mike Tirico isn’t broke, there’s no need to fix it.
The same could be said about ESPN. Joe Buck and Troy Aikman are pretty much a package deal at this point. And although they have seemingly been around forever, they are both still at the top of their games. When their contracts with ESPN come up later this decade, it should be a formality that the network would want to keep them unless the pair is ready for new challenges. Buck and Aikman would both be around 60 when it comes to decide, which would mean they could have another 10 years calling games if they wanted, well into the 2030s.
Then there is CBS. Tony Romo set the bar with broadcast contracts when CBS signed him to a 10 year, $180 million deal in 2020. Romo’s seat may be the hottest of the group given the criticism that has risen in recent years, but there’s no way CBS is getting out of that contract unless Romo turns into Monty from the Major League movies.
NBC was clearly the cleanest track for Greg Olsen to get a top analyst job again. He is even partnered with Mike Tirico on the newest iteration of Madden! But alas, it looks like it’s not going to come to pass. And now it may be a long time before it ever will.
