For years, Greg Olsen has been tipped for broadcasting in his post-playing days.
Now, after a season with the Seahawks, Olsen himself announced on Fox’s pregame show that those days have arrived.
Welcome to the @FOXSports family!@gregolsen88 announces his retirement from the NFL after 14 seasons as he gets set to start his career in the booth at FOX! pic.twitter.com/ccQaBy6r1S
— FOX Sports: NFL (@NFLonFOX) January 24, 2021
This isn’t a surprise, as Olsen has talked openly about his desires to go into broadcasting, and indeed has done work for both Fox and ESPN in the past. (His prior Fox work came while he was still an active player, albeit injured, and it caused some in the league to complain.)
It’s probably not a surprise that Olsen is definitively calling it a career. In addition to battling injuries and age, Olsen once told Dan Patrick that as soon as you’re thinking of retiring, that’s the time to do it.
OLSEN: First and foremost, if you’re on the fence at all about playing, you probably shouldn’t play. In order to play and continue to play at a high level, you have to be all in. Up to this point for the most part I have been. I’ve had some injury issues, and any time you’re injured and on the shelf, you ask yourself do I want to continue to rehab, do I want to continue to go through this now the third year in a row. And the answer is yes.
[…]
To your point, the last couple years we did have some different TV offers and opportunities come along, but they weren’t the right opportunities. It wasn’t something I just couldn’t turn down because it might never come again…Jason [Witten] and Monday Night Football, that’s one of those jobs that if that’s put in front of you, even if you think you still want to play, you have to at least think it through. Because you might never have that opportunity given to you again.
Olsen told us he wasn’t going to hedge on this decision, and now he hasn’t. Considering he’s been able to amass broadcast experience already (where he’s been well-received, too) and that he’s just out of the league, Olsen should slide in comfortably wherever Fox decides to put him. This feels like a good move for everyone involved, including viewers.
