Joe Buck says Caleb Williams snubbed ‘MNF’ booth twice

Caleb Williams admitted to missing his Monday Night Football meeting with Troy Aikman in Week 6, but Joe Buck says the same thing happened Week 1.

Forget about Jordan Love, Aikman might be Caleb Williams’ biggest rival right now. The perceived rivalry began after Aikman was widely accused of having an anti-Caleb Williams bias during the Chicago Bears Week 6 win over the Washington Commanders on Monday Night Football. There was a belief some of Aikman’s criticisms didn’t fit within the flow of the broadcast considering Williams scored two touchdowns and didn’t commit a turnover in the win.

Caleb Williams later acknowledged he missed his production meeting ahead of the broadcast. But would missing a meeting be cause for added criticism from Aikman? How about missing two meetings?

Joe Buck joined the latest episode of SI Media with Jimmy Traina where he was asked about Aikman’s perceived feud with Williams earlier this season, and whether it stemmed from a missed meeting. And Buck did confirm Williams missed a meeting, in fact, he missed two.

“We understand you guys are busy. You’re preparing for a game. The last thing you probably want to do is talk to us. It’s kind of part of the drill, but we will do it when it works for you, on your schedule,” Buck said while explaining most of these meetings are done remotely via Zoom, allowing them to work around the team’s schedule.

Joe Buck and Troy Aikman were apparently willing to meet with Caleb Williams on his schedule before Week 1, when Chicago played the Minnesota Vikings. They were also willing to meet with Williams on his schedule before the Bears returned to Monday Night Football Week 6. And according to Buck, Williams didn’t show up for either meeting.

“We had that same issue Week 1 with Caleb,” Buck told Traina. “And then we had it again. I guess he brought it up saying, ‘Well, I didn’t talk to Troy before the game.’ But we sat on a Zoom waiting forever and he just never came! I don’t know what else we can do.”

Buck also took issue with Williams initially implying it was Aikman who didn’t show up for the meeting when the Bears quarterback claimed he tried calling a day late and it didn’t go through.

“That’s the part that bothered me the most…this was on your guys’ schedule. And we sat there and we had it happen twice within the first six or seven weeks…I thought the intimation that we weren’t there or [Aikman] wasn’t there was not an accurate description of how that all went down.”

To be clear, Joe Buck didn’t think Troy Aikman’s commentary or analysis of Caleb Williams was over the top. “Troy was great,” Buck said of the broadcast. Aikman has similarly pushed back on the notion that he had any sort of axe to grind with Williams. And maybe they tried to call the game without any bias, but after Williams missed two scheduled Zoom meetings in six weeks, you can understand Aikman feeling a little slighted.