As sports fans, we’re all accustomed to seeing former athletes try to launch a second act as a media personality after their playing days are over. One look at the top NFL broadcast booths, and nearly every single one has a former player sitting next to the play-by-play voice as a game analyst.
But that doesn’t mean that every former player that tries to carve out a career in media becomes a success story. In fact, according to one veteran play-by-play announcer, those individuals are the exception, not the rule.
Longtime broadcaster Jon “Boog” Sciambi believes that most ex-athletes don’t have what it takes. “It’s hard to be an analyst,” he said on a recent clip released by the Pablo Torre Finds Out YouTube channel. “If you’re betting on it, more often than not these guys [that] come to become color analysts, they’re not very good.”
“There’s so many reasons for it. I mean, I would say number one is they’re not going to respect it and put the work into it that they put into their game. But then the next part that I would say … is just this idea of like, when Tom Brady’s playing the other team, he doesn’t know the first and last name of all 11 on the other side. He knows the corner’s bad and he can pick on him, but he doesn’t know his first and last name. When the ball’s thrown to him and he’s broadcasting a game, he’s got to say his first and last name. And accessing that is a completely different skill set than the idea of, ‘Oh he’s open, I can throw it to him.’ Like, it’s completely different.”
On the one hand, Sciambi’s remarks make it all the more impressive that so many ex-athletes are doing it at a high level. Not only have they become some of the best at their craft on-the-field, but they’ve accomplished the same off-the-field as well.
But there can be a fine line between a broadcaster who has earned the prestige of a top job, and one that is getting thrust into a position based on name recognition alone. This is the debate currently going on with Tom Brady, who vaulted straight into Fox’s top gig without any broadcasting experience. Similarly, J.J. Watt is debuting as the No. 2 analyst for CBS this NFL season with little experience in a broadcast booth.
If Sciambi’s assessment is right, as networks continue to value the sizzle of placing big name ex-athletes on their top broadcast teams, the overall quality of announcing could very well take a hit.
About Drew Lerner
Drew Lerner is a staff writer for Awful Announcing and an aspiring cable subscriber. He previously covered sports media for Sports Media Watch. Future beat writer for the Oasis reunion tour.