College announcers reportedly may be used to call ‘Monday Night Football’ games
When fans tune to “Monday Night Football” this fall, they know Joe Tessitore and Booger McFarland won’t be calling games.
ESPN announced last month that the duo wouldn’t return to the broadcast booth but without saying who would be taking over. ESPN had pursued Peyton Manning, but he turned down the network. It also tried to “acquire” Al Michaels, but that didn’t happen.
With the college football season in question because of the COVID-19 pandemic, ESPN may turn to announcers that viewers are used to seeing on Saturdays to fill the Monday night void.
This is from a Front Office Sports story: “If college football’s fall season is delayed or, at worst, canceled, ESPN will likely turn to its top college football broadcast team of analyst Kirk Herbstreit and play-by-play announcer Chris Fowler to call ‘MNF’.”
The New York Post reported earlier this year that ESPN’s top candidates to take over on “Monday Night Football” are Steve Levy, Louis Riddick and Dan Orlovsky.
However, with no announcement having been made, perhaps ESPN is leaving the door open for Fowler and Herbstreit.
James Andrew Miller, who wrote a book about ESPN, told Sports Illustrated in March the network could be messing with a good thing by having Fowler and Herbstreit on “Monday Night Football.”
“I think that they have to start understanding what they can do internally,” Miller said about replacing Tessitore/McFarland. “I think the big, big question that’s always been there is, do they want to rob Peter to pay Paul? Do they want to mess around with the Chris Fowler-Kirk Herbstreit dynamic on college football? ESPN spent more than $25 billion securing college football rights. They spent $15.3 billion on the last NFL contract. They’ve spent more on college football. The national championship, they’ve spent a ton on. That’s one of the biggest questions they face.”
