How Three All-Time Greats and Former Rivals Formed MLB’s Most Compelling Studio Show

LOS ANGELES – Under an unseasonably sweltering Southern California sun, David Ortiz is an easy man to spot. As stadium vendors, media members and security workers pace in and around Dodger Stadium on a cloudless day in weather-combating garb, the man who years ago etched himself into October lore is dressed head to toe in all black (apart from a sparkling iced-out watch). That includes wraparound sunglasses, which he wears for the duration of our conversation inside of Fox’s green room trailer set up in the parking lot.

Compared to his crewmates on MLB on Fox, Ortiz certainly qualifies as overdressed: Derek Jeter, Alex Rodriguez and Kevin Burkhardt are all in various states of athleisure-inspired fits hours before first pitch of Game 3 of the NLCS. Eventually, Ortiz’s shades become impossible to ignore.

“A lot of sun in here, Papi,” Rodriguez needles. “The sun is blazing.”

“I just keep it gangsta,” Ortiz quips back.

Spend any amount of time in the quartet’s orbit, and such interactions quickly become routine. On or off the air, the show strives for a loose clubhouse vibe—all part of the design for baseball’s most star-studded studio show.

The effect of such a laid-back atmosphere can be jarring at first. If you made a list of the players who defined the era for millennial-aged baseball fans, the names Jeter, Rodriguez and Ortiz would likely top it. Now more than a decade removed from their last official at-bats, the three remain permanent fixtures during the game’s most consequential month thanks to their second acts as TV talking heads.

In many ways, their paths to the small screen follow the script of every big name athlete-turned-analyst. And in some, they’re completely unique. All sports studio shows of the MLB on Fox ilk have big names with big personalities (or, at the very least, loud personalities). These programs are populated by former players and coaches who bring a wealth of knowledge, can communicate the intricacies of the game to help audiences better understand them and, hopefully, be entertaining during the downtime between the action.

But few, if any, employ an entire desk of former players who all reside within the innermost circle of the greatest to ever play the game. And in their own way, this trio has combined their unique skill sets to create a studio show that has its own signature feel while showcasing stars who often shine brighter than the players they’re covering.

To hear Rodriguez tell it, working in TV was not in the cards as an option for his post-playing life.

“Never,” Rodriguez says when asked at what point, as a player, did he consider getting into broadcasting. “If somebody said to me [I would be working in TV], I would have bet against that. I never thought about it once.”

In some ways, that notion feels entirely believable. The last few seasons of Rodriguez’s career were, to put it mildly, turbulent. After years of being linked with—and strenuously (and litigiously) denying—using PEDs, eventually, the truth emerged. Rodriguez missed the entire 2014 season while serving a 162-game suspension. He returned from exile the following year a disgraced fallen star—”a pariah,” as he puts it—trying to cling to the dying embers of a singularly dazzling, often frustrating, and altogether mystifying career.

But he still had one last productive year in him. In 2015, his age-39 season, he played in 151 games—his most since ‘07—and hit a team-leading 33 home runs, taking the first steps in reshaping his story. When the Yankees were eliminated in that year’s wild-card game, he joined Fox as a guest studio analyst for the network’s playoff coverage. A year after being perhaps the most derided figures in all of baseball, here he was with a seat at the table during the most-watched time of the season and a platform to address millions of fans, many of whom held nothing but disdain for him.

“Nobody wanted to deal with me. That process, I was going through a bunch of therapy, just trying to get my life together,” Rodriguez says. “Baseball was secondary, media was, like, forget it. So when Fox took a shot with me, I was very fortunate, very grateful.”

As a baseball prospect, a teenaged Rodriguez was heralded as one of the best prep players anybody could remember seeing. But even in his first profession, he scuffled through two brief cameos in the big leagues before finding stardom at 20. Similarly, as a broadcaster, there was a bit of a learning curve.

To find success in his new venture, Rodriguez committed to quickly learning the ropes. He prioritized connecting with Burkhardt, by then the show’s host, to immerse himself with the ins and outs of working in TV.

“Our first day, we spent, like, two and a half hours practicing. I feel like a jerk, looking back—we’re in an empty studio, him and I, in our same seats that we sit in now, and literally my knees were shaking,” Rodriguez recalls. “There was nobody in the studio—like, fake camera, no cameraman.”

As amusing as it is to imagine Rodriguez—someone who had spent over half his life in the public eye—feeling jitters in an empty studio, the veteran Burkhardt appreciates how difficult a challenge it can be for retired athletes to make the transition to working on live television.

“We just expect guys to get done playing, throw on a microphone and be like, Oh, he’s gonna be f—ing great on TV,” Burkhardt says. “Well, why? Because he can talk? Like, there’s a lot more to it … With Alex, he came in [to rehearse in-studio] and was like, ‘Where do I look?’ Things that I take for granted because I’ve been doing it for a long time.”

In short order, though, Rodriguez took to his new calling. He joined Fox as a guest analyst for the 2015 and ‘16 postseasons before signing on to the show full-time in ‘17. In the years that have followed, he’s embraced the baseball-obsessed part of himself to forge an on-screen persona that’s a fan first. He’s also, perhaps much to the surprise of audiences who had long ago reached their own conclusions about him, found ways to showcase a more fun, carefree side of his public image.

An early example came during the 2018 playoffs, when the Yankees and Red Sox met in the division series. Rodriguez and Ortiz made a bet that whoever’s team lost the series would have to wear the opposite jersey on-air. When Boston won, Rodriguez paid up, donning a Red Sox jersey while Ortiz doused him with champagne.

The segment showcased a breeziness that, throughout most of his playing days, felt inaccessible to fans who had followed Rodriguez’s career. This was a player who was booed nearly everywhere he went, scrutinized constantly and endured a very public and spectacular fall from grace. Now, thanks to a role that he’d wrapped both arms around, Rodriguez was able to show a new side of himself to the baseball public in a way that he’d previously been unable to.

“I was convinced early on that they’re never going to do anything to make me look bad. I’m not an entertainment guy, I’m a novice … I was surprised [at] how well [the segment] was received and how some self-deprecation actually went a long way,” Rodriguez says.

(Self-deprecation is a consistent theme for Rodriguez at the desk. During the pregame show ahead of Game 3 of the NLCS, Burkhardt posed a question to the group about the Dodgers’ struggling bats. Rodriguez chimed in first: “Don’t ask them, they never struggled in October. I have plenty of experience there.”)

Stunts like that are all part of the show’s philosophy of putting their talent in a position to succeed, both by tapping into each personality’s strong suits and trying to discover some hidden strengths along the way.

“I think the biggest thing is credibility,” says coordinating producer and VP of production Bardia Shah-Rais, who also produces Fox’s Big Noon Kickoff college football pregame show. “Are they credible? Can they speak to the moment? Do they have a fun gear? Are they gonna be entertaining? Can they laugh at themselves? It’s easier to give feedback to someone who could laugh at themselves because they’re not going to take it personally.”

While Rodriguez’s fun gear might have caught some by surprise, the same cannot be said for Ortiz.

During his playing career, Big Papi was defined by the big moments, and the way he wore his enthusiasm on his sleeves seemingly at all times. His heroics during the 2004 postseason, when the Red Sox erased a 3–0 ALCS deficit against the Yankees and eventually ended their 86-year World Series drought, solidified his status as a legendary figure. His play over the following decade-plus—two more championships and a World Series MVP before retiring with 541 home runs—ensured he would become a Hall of Famer.

When he retired after the 2016 season, Ortiz didn’t have his post-baseball plan fully mapped out, and had some reservations about turning to broadcasting. But for someone who so naturally thrived in the spotlight as a player, the opportunity to be a part of MLB on Fox was the right fit, so he joined as a guest analyst the following October and took on a full-time role in ‘18.

“When my agent first came to me with the idea of [working in TV], it was something that I had a lot of questions [about],” Ortiz says. “I had just retired, wanted to get to spend some time with my family, stuff like that. … But I know a lot of guys, when they retire, they don’t know what to do with their life. They kind of go away, you don’t hear too much from them. So I figured that working on TV was something that was gonna keep my focus. I’m glad I did it.”

His penchant for clutch moments was surpassed by his naturally exuberant demeanor, which made him a perfect fit for the vibe the show was going for. It didn’t take long for Fox to realize it had a budding TV star on its hands.

“We want everyone to be true to themselves. David Ortiz is naturally fun,” Shah-Rais says. “If you’re around him for five minutes, he’s gonna light up the room with his personality … If someone isn’t like that, we never want someone to be who they’re not. We’re not gonna produce Urban Meyer the way we produce David.”

Where his on-screen persona is full of high-energy showmanship, Ortiz takes a more down-shifted tenor throughout our conversation, almost as if he’s saving some juice for showtime. Which is understandable if you’ve watched the show before, as it usually doesn’t take long for some aspect of the broadcast to light a fire within the 10-time All-Star.

And there’s nothing that does so quite like when the Yankees lose. The franchise hasn’t won a World Series since 2009, and the night when the team gets eliminated from the playoffs has become MLB on Fox’s version of appointment viewing because of the jubilation with which Ortiz celebrates the moment.

Take this year, for example, when the Yankees were unceremoniously swept by the Rays in the division series. During the show that night, Ortiz welcomed the Yankees to “Chilligan’s Island” and poured tequila shots for Jeter, Rodriguez and Burkhardt. He led them all in a toast and unleashed his now-signature catchphrase, an inversion of the famous call by the late John Sterling: “Daaaaa Yankees lose!”

The reaction this draws from the group, particularly from Jeter, is what makes segments like this really shine. The buttoned-up Captain is typically more than happy to go along with any on-air hijinks, but in these instances, he leads with Yankees loyalty and carries just enough quiet disgust to perfectly sell the bit that he’s not too pleased with all the revelry.

“I think it means more to him than actually Boston winning, you know what I mean? So, you give a good chuckle. But it gets to be annoying,” Jeter says in pitch-perfect deadpan. “He doesn’t really look in the mirror … It's therapeutic for him. If it helps him sleep better at night, then I’m all for it.”

Ortiz is well aware of the effect these antics have on his colleagues. Though he’s used the catchphrase for years, he says its popularity really took off after last year’s ALDS, when Blue Jays star Vladimir Guerrero Jr. cheerfully (and repeatedly) said the phrase to Ortiz during a clubhouse interview after Toronto eliminated New York in four games. Now, it’s become so commonplace, he hears it shouted at him wherever he goes—even by a customs agent checking his passport in Toronto as the crew traveled for last year’s World Series.

“The Yankees organization, I respect it, just like I respect any other. It’s nothing personal,” Ortiz says. “This is one of the top organizations in the game, without a doubt … But we are entertainers now, you know? You visualize things through a different view point to entertain people.”

Ortiz’s superpower in this space lies in his ability to be entertaining even when it looks like he isn’t trying to. It’s something Shah-Rais says he encourages Ortiz to do—lean into his larger-than-life persona rather than worry about asking the perfect interview question.

“One thing we always preach is the reason we hired him is because we want him to be himself, we want him to be Big Papi. If we didn’t, we’re doing him a disservice by neutering his personality.”

Where Rodriguez brings a self-proclaimed baseball nerdiness and Ortiz brings the theatricality, Jeter operates on a different frequency. He’s the closest thing baseball has to Michael Jordan—an intense competitor, consistent winner and the one who most frequently appeared on posters in current players’ childhood bedrooms. If there is such a thing as a white whale in baseball media, Jeter is it.

Unlike his fellow analysts, the five-time champion didn’t turn to broadcasting immediately after retiring. His post-playing ventures included launching The Players’ Tribune, buying an ownership stake in the Marlins and various other business enterprises. But a guest appearance during the 2022 World Series in Philadelphia piqued his interest, and he joined full-time the following year.

It was a landmark acquisition for the show to add such a towering figure after Jeter had spent nearly a decade avoiding the call to join the media.

“When they’re like, ‘Hey, would you like to have Derek Jeter on the show?’ The answer is, ‘Yeah, can we do it tomorrow? Can we do it yesterday?’” Shah-Rais says. “He’s been an incredible addition, he brings massive credibility. He craves feedback … We send him notes every night on things that he did well or things he could improve on. Never once has he, like, bristled at it or rolled his eyes. He totally gets it.”

Jeter is the steady fulcrum between Rodriguez and Ortiz. His mere presence at the desk ups the wattage of the whole production and elevates the group’s already sky-high stature. One of the most notable aspects of his new role is the reaction he gets from active players when they come for postgame interviews. Even though some were still in grade school by the time Jeter hung up his spikes, they still marvel at being in the company of baseball royalty.

“We have people come to the desk and they say they looked up to us and watched us or are big fans. But at the same time, we’re still fans of the game, so we’re fans of them as well,” Jeter says. “So I think the feeling is mutual … Just as happy as they are to come to the desk, we’re also excited to talk to them and, in some cases, introduce them to the rest of the world.”

In many ways, that’s what MLB on Fox has done for Jeter, a man who needs no introduction but now has a direct line to baseball fans after spending much of his post-playing days outside the public eye. There’s no gimmicks, no schtick—just Jeter lending his Mr. November mystique to an already A-list cast.

When it comes time to start the broadcast, all three analysts follow Burkhardt’s lead. The veteran host—lauded by everyone attached to the show as “egoless” and a “true point guard”—seemlessly keeps the trio of stars involved in the conversation, giving time for one-liners to breathe and analysis to develop organically.

All three of Jeter, Rodriguez and Ortiz took time to heap praise on Burkhardt’s ability to wear many hats, to go from lighthearted banter to serious reporting (says A-Rod of Burkhardt in rare times of more sober on-air moments: “He just turns into Tom Brokaw”). For a group of former players that never envisioned themselves as TV personalities, Burkhardt is their North Star that keeps everything running on time.

“In my view, we want to be a good hang,” Burkhardt says. “I think if you’re a good hang, that involves, we can all make fun of each other. … They are great enough dudes that we all take shots at each other. I think that’s why it works, because people tune in and they all know who they are, they’re three of the greatest to ever do it. But they feel like they know them.”

The familiar nature of it all gives the show the type of equilibrium most TV products strive for: credibility, sure, but also distinct personalities and viewpoints that complement each other well and make for good company to have in your living room before and after big games. For all the individual swagger each member brings to the table, it’s the ability to play off one another that keeps things humming.

After Game 3 concluded with the Brewers earning a 6–2 win to take a 3–0 series lead, postgame talk inevitably centered around the most famous 3–0 lead in all of sports: the 2004 ALCS that prominently featured all three of the show’s stars. If any tension ever existed between the trio about the subject, it’s long since evaporated, replaced with digs and faux-disdain—Jeter opines, “I don’t want to talk about this.” Rodriguez responds, “It’s like therapy for us,” all while Ortiz cackles in amusement.

Red Sox–Yankees talk is prominently featured throughout the show, not necessarily because of any East Coast, big-market bias, but because that’s fertile territory for the three stars to draw on their experiences to fuel the most compelling conversations possible. At various points friends, teammates and rivals, they now comfortably exist to share their insights alongside the sport’s biggest moments.

“It’s such a subjective thing, right? Some people may think it’s great, some people may think you’re a buffoon,” Rodriguez says. “It’s up to the audience watching. When I go home, sometimes I watch a replay of our show … I look at it like, I’m learning something from all three of them every day. So that makes it interesting to me.”