Kevin Burkhardt sees a side of Tom Brady that fans rarely get to witness, long before the NFL legend steps into the broadcast booth.
Burkhardt joined Julian Edelman for an episode of the latter’s show this week, where he spoke about his priceless experience and takeaways from those interactions with one of the greatest to ever do it.
Kevin Burkhardt Details Tom Brady’s Film Sessions With the FOX Crew
“He’s funny, man. The stuff that he says is hilarious. It’s just full-on unfiltered TV,” the FOX Sports play-by-play announcer said about his broadcasting partner.
FOX kept its top booth together for 2026, sending Brady and Burkhardt into a third season as the network’s No. 1 team, with Erin Andrews and Tom Rinaldi on the sidelines. “He comes in with these thoughts, and we’ll do a production meeting where he’ll break down the tape for us and watch all these things,” Burkhardt said.
Brady made his FOX debut in 2024 on a reported 10-year, $375 million deal after retiring from the NFL following the 2022 season. He is the NFL’s highest-paid game analyst by reported annual compensation, with the deal averaging $37.5 million per year.
“I would love to compare notes because, put it this way, we come in, and we’re like, well, we know exactly how he feels about this game or this guy going into the game, showing the film,” Burkhardt told Edelman.
The FOX lead play-by-play announcer also offered his own version of the verdicts Brady delivers during those sessions. “He’s uber-critical when watching the film and telling us, ‘This is good, this sucks,’ you know, it’s great.”
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For Burkhardt, those meetings with Brady are super productive. “I’m learning a lot about football just being with them and going through that stuff. It’s cool.”
Notably, production meetings with a game’s head coaches and key players were once off-limits to Brady. The NFL barred him from them during his first season in the booth because of his ownership stake in the Las Vegas Raiders. He was eventually cleared for that season’s Super Bowl, and in August 2025 the league relaxed the rule to let him take part remotely.
However, Brady still has a few limitations on his access to players and coaches because of that stake. “I just focus on what I need to do to be prepared. That’s what I did as a player, and I go out there every week as a broadcaster and try to do the same thing,” Brady said before the season.
“There’s such great camaraderie and chemistry we all have together. We have seminars. We have off-site retreats. We have text threads with all of us. It feels like a big family in so many ways, and I was not really expecting that when I decided to take the job,” he added.
Burkhardt and Brady will call the Green Bay Packers’ matchup against the Detroit Lions at Ford Field on Sunday at 4:25 p.m. ET. Later in the season, Brady will also call his first Patriots game as a broadcaster when the Packers visit Gillette Stadium on Nov. 8 in Week 9.
This article originally appeared on Pro Football Network.
