Al Michaels said the decision on when he stops calling NFL games for Prime Video will come from Amazon, from himself, or from some combination of the two.
On The Dan Patrick Show on Wednesday, Michaels was asked who would ultimately tell him, or how he would know, it was time to step away from the booth. The 81-year-old, now in his fifth season as Prime Video’s lead play-by-play voice, used part of his answer to heap praise on the streamer for how it has treated him.
“Well, either the people that I work for will tell me, or I’ll know myself, a combination,” Michaels said. “Let’s put it this way. The folks at Amazon and Prime have been fantastic. Fantastic to me.”
Michaels left NBC for Prime Video on a three-year deal when the streamer took over Thursday Night Football in 2022, lending instant credibility to Amazon’s foray into the NFL, and he has worked on a year-to-year basis since that contract expired after the 2024 season. Amazon brought him back for 2025, and in January, as Michaels prepared to call the Packers-Bears Wild Card game, Richard Deitsch of Sports Business Journal reported that Prime Video had committed to bringing him back as its lead voice for 2026.
Michaels told Patrick that Amazon has checked in with him after each of the past two seasons to gauge his interest in returning, and he was candid about how he would handle it if the streamer eventually decided not to ask again
“If they come to me and say, you know, it’s time for us to move on … You guys have been fantastic. You’ve been great. I’ve done the NFL for 41 years, which is half my life. Love it. But you know what? At a certain time, it’s time,” he said. “And if they feel it’s time, great. And if I feel it’s time, I’ll know it. And I’ll say, ‘You know what? Thanks for the memories.'”
Michaels did not say whether he expects this season to be his last, but his comments come less than a week after a broadcast of the Buccaneers’ upset of the Cowboys that renewed calls for Amazon to move on.
During that Oct. 8 Thursday Night Football game between the Buccaneers and Cowboys, a 24-16 upset in which the previously winless Bucs started undrafted rookie quarterback Jalon Daniels in place of an injured Baker Mayfield, viewers took issue with Michaels’ subdued calls on several of the game’s biggest plays, according to Matt Yoder’s breakdown of the broadcast for Awful Announcing. Michaels also said it would be ridiculous to call the game a must-win for Dallas, then described it as a “can’t-lose game” in the same sentence, and he faced further criticism for his handling of Tampa Bay’s decision to go for a touchdown on fourth-and-goal while leading 24-10 in the fourth quarter instead of kicking a field goal to take a three-score lead.
That broadcast came one week after Michaels and analyst Kirk Herbstreit were taken to task for a simplistic evaluation of Deshaun Watson’s comeback with the Cleveland Browns, in which the duo largely glossed over the circumstances surrounding Watson’s tenure in Cleveland.
The criticism of Michaels’ work at Amazon is hardly new, as complaints about his enthusiasm on Thursday nights have trailed him since his first season with Prime Video, and they reached a crescendo last December, when he was widely faulted for failing to match the stakes of a Week 16 Rams-Seahawks thriller that ranked among the best games of the season. Michaels, for his part, has pushed back against critics who want more volume from his delivery and has maintained that he can still call games at the highest level.
Michaels may still believe he has plenty left, but Prime Video has already begun laying the groundwork for the day it no longer agrees. On Sept. 30, The Athletic’s Andrew Marchand reported that Amazon had agreed to an extension with Herbstreit to remain its Thursday Night Football analyst, with terms that allow the streamer to move on if one of its top targets, including Rams head coach Sean McVay, becomes available, an arrangement that leaves Herbstreit’s long-term status in question.
Marchand has also identified a potential successor to Michaels. Appearing on Puck’s The Varsity podcast with John Ourand in late September, Marchand said Prime Video has its sights set on CBS Sports’ Ian Eagle, though he added that CBS wants to retain Eagle, citing his long tenure with the network and his relationship with CBS Sports president David Berson.
Michaels and Herbstreit are scheduled to call the remainder of Prime Video’s Thursday Night Football schedule this season, after which Michaels’ status will again be determined on a year-to-year basis.
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