Just a few weeks ago, you could have assumed everything was hunky dory in the world of ESPN’s Monday Night Football booth.
Now, it feels almost certain that the steadiest NFL booth in the business is about to end acrimoniously.
After an initial report of an argument between longtime broadcasting partners Joe Buck and Troy Aikman, the latter has made it clear he’s unhappy with contract negotiations (or the lack thereof) and expects to be a free agent after ESPN’s broadcast of Super Bowl LXI in February. Further reports have cemented that fallout, describing it as intense and saying the former Dallas Cowboys quarterback feels backstabbed by his partner, his network, and even his own agency.
The most fascinating part is that it’s happening to Aikman, widely considered the gold standard of NFL analysts by almost anyone in the industry. At 59, he’s no spring chicken, but that’s still relatively young for an A-list NFL booth analyst. Cris Collinsworth is 67, Frank Gifford called games until he was 67, and John Madden worked until he was 73. Not to mention the play-by-play announcers who have called games into their 70s and 80s. By all accounts, Aikman still has a good 10-15 years, if not more, ahead of him.
So why does ESPN seem so at peace with potentially letting him walk?
Let’s look at the specific reasons: two are probably obvious, and the third only matters because of what Aikman is apparently asking for.
1. Money*
But you already knew that.
Puck’s Dylan Byers reported earlier this week that Aikman, who had been making $18 million a year, was apparently seeking a raise to around $30 million, putting him in the vicinity of Tom Brady’s 10-year, $375 million deal. Aikman’s previous deal put him on par with Tony Romo’s, the largest when it was signed, so it stands to reason that the trusted veteran voice would want to remain near the top of the heap.
The simplest, most likely scenario is that, for all his talent and status, Aikman isn’t worth that kind of investment. We’ll get into why below, but even before getting specific, that is a lot of money to invest in a guy who calls one football game a week, especially when you’re ESPN and have to shell out that kind of money to a lot of people. The scales simply don’t balance on this transaction as they do for Stephen A. Smith or Pat McAfee.
Unfortunately for Aikman, the market also quickly turned against him. CBS seemed like a great landing spot with the recent split from Romo, but they re-signed J.J. Watt instead.
Amazon is a potential landing spot, but they re-upped Kirk Herbstreit for three years. Herbie’s deal includes a caveat that lets them bump him for a bigger fish, but all signs point to them waiting on Sean McVay. Plus, Amazon doesn’t have a Super Bowl (for now).
Fox has Tom Brady, and NBC has Collinsworth. That leaves Netflix, which only has five games and has already invested in Luke Kuechly.
And then there’s Greg Olsen. Many consider him the heir apparant to Aikman’s mantle as the best NFL analyst, and he’ll be a free agent, with all signs pointing to him landing on ESPN next year. Olsen is younger, fresher, and more engaged with the media ecosystem. He’ll probably take the job for less than Aikman, but even if ESPN had to shell out $30 million a year for him, you could make a better case that Olsen could do more at the network than Aikman’s current workload.
2. Troy Kinda Seems Like He Might Be a Dick
All due respect to Mr. Aikman, who’s accomplished a lot in his NFL playing and broadcasting career, but there aren’t many stories about what a pleasure he is to work with (aside from Joe Buck, though he’s even admitted Aikman is “intense.”
Three years ago, we wrote a piece about how Aikman, then in the first year of his ESPN deal, was fomenting bad blood with many members of the Monday Night Football crew, with sources saying he was “dogging the crew and gear on the air” and would “yell at everyone in the truck when he wasn’t getting what he wanted.” ESPN pushed back hard, calling many of the accusations untrue or biased. The last two weeks have seemingly confirmed many of the article’s accusations and our own assumptions that some of ESPN’s pushback was rooted in bracing for how Aikman would react to a negative story.
Just look at the way Aikman seems more than happy to let the narrative of Buck as a greedy villain persist. Not long ago, Aikman literally left him behind, jumping from Fox to ESPN with no promise that his broadcasting partner would follow. Now, his silence on reports of animosity over Buck’s extension speaks volumes. In the end, he seems happy to throw Buck under the bus despite so many years of partnership and support.
To be fair, his “give no f*cks” era has been refreshing, but it has a flip side. Many people defend Aikman for his broadcasting acumen and experience, but you don’t see many stepping up to defend him because he’s such a good dude.
3. The Modern Media Ecosystem Demands More
The fact that ESPN seems to be having second thoughts about re-signing Aikman speaks to the ongoing evolution of his role.
The era of John Madden-style analysts is ending.
Specifically, the era of the NFL lead analyst who does nothing but call one game a week is ending.
Aikman and Collinsworth appear to be the last of their kind, as, as with so many sports media roles, NFL media partners will expect their top analysts to extend their personality across social media, podcasts, and other opportunities.
Tony Romo was in Aikman’s boat, but his replacement, J.J. Watt, regularly posts on social media, makes several media stops each week, and makes news as an investor and soccer club owner.
Kirk Herbstreit is America’s most famous golden retriever owner and spends all week making appearances amid 47 other media jobs.
Tom Brady is seemingly ever-present for Fox, which, it should be noted, is baked into that $375-million contract. He not only makes regular appearances across Fox socials, TV shows, and NFL programming, but he’s also a one-man PR machine (for better or worse) and, literally, an NFL team owner.
Olsen isn’t a born poster by any stretch, but he’s in good with The Pat McAfee Show and Barstool audiences, which counts for something.
Case in point, McAfee has openly complained about not being able to get Aikman on his show, which is, by all accounts, the No. 1 stop for anyone NFL-related. To be fair, part of the complaint was that Troy appeared on The Rich Eisen Show, but not kissing the McAfee ring right now likely didn’t land well in Bristol.
And we should say, it’s not likely any of this would matter if Aikman asked for $20 million. It stands to reason that ESPN would be happy to keep the Buck and Aikman train rolling at a modest raise. But by asking for Tom Brady money without doing any of the other things Tom Brady does every week, Aikman seems to have set himself up to fail.
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