ESPN whiffed in its pursuit of Tony Romo. Then it whiffed in its pursuit of Peyton Manning. Then it took a called strike three in its pursuit of Drew Brees.
The network hasn’t officially commented on the futures of Joe Tessitore and Booger McFarland, but if I were taking bets, I would say the odds of the duo in the Monday Night Football booth for 2019 returning in 2020 are somewhere around 500 to 1.
In fact, Michael McCarthy of Front Office Sports reported on Thursday that the network was now focusing its search internally to find the next Monday Night Football broadcast crew. Talent and executives have been asked to take pay cuts. Lower-level employees have been put on furlough. It would be a bad look for the network to go out and offer a former star $10 million dollars per year right now.
McCarthy says the new booth is likely to be made up of some combination of Steve Levy, Louis Riddick, Dan Orlovsky, and Pat McAfee. It could be that the first three are in the booth, while McAfee serves as a sideline reporter like he did for ESPN’s XFL broadcasts. No final decisions have been made.
With that list of names, it is clear that Levy is the favorite to call the action on Mondays. The only real question is who his teammates will be. I think Riddick has proven he is a great game analyst. Orlovsky not only knows football, he knows how to talk about it in a way anyone can follow. McAfee is one of the three or four most entertaining people on ESPN’s payroll.
All of them are very good at what they do, but none of them are the right answer. ESPN has the perfect candidate to be the next game analyst for Monday Night Football already in house.
It’s Randy Moss.
FOX has Aikman. He has the name recognition. CBS has Romo. He’s got the knowledge and enthusiasm. NBC has Colinsworth. He has the track record of greatness. You know what you can’t say about any of them?
Not a single one of them can be counted as one of the three best to ever play their position. Randy Moss can. If ESPN wants a name in their booth that gives Monday Night Football a special feeling again, putting a Hall of Famer in the booth is a big step in the right direction.
Moss not only has the star power. He has also proven in his four years on Sunday NFL Countdown and Monday Night Countdown that he is fearless in his criticism and that he is incredibly entertaining.
Did you see Rand University, the 30 for 30 documentary about his life in West Virginia? Moss’s frankness and country twang alone are enough to help elevate him to “America’s sweetheart” status if he were calling big games.
I recently responded to Andrew Marchand’s request for questions for his weekly media mail bag by asking why ESPN hasn’t considered Moss. To me, the guy is not only ideal for the role, he is so clearly the guy that checks all the boxes ESPN is looking for that it is absurd this isn’t a done deal.
Marchand responded to my question in his New York Post column.
“I think ESPN has thought about Moss,” Marchand wrote. “He is a big name, but he hasn’t done games and that is something they are hesitant about considering how inexperience has burnt them the last two years. I wouldn’t fully rule anything out.”
You can’t argue with the bulk of Marchand’s argument. Louis Riddick, Dan Orlovsky, and Pat McAfee have all been in the booth calling games. Granted, the majority of game analyst experience for all of them is college football. Still, that is more experience in that realm than Randy Moss has.
I would push back a bit against ESPN if network executives are nervous about committing to Randy Moss based on Booger McFarland and Jason Witten failing to break out as stars.
We knew nothing about those guys before they were put in the Monday Night Football booth. Booger McFarland was one of a thousand different NFL analysts at the network. Jason Witten only got the job because he was a Dallas Cowboy and his friend and former teammate (Romo) was an instant hit on CBS. ESPN didn’t get burned. They made dumb choices.
Any of the four names mentioned in this column (Moss included) are outspoken. They are committed to being great in the commentary world. The last time ESPN had a name that carried weight in the Monday Night Football booth was 2017. That was the last season Jon Gruden was with the network.
Gruden earned praise during his nine years at ESPN. Fans and the media saw a man that understood the game and took pleasure in telling an audience what he saw on the field. I saw a guy afraid to burn bridges that could lead to his next coaching job. A big name is only a valuable asset if he is willing to provide valuable insight.
There isn’t a loser in the bunch when you look at the names being tossed around as in-house options for ESPN’s Monday Night Football booth in 2020. It just seems to me that everything the network has been pre-occupied with finding has already been traveling with the network every Monday night for the last four years and will likely do so again in 2020…if we’re playing football this year, that is.
This is Barrett Sports Media. I know who our audience is, and I know someone that is a part of this decision might be reading this, so I’ll be blunt.
You have plenty of time to train the guy up. Move Randy Moss off of Monday Night Countdown and into the Monday Night Football booth. You have good candidates that offer a lot. Certainly, they can help stem the tide of negative criticism Monday Night Football has received the last two seasons.
It’s not just you, ESPN. The world only has one Randy Moss. With the right teachers and the backing of the biggest name in sports media, he could become a stand out amongst NFL analysts in no time.
Demetri Ravanos is a columnist and features writer for Barrett Media. He is also the creator of The Sports Podcast Festival, and a previous host on the Chewing Clock and Media Noise podcasts. He occasionally fills in on stations across the Carolinas in addition to hosting Panthers and College Football podcasts. His radio resume includes stops at WAVH and WZEW in Mobile, AL, WBPT in Birmingham, AL and WBBB, WPTK and WDNC in Raleigh, NC.
You can find him on Twitter @DemetriRavanos or reach him by email at DemetriTheGreek@gmail.com.
