If you tune in Sunday afternoon to watch the Panthers visit the Buccaneers, you will not be greeted with the familiar “hello, friends”. Jim Nantz will miss the final week of the NFL regular season due to Covid protocols.
Instead, Tony Romo and Tracy Wolfson will be joined on the broadcast by Tom McCarthy. McCarthy has been with the network since 2014 calling NFL action. He has been paired with Tiki Barber for most of the 2021 season.
Nantz has lead CBS’s top NFL crew all season. Certainly, the network would prefer he be available. However, entering Week 18, CBS does not have any games on its schedule featuring two teams playing with a trip to the playoffs for the winner on the line. That may have made shuffling the deck with network talent easier.
Even the game McCarthy, Romo and Wolfson are covering may not offer much in the way of excitement. The Tampa Bay Buccaneers have secured a playoff spot and have no chance to earn a bye. The Carolina Panthers were eliminated from contention long ago. It is likely starters do not play much at all this week.
