Reporter Kim Jones announced on Friday that she is leaving NFL Network after a 10-year stint. Further details haven’t yet been announced or revealed, but this news coming in the final Friday of January would appear to indicate that this is a contractual matter.
Jones joined NFL Network in 2012 after seven years as a reporter for YES Network (and reserve commentator for New York Yankees radio broadcasts on WCBS). Prior to that, she covered the New York Giants and was a national NFL columnist for the Star-Ledger. She’s also a fill-in host at WFAN.
The reporter made her own headlines in November 2018 when she suffered a significant heart injury while covering a Washington Football Team practice. Shortly before she was to go on the air, Jones tripped and felt a burning sensation in her neck.
“I walked outside and I tripped,” Jones told NBC’s TODAY show in Feb. 2019. “Immediately, I knew something was wrong, but then I knew it was something serious because this is something I’d never experienced before. So I went back into the room, I sat down, and from that point on I was in and out of consciousness.”
Washington employees called an ambulance and Jones was rushed to a hospital where she underwent emergency surgery to repair an aortic dissection. (More specifically, Jones suffered a tear in an artery that carries blood from the heart.)
“The layers of the aorta in my body had split,” Jones explained. “That leaves the aorta in danger of rupturing. If that happens, I’m not here.”
No word yet on what’s next for the longtime reporter. In response to her tweet announcing her departure from NFL Network, many of Jones’s colleagues at NFL Media and elsewhere expressed their support and encouragement.
Ian Casselberry is a sports media columnist for BSM. He has previously written and edited for Awful Announcing, The Comeback, Sports Illustrated, Yahoo Sports, MLive, Bleacher Report, and SB Nation. You can find him on Twitter @iancass or reach him by email at iancass@gmail.com.
