NBC Sports play-by-play announcer Mike Tirico recently ruptured his left Achilles tendon, revealing the news on the Week 12 edition of Sunday Night Football. Nonetheless, he is going to continue calling games throughout the rest of the season and has been using a knee scooter to utilize in the press box. Kyle Brandt, co-host of Good Morning Football on NFL Network, revealed that Tirico was scheduled to have his Achilles surgery the day after calling the Week 13 matchup between the Buffalo Bills and San Francisco 49ers, completing a marathon of three games in eight days.
On top of that, Highmark Stadium was buried in 18 inches of snow that needed to be shoveled before the game and consistently maintained. Nonetheless, Tirico was present for the matchup and ended up calling a highlight play on the NFL season thus far.
Bills quarterback Josh Allen threw for 148 yards and two touchdowns as the team defeated the 49ers 35-10 to clinch the AFC East division title and a playoff berth. On a play in the third quarter, Allen threw a short pass to wide receiver Amari Cooper, who then began to run for a lateral from Cooper and dived into the end zone, knocking down the pylon for an improbable touchdown. Tirico described the play as it happened in real time and was exhilarated towards what he had just witnessed. Moreover, analyst Cris Collinsworth said that it was “showtime in Buffalo” and remarked about the grandeur of the play before revealing that it had added significance.
“Josh Allen’s my fantasy quarterback,” Collinsworth said. “Not kidding you – it just showed up. I got a touchdown pass and whatever the touchdown was to move ahead of [my son] Jac.”
In a segment on the Tuesday morning edition of Good Morning Football, Brandt and his co-host Peter Schrager awarded the broadcast with its ‘Best Play Call’ distinction for the week. Upon listening to the replay of the call, they were laughing not about the achievement on the field, but the ingenuity and rapport of the broadcast booth.
“They’re so happy, and it’s like, it’s pure, it’s real, it’s earnest,” Schrager said. “Cris is having a blast. Mike’s having a [blast]. Mike’s sitting there with a boot on his leg about to get Achilles surgery and he’s in the snow. [He] probably took an elevator up there with a giant car, who knows. Meanwhile, Cris is talking about being his son in fantasy football live on the air.”
Brandt acknowledged that the scene represented bedlam and that Tirico was calling a highly unusual play. Additionally, he gave him plaudits for working the game preceding the surgery on his Achilles, contrasting it with his own experience undergoing the operation in the past.
“I wasn’t calling a game or doing anything intelligible like Mike was,” Brandt said. “Both of those guys were great.”
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