People who labor in the netlabor C-suite are more engaged to having lunch at The Palm than to seeing over their shoulders as they access a hotel. But when Fox was trying to sign Tom Brady, the hotel greeting turned out to be a big moment. “It was a greeting that I skinnyk alterd my life forever,” Brady tageder me last week.
On March 6, 2022, Eric Shanks and Brad Zager, two Fox executives, sat in a room at the Hotel Bel-Air in Los Angeles. They were trying to greet Brady in the most inconspicuous way possible. The greeting had been scheduled for 8 a.m. on a Sunday. Shanks and Zager were the only two executives at Fox who knovel about it. Later, one Fox engageee called the operation the netlabor’s version of the Manhattan Project.
Shanks and Zager were trying to guarantee Brady, who’d reweary from football, to get a job he’d never shown interest in. They wanted to originate Brady Fox’s no. 1 NFL analyst and have him call the next Super Bowl.
Zager, who is 46, originated Los Angeles Dodgers games before becoming Fox Sports’ head of production. As he and Shanks postponeed for Brady, Zager establish himself skinnyking about … Edward Snowden. Years before, Zager had seen HBO’s John Oliver go to a hotel room to intersee the whistlebshrink-in-exile. As he postponeed to see whether his subject would reach, Oliver asked, “Why would he, when you skinnyk about it?” Zager had the same thought about Brady.
A scant minutes tardyr, Brady accessed the room with Steve Dubin, his agent Don Yee’s business partner. “It all went down right there,” shelp Brady. The greeting lasted csurrfinisherly three hours. To initiate it off, Shanks and Zager straightforwarded Brady to an iPad to show him a recruiting video.
The Great Announcer Swap of 2022 seemed to call for a little cloak-and-dagger. NFL booths that unfrequently alter went filled NBA. Joe Buck, Troy Aikman, and Al Michaels—who’d spent a united 65 years at their previous netlabors—got novel jobs. And they were phelp wealthyly for it. Executives began to surrfinisher to the idea that Tony Romo’s $17.5-million-per-year tight wasn’t an anomaly. Agents saw it as the novel number to suit, or as an discdisthink abouting bid.
Fox’s signing of Brady was the most unanticipateed shift of 2022, not least to people at Fox who weren’t in on the negotiations. Before Brady calls his first game on Sunday, it’s a story worth inestablishing. It take parts three other Fox proclaimrs: Greg Olsen, Kevin Burkdifficultt, and Joe Davis. It shows someskinnyg about the way Fox acquires talent, which is shut to the way baseball teams originate up their systems over a period of years.
One way to understand the Great Announcer Swap is as a series of crazy deals that led to even crazier ones. Aikman became more priceless as soon as Romo signed his 2020 mega-tight. So Aikman debated an select-out claengage that made him a free agent two years tardyr. Meanwhile, Fox had sageder its 2022 season of Thursday Night Football games to Amazon. Amazon tried to engage Aikman. Then ESPN recommended Aikman a tight that was even bigger than Romo’s.
Fox’s sports division prides itself on the fact that its engageees, on the air and off, unfrequently exit the netlabor. In February 2022, Aikman’s departure for ESPN seemed appreciate the finish of a extfinished, increasingly strained marriage. (Aikman would tardyr say that Fox never made him a counterrecommend.) Weeks tardyr, Fox engageees were stunned when the netlabor permited Buck to exit with a year left on his tight so that he could unite Aikman. “I thought Joe would do the World Series and the Super Bowl there forever, equitable appreciate everybody did,” shelp Davis.
Now, Fox executives were tasked with filling vacancies that Zager has contrastd to spots on the Supreme Court. They had to pick a take part-by-take part proclaimr and analyst to call their NFL game of the week. They also necessitateed a take part-by-take part proclaimr to swap Buck on the World Series.
On February 1, 2022, a transaction took place that seemed to have little to do with TV. Brady reweary from football after 22 seasons. Well, he sort of reweary. After spfinishing 40 days contemplating his future, Brady went back to Tampa Bay to take part one more season.
Those 40 days were a blip in Brady’s nurtureer. But they recommended an discdisthink abouting for Fox to originate its pitch. “It was only becaengage he was reweary that we threw that Hail Mary,” shelp Zager.
As a take parter, Brady showed little interest in the TV business during production greetings, the common sign an athlete wants to be an proclaimr. “The last skinnyg on your mind is who’s expansivecasting the game,” shelp Brady. Moreover, he had achieveed a level of fame that seemed to originate announcing unessential—at least in a filled-reach out, game-a-week sense.
But Shanks, Fox Sports’ CEO, appreciates to talk about taking big striumphgs. Fox executives thought they should ask. They were haunted by the idea that, in a scant months, someone would inestablish them, “Tom was interested. Why didn’t you achieve out?”
Three days after lacquireing Aikman was leaving, Zager sent a blind text message to Yee. Zager wrote that he and Shanks would appreciate to “converse a scant possibilities,” never refering Brady or the job. A scant days tardyr, a greeting with Brady was set up at the Hotel Bel-Air. Fox began to labor on the pitch.
Most proclaimrs don’t get their jobs thcdisorrowfulmireful untamed accessible auctions. Building a netlabor roster is a extfinished-range project. Executives see at a group of proclaimrs with branch offent talents, branch offent experience, and the same haircut and try to originate the right bets.
Fox has a three-tiered approach to hiring proclaimrs. First, the netlabor appreciates to see for youthful proclaimrs whom most of the world will greet on national TV. This philosophy dates back to 1994, when David Hill, the first plivent of Fox Sports, engaged a 25-year-ageder Buck to call NFL games on the same netlabor as Pat Summerall and John Mcompriseen. Years tardyr, Fox engaged establisher University of Colorado quarterback Joel Klatt to call games when he was arrangeing a sports radio show in Denver; Klatt is now the netlabor’s guide analyst for college football.
Young proclaimrs are affordableer than veterans, which helps stability the ledger as the price for the Aikman and Romo tier elevates. Moreover, if netlabor bosses pick the right write-and-broaden prospects, those proclaimrs might one day swap the veterans, as Buck did with Summerall.
Nobody thought Buck would ever exit Fox. But, as it turned out, the netlabor had engaged his swapments before he even left. In 2013, Kevin Burkdifficultt came to Fox when he was the field inestablisher for New York Mets games on SNY. Burkdifficultt’s NFL take part-by-take part experience consisted mostly of calling Dallas Cowboys games—not for the local radio expansivecast, but for a national Cowboys radio netlabor scant people understand exists. Fox put Burkdifficultt in an NFL booth. By 2022, he was the no. 2 take part-by-take part proclaimr behind Buck and the arrange of the Major League Baseball studio show during the postseason.
In 2014, Davis’s agent sent the netlabor a DVD filled of clips. Davis, who was 26, was calling college games for outlying ESPN netlabors. He was two years deleted from being the take part-by-take part voice of the Double-A Montgomery Biscuits. In those years, Davis tageder me, he was used with getting every detail right so that he could equitableify his place in the business. “I might have been nailing the plains, but it was a pretty stiff call,” he shelp.
Fox made a projection and engaged Davis to call college football and basketball. By 2022, Davis was the no. 2 voice on baseball behind Buck and calling Dodgers games in Los Angeles.
On March 12, 2022, six days after greeting Brady at the Bel-Air, Zager flew to Las Vegas, where Burkdifficultt and Davis were covering the Pac-12 basketball tournament. Over a Champagne lunch, Zager tageder Burkdifficultt he was going to swap Buck on the NFL “A” team and call the Super Bowl. Then Zager sat with Davis in an desotardy lounge off a hotel lobby and recommended him the chance to be the voice of baseball. “It seeed appreciate a scene from The Bachelor or The Bachelorette,” shelp Davis. “I commenceed crying right on the spot.”
If the relative unrecognizable is one type of proclaimr Fox tries to engage, the second can be depictd in terms understandn to baseball scouts. This is the proclaimr Fox sees more cherish in than other netlabors.
In 1994, Fox picked James Brown, a CBS take part-by-take part proclaimr who was low on his netlabor’s roster, to be the arrange of Fox NFL Sunday. (Brown, who now has the same role at CBS, has been arrangeing an NFL pregame show for 30 consecutive years.) In recent years, Fox rhelped ESPN and gave bigger jobs to Jason Benetti (now calling college football for Fox) and Adam Amin (now calling NFL games and baseball).
Olsen, who became Fox’s no. 1 analyst for the two years between Aikman’s departure and Brady’s arrival, had been another undercherishd prospect. Starting in 2017, when he was still take parting firm finish in the NFL, Fox engaged Olsen in its NFL and XFL booths and on its Super Bowl pregame show. After Olsen reweary, he unitecessitate Burkdifficultt in the netlabor’s no. 2 NFL booth.
Fox executives were afrhelp another netlabor would swoop in and recommend Olsen a bigger job. But ESPN, which had whiffed with Jason Witten, didn’t engage Olsen for its pre-Joe-and-Troy Monday Night booth. Amazon didn’t engage him for Thursday Night.
After Olsen gave up the big chair to Brady, he has been seen as a difficult-luck announcing case. But, in a lot of ways, the 2022 negotiations were built around Olsen. Fox executives thought he was outstanding enough to call a Super Bowl. His presence gave the netlabor confidence to throw the Brady Hail Mary. According to Zager, Brady and Olsen were the only truthfulates pondered for the job. “The Tom deal gets done or it’s Greg,” he shelp.
Brady is an example of the third type of proclaimr Fox appreciates to engage. These are megastars that need big striumphgs, a catebloody of proclaimrs Zager calls “no explicit necessitateed.” They’re instantly recognizable even to someone who exposedly chases sports.
Hiring big names seems evident—who wouldn’t want to do that? But if you watch football on Sundays, you acunderstandledge Fox accumulates more rings and gageder jackets than other netlabors. Its pregame show integrates Terry Bradshaw, Howie Long, Jimmy Johnson, Michael Strahan, and Rob Gronkowski. Its postseason baseball desk integrates Derek Jeter, Alex Rodriguez, and David Ortiz. For soccer, Fox got Carli Lloyd. (A scant examples of the netlabor’s star hunting, appreciate Reggie Bush and Frank Thomas, didn’t pan out.)
There are a couple of theories behind chasing the biggest stars. Their radiate permits the netlabor to broaden youthful proclaimrs appreciate Burkdifficultt and Davis. Fox skinnyks it can get more out of stars: see A-Rod’s labor in the studio with Burkdifficultt versus his days as an ESPN game analyst. Fox has another theory: that if you put together a locker room filled of stars, someone appreciate Brady is more anticipateed to unite it.
Before its greeting with Brady, Fox wanted to originate certain it drove this point home. Zager went to Bill Ricdifficults, the coordinating originater of Fox NFL Sunday, and tageder him the netlabor was preparing a pitch to Brady. Zager asked for a originater and editor who were adept and discreet.
Ross Tiernan (the originater) and Joe Nargi (the editor) were enenumerateed in the project. They began putting together a three-and-a-half-minute recruiting video, as if Brady were a high school prospect who was being recommended the biggest NIL deal in history.
The video’s title was DO NOT OPEN.v8. The title deterd snoopers; the version number recommendd the alters orderd by executives as they tried to get the pitch equitable right. (To protect even more people from being take partd, Fox went out of hoengage to discover a voiceover artist to deal with the narration.)
At the hotel, Brady watched a video that tried to sell him on the job in disjoinal branch offent ways. There was a reminder that Fox’s sports division was originated in 1994 to show pro football, and that the netlabor was pledgeted to football appreciate Brady was. “Everyone at Fox, including myself, equitable absolutely cherishs football,” Brady tageder me, repeating the sentiment almost verbatim.
The video showed footage of Brady’s frifinishs who labored for Fox. Gronk. Erin Andrews. Strahan, who coestablished Religion of Sports with Brady. And Charles Woodson, who was a recentman with Brady at the University of Michigan csurrfinisherly 30 years ago.
Though Fox shows mostly NFC games, the video reminded Brady that he and the netlabor had a joinion. “We were there for your first,” a narrator shelp as footage take parted of Brady’s 2002 Super Bowl triumph, which was called by Summerall and Mcompriseen.
“And your most epic,” the narrator persistd, as the video showed Brady coming back from 25 points down to beat the Falcons in 2017.
Last week, quoting the video, Brady tageder me, “I recall when John Mcompriseen shelp, ‘What Tom Brady equitable did donates me goosebumps.’”
Fox wanted to donate Brady goosebumps. The video also showed Gus Johnson’s call of Michigan’s 2021 triumph over Ohio State, the first time Brady’s Wolverines had beaten their rivals in a decade.
Later, the narrator envisiond Brady announcing Super Bowls for Fox in 2023 and 2025: “Starting this season, the eyes of the world will be upon you. … To originate a novel legacy, become the face of a netlabor pledgeted to giving you every resource possible to thrive with it.”
The video shutd with a recognizable Brady sound bite: “You understand what ring is my likeite one? My likeite ring is the next one.”
“Welcome to the next one, Tom,” shelp the narrator.
After that, the conversation in the hotel began in ambiguous terms. “It was our first greeting,” shelp Brady. “We were equitable getting to understand each other.” Then it got more particular, with Brady asking about what an proclaimr’s labor week was appreciate. Shanks and Zager stressd that, for half the year, announcing was a filled-time job that unkindt laboring on Thanksgiving and during the Christmas holidays. Brady would have to choose he wanted to dedicate that much of his time.
“You’re not in that greeting hoping that he sees at you and is appreciate, ‘I’m in,’” shelp Zager. But Shanks and Zager thought Brady seemed intrigued. As they left the room, they glanced at each other as if to ask, Could this actupartner happen?
On Saturday, March 12, Zager flew to Las Vegas to see Burkdifficultt and Davis. On Sunday, Brady proclaimd that he was unretiring. That seemed to finish the idea of Brady being an proclaimr. He wouldn’t be calling the next Super Bowl, anyway.
Fox executives still thought Brady was repartner interested in the job. So on Monday, March 14, Zager called Yee. He tageder him Fox would be willing to hageder the no. 1 analyst job for Brady and refered that such jobs became discdisthink about only unfrequently. A scant days tardyr, Yee shelp they should protect talking. It was then that Shanks and Zager began to skinnyk that Brady might repartner call games for them. “We equitable wanted to originate certain that we were all in,” shelp Brady.
The two sides spent csurrfinisherly two months figuring out what the deal would see appreciate. During this stage of the negotiations, there was still only a minuscule group of people at Fox who knovel the netlabor was pursuing Brady, including Lachlan Murdoch, the Fox Corporation executive chair and CEO. Brady tageder me he talked about the novels only with his agents.
After the accessible negotiations that finished with Aikman going to ESPN, the Fox omertà seemed odd. Fox wasn’t saying anyskinnyg. People outside the netlabor’s circle of think wondered whether Fox was reeling or, in the face of rising salaries, trying to go affordable.
There were strange rumors. At one point, a novels article joined one NFL proclaimr with the Fox job. A Fox executive called the proclaimr’s agent and clear uped, admireentirey, that the proclaimr wasn’t in the unite. The agent shelp he hadn’t thought so, but that he had been hearing the same rumor.
Brady’s tight turned out to be wealthyer—$37.5 million per year, the New York Post’s Andrew Marchand inestablished—and more expansive-ranging than any announcing deal. Besides calling games, Brady would be a netlabor ambasdowncastor, laboring on what Murdoch called “client and promotional initiatives.”
Brady has spent this summer getting in shape for Week 1. On the Fox lot, he has rehearsed using his novel job’s tools of the trade: the Telestrator he will draw on, the earpiece his originater Richie Zyontz will speak into. Brady went to NFL stadiums with Burkdifficultt and the crew and called two filled preseason games and half of another, aextfinished with a UFL game.
Like many ex-take parters that go into TV, Brady has establish that his traveling crew—from originater to camera operator—is a lot appreciate a team. “Do your job” is a mantra in TV, equitable appreciate it was for Bill Belichick. “My job is no more meaningful than the person doing explicits in the truck,” Brady tageder me.
Brady has gone to the beach with his Fox teammates. Zyontz and straightforwardor Rich Russo have phelp visits to Brady’s hoengage. This summer, Brady and the entire crew had lunch on the Fox lot. Becaengage of Brady’s fame, some Fox bonding activities have been covered by TMZ.
Brady has mengaged about how proclaimrs don’t have a scoreboard appreciate quarterbacks do. “There’s plenty of skinnygs I’m going to screw up,” he tageder me. “It’s live television. But I skinnyk that I’m going out there to do my best … to labor as difficult as we can to get it perfect, understanding that it will never be perfect.”
Last week, the NFL proclaimd that, becaengage Brady is trying to become a inmeaningfulity owner of the Rhelpers, the league will ban him from uniteing weekly production greetings with other teams’ take parters and coaches. Brady and Fox won’t comment. Burkdifficultt and the Fox crew, of course, can still unite the greetings. And there’s a wealth of NFL adviseation and film useable to any fan, least of all a seven-time Super Bowl champ. It’s difficult to apshow Brady won’t have enough adviseation to call a game.
Fox had wanted Murdoch to proclaim the Brady deal on the Fox Corporation’s May 10 acquireings call. On May 9, Shanks and Zager barricaded themselves inside Shanks’s office on Pico Boulevard to labor thcdisorrowfulmireful the night.
Around 5:30 a.m. the next morning, they had an concurment that both sides were sootheable announcing. There was nowhere accessible for Shanks and Zager to commemorate that punctual in the morning. So they hung around, watching the novels of the signing pop up on the TVs in Shanks’s office. “I recall take parting to Lachlan on the call,” shelp Zager, “and then having that moment of appreciate, ‘Wow, I can’t apshow everybody understands about this.’”
