As he sat inside an SUV heading north on I-95 from Providence to Foxborough on a chilly December Sunday morning in New England, Jim Nantz thought aloud about his immediate NFL broadcasting future.
It was five hours before Nantz and Tony Romo would broadcast a Chiefs-Patriots game to 28.1 million viewers, the network’s most-watched regular-season Sunday game in four years, and as the vehicle rolled toward Gillette Stadium, Nantz suggested to a reporter from The Athletic that he believed if Romo opted to re-sign with CBS and the key production people from the team could stay together, the group had a chance to be one of the greatest NFL broadcasting teams in history.
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“If we could get 15 years, that would be a career goal for me,” Nantz said, excitedly. “That would cover five or six Super Bowls in that span. … How I would love to be able to play this out for a generation of games together.”
He got his wish.
In March, CBS announced it had signed Romo to a long-term deal that extends far beyond the current rights deal between CBS and the NFL (which expires after the 2022 season). Romo will make in the neighborhood of $17 million per year, the highest annual salary ever for a sports broadcaster.
Money well spent? Well, CBS, it seems, is not the only entity who loves Nantz and Romo calling NFL games.
Last month, we asked readers of The Athletic to fill out an NFL TV Broadcast Survey — and nearly 2,700 of you responded. We broke down and analyzed your responses — and came away with one conclusion: You love Romo and Nantz.
CBS’ lead team was a runaway choice for the best NFL broadcasting duo among the top teams at each NFL-airing network (Note: We did not include a team for ESPN given that Joe Tessitore and Booger McFarland are not returning to “Monday Night Football”). Nantz and Romo drew 57.4 percent of the vote, easily topping Al Michaels and Cris Collinsworth of NBC (28.2).
Despite heavy AFC ties via CBS, Nantz and Romo dominated the survey among those who identified themselves as fans of teams from both conferences. They were the preferred pick of NFC fans and more than doubled the vote (719 to 328) among those who designated themselves as fans of AFC teams.
The duo helped CBS (40.4 percent) hold off NBC (34.9) as our readers’ favorite NFL broadcast overall.
Those who defined themselves as fans of NFC teams preferred NBC’s game coverage more than any other, followed by Fox, CBS, NFL Network and ESPN. Those who defined themselves as AFC fans preferred their home network of CBS, followed by NBC, Fox, NFL Network and ESPN.
Romo was the runaway choice when it came to fellow NFL analysts. He was the selection of 74.1 percent of our respondents, with Collinsworth a distant second at 13 percent.
Before we move on to the rest of the results, a note on demographics: The highest number of our respondents were 50 or older (24. 1 percent). The second-highest group? Ages 25-30 (21.4 percent).
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The best-represented fan bases belonged to the Eagles (189), Packers (181), Patriots (161), Cowboys (143) and Giants (141), while we received just 15 entries from Jaguars fans, the lowest number overall.
And something to keep in mind as we move on to the results: Most of our respondents are pretty happy with the state of NFL broadcasts, with nearly two-thirds (62.8 percent) rating them a 4 out of 5 in overall quality.
Al Michaels is generally regarded as the best play-by-play broadcaster in NFL history so it was little surprise that he topped our poll with 42.7 percent of the vote, followed by Nantz (17.9) and Buck (15.2) when asked how they favored the game-callers on the top broadcast teams.
There was a more even split here than with the play-by-play or analysts, with Fox’s Erin Andrews (28.1 percent) topping NBC’s Michele Tafoya (25.4). Tracy Wolfson (15.2) of CBS and Pam Oliver (14.1) of Fox rounded out the top four selections.
We offered readers a choice of six current NFL quarterbacks (Tom Brady, Drew Brees, Patrick Mahomes, Aaron Rodgers, Philip Rivers and Russell Wilson) and asked which of them would make the best broadcaster. Brees ran away with the vote with 48.9 percent, followed by Rivers (17.3 percent).
For context purposes, we note that the vast majority of the votes were tabulated prior to Brees’ June 3 comments about kneeling during the national anthem to protest police brutality, as well as his multiple apologies and acknowledgments that he now has a clearer understanding of the intent of the kneeling.
“Fox NFL Sunday” has been the most-watched NFL pregame show for a quarter-century, and it led a competitive category with 32.3 percent of the vote. NFL Network drawing 24.5 percent of the vote was a quality showing given the cable-versus-network dynamic.
Our respondents appeared more favorable to gambling information being part of a pregame show than they did a game broadcast. More than 70 percent of respondents were good with some kind of gambling information on a pregame show, while more than half (51.3 percent) did not want anything having to do with gambling presented during the games.
An overwhelming number of you (82.6 percent) want a rules analyst on every broadcast. (We agree.) Fox’s Mike Pereira, the dean of the NFL TV rules analysts, drew nearly half of the votes from our readers.
ESPN did not fare well in this survey in game and studio coverage, but it was the heavy choice (54.8 percent) when it came to the network you prefer for NFL Draft coverage. This year’s opening round of the NFL Draft — which aired across ABC, ESPN, NFL Network and ESPN Deportes — was the most-watched Round 1 in television history with 15.6 million viewers tuning in.
On the subject of whether national TV announcers are rooting against your team, a sane 87.2 percent of you responded that they were not. However, more than a fifth of Eagles (23.3 percent), Bills (21.3) and Vikings (20.9) fans believed announcers had an ax to grind when it came to their teams.
Finally, the innovation has made the biggest impact on your viewing experience? The yellow first-down marker with 56.1 percent.
(Photo of Romo: Scott Winters / Getty Images)
