Tom Brady has participated in 17% of the Super Bowls ever played. It’s accurate to say nobody knows what it’s like to be in a Super Bowl better than Brady, who set the record with 10 championship game appearances as a player.
Brady’s 11th Super Bowl will be a lot different though.
Brady, in his first season as Fox’s highly paid No. 1 color analyst, will be in the booth for Super Bowl LIX when the Kansas City Chiefs face the Philadelphia Eagles for the second time in three years. Brady has been the star in some of the most tense, memorable and watched Super Bowls ever. That was as a player, not as a rookie announcer with roughly 120 million people watching and critiquing his analysis.
When this Super Bowl kicks off, Brady will once again be one of the biggest stars of it.
How has Tom Brady done?
One thing is certain: Brady will be making more to call the Super Bowl than just about any of the players on the field.
Brady’s $375 million deal with Fox Sports over 10 years was a stunner. It was unprecedented for an announcer. There was always going to be plenty of attention on Brady if he became an announcer after his playing days were done, but the contract added to the pressure a bit.
It has been an up-and-down season for Brady. There were questions surrounding him replacing Greg Olsen on Fox’s No. 1 team because Olsen had established himself as one of the best color commenters in the business. Brady’s style as an announcer hasn’t really stood out. He shares his vast expertise at times, but also has too often reverted to clichés and buzzwords. He has mostly been too safe in the booth, not letting his personality show much or creating many waves. The restrictions on him as a limited owner of the Las Vegas Raiders — a dual role that has led to controversy this season — could be why he has been reluctant to be overly critical.
In an Awful Announcing poll of readers ranking the NFL’s 25 announcing teams this season, Brady and his partner Kevin Kevin Burkhardt ranked 14th. That’s not exactly what Fox was paying millions for, but the middle-of-the-pack ranking seems like a fair assessment of Brady’s rookie season in the booth. Some have enjoyed him, some haven’t, but it’s hard to say he’s made a big splash like Tony Romo did his first season calling games.
But on Super Bowl Sunday, everyone will have an opinion on Brady’s call.
Why some NFL die-hards can’t stand Tom Brady in the broadcast booth
Here were some criticisms of Brady’s work during his rookie year in the booth:
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The Athletic’s sports media critic Richard Deitsch after a Week 2 Saints-Cowboys game: “Brady is still coming to the replays a little late, he seems reticent to criticize coaches, and we still don’t get second-level analysis, which for my definition is teaching me something new about the game that I didn’t see if I was following the ball. For me, that’s the separator between being a good NFL analyst and a great one.”
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Bill Simmons on his podcast in early November: “This guy’s like one of the greatest resources in football that we have, and they don’t tap into any of it. … I know it’s in there, and they just have not unlocked it. I think they really have to figure it out. He seems super over-prepared to me.”
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Yahoo Sports’ Jay Busbee after Brady was approved for a minority ownership stake in the Las Vegas Raiders: “A broadcaster doesn’t have to burn everything to the ground; that kind of Skip Bayless/Stephen A. Smith flamethrowing is less analysis and more performance, and fans can see through it. But a broadcaster ought to have the freedom to speak both honestly and authoritatively on tricky topics — an underperforming player, a dubious coaching decision, a missed or misapplied penalty.
“The alternative is exactly what we got from Brady on Sunday afternoon during Fox’s Chiefs-49ers broadcast: a peppy, cheerful broadcast so full of praise and rah-rah that the NFL’s own scriptwriters couldn’t have crafted it better.”
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Former teammate Vince Wilfork on WFAN’s “Boomer and Gio” show on Jan. 14:
Brady enjoying his time in the booth
There was speculation that perhaps Brady would walk away after one season due to his other job as part owner of the Raiders. He said that’s not the case, that he likes the job and he has “had the best time at Fox.”
Like his playing career, he’s learning as he goes.
“It has been a lot of growth for me in one year,” Brady told Colin Cowherd during an appearance on “The Herd.” “I can’t wait to see what it looks like in Year 2 and way beyond that too. I’ve got nine years left on my deal and maybe longer, you never know. If Fox wants me then I want to go. We’ll just keep going because it has been really fun thus far.”
Brady gets to try his new trade on the biggest stage possible at Super Bowl LIX. If people don’t have an opinion about Brady as an announcer yet, they might after that game.
