Colin Cowherd said ESPN tried to bring him back

As transcribed by Brandon Contes at Awful Announcing, Cowherd said that a decade at ESPN was enough for him:

“10 years is a lot to do the ESPN treadmill, the car wash,” Cowherd told the New York Post’s Andrew Marchand. “I enjoyed it. I hopefully don’t have any enemies there, I really enjoyed it. They circled back a few years later and came after me and I said, ‘I really appreciate it, but I’m part of a new family.’ But it wasn’t for any other reason than my wife and I, we wanted new adventures.”

Cowherd worked in local TV and radio up and down the West Coast long before he made the move to go national with ESPN. "The Herd" was arguably the most successful syndicated radio show on ESPN Radio for several years despite several on-air controversies, and it led to him becoming one of the original hosts of "SportsNation." His contract at ESPN was cut short in 2015, weeks after a suspension for his terrible comments on Dominican players in Major League Baseball, and he joined FOX Sports later that summer.

The interview comes at an interesting time for FS1, which is in the midst of finding a replacement for Shannon Sharpe at "Undisputed." The network came into 2023 on a high after all-time best viewership through matches from the COVID-delayed men's World Cup in December 2022, and it will broadcast some matches of the women's version this summer to augment its usual MLB and NASCAR games. Yet Sharpe's upcoming departure shines a light on FS1's lack of non-sports programming that widely resonates with the public.

"The Herd" is FS1's most watched non-game program, but respectfully that's not a massive feat when considering how much similar debate shows on ESPN dwarf those of their competitors on other networks. Yet it looks as if the lifestyle of FOX Sports suits him best since the checks keep clearing.