Amazon confirms Al Michaels-Kirk Herbstreit broadcast team for 'Thursday Night Football'
One of the worst-kept secrets of what's been a wild and historic NFL offseason was confirmed Wednesday.
Per Michael Baca of the league's website, Amazon Prime Video has officially announced that legendary play-by-play announcer Al Michaels and ESPN college football personality and analyst Kirk Herbstreit are teaming up as the new broadcast duo for "Thursday Night Football," which moves to the streaming service in September. Rumors of the Michaels-Herbstreit partnership broke weeks ago and well after it was essentially public knowledge that Michaels would be leaving NBC after 16 years with that company following Super Bowl LVI.
As Michael David Smith noted for Pro Football Talk, NBC still holds the rights to the Week 1 "TNF" regular-season opener. Amazon, thus, will have one preseason "TNF" game and 16 regular-season contests.
Per Tom Tapp of Deadline, Mike Tirico is replacing Michaels to call games alongside Cris Collinsworth for NBC "Sunday Night Football" broadcasts.
According to Chris Pugh of The Columbus Dispatch, Herbstreit will continue his work with ESPN despite his new NFL duties.
"I am so proud of the work our ESPN and ABC team does on college football – this has been my family for 26 years and my passion for the sport is unwavering," Herbstreit said about signing an extension with the Worldwide Leader, per a statement shared by Amanda Brooks of ESPN Press Room. "Calling college games and being a part of 'College GameDay' is important to me. I am very appreciative of Jimmy Pitaro for his leadership and for allowing me to continue in this role with Disney."
Andrew Marchand of the New York Post previously reported Michaels' Amazon contract is for three years and could be similar to the five-year deal worth a total of $75 million that Joe Buck reportedly received to make the jump from FOX to ESPN. The terms of Herbstreit’s Amazon contract weren't known as of Monday.
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