We’ve recently seen a tectonic shift in sports media, culminating in Tuesday’s bombshell announcement that Tom Brady, once he’s done playing, will join Fox as its lead color analyst on NFL broadcasts. Not only will Brady soon become the highest-paid broadcaster in sports (his $37.5-million salary dwarfs the $30 million pocketed by Jim Rome on a yearly basis), but barring a miracle, he’ll earn more in a decade at Fox than he did his entire playing career ($332.96 million). That’s an ungodly sum to pay a first-time announcer who, at least in the eyes of Dan Le Batard, has never said anything remotely interesting.
“I want the audience to understand how absurd it is for anyone to get $375 million for something that no one has any proof. Tom Brady isn’t fun or interesting in front of a microphone. They just gave $375 million to somebody who’s never said anything interesting,” the former ESPN personality marveled on Wednesday’s episode of The Dan Le Batard Show with Stugotz. “It’s not like Tom Brady’s agent just went to one person with this. He got it up to $375 million, because money is being spilled all over the place with people in broadcasting fighting over all the white legends.”
Even if Brady proves competent in his new role (a lifetime of fourth-quarter comebacks has taught us never to doubt the 44-year-old in anything he does), was it really necessary for Fox to splurge on a big name when Greg Olsen would have done just as good a job, if not better, at a fraction of the cost? No, but that’s precisely the argument Le Batard is making.
“All of it, I thought, was sort of a seismic shaking of the money doesn’t matter around here. It’s not even about worth, it’s just get your name out in front of people because of ego, pedigree, framing, accent and how the NFL wants to be represented,” explained Le Batard, whose $50-million DraftKings fortune now looks like a drop in the bucket compared to what Fox will be paying Brady to be the new face of their NFL coverage. “Tom Brady has cosigned on, I will go every Sunday and I will lend all of my aura to this big giant thing that has become religion in this country.”
Brady’s windfall is symptomatic of a product that’s too big to fail, affording Fox and other NFL partners the luxury of overpaying for whatever A-list celebrity they want, regardless of their experience or broadcast credentials. Brady could be a bigger flop in the booth than Joe Montana, but he’d still be worth the investment for Fox, who just dominated an entire news cycle while flexing on their competitors.
“What we just got yesterday was a whole lot of advertising that Fox is back in the game in broadcasting,” notes Le Batard. “You’re talking about so much money that even if you could get the same broadcaster for many hundreds of millions less, the television dollars are so large, that the loss of money doesn’t matter. The people that are losing that money don’t care that they’re overspending because football itself as an entity brings so much money all over the place and credibility to your network.”
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