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If you don’t have anything nice to say, say it to football fans.
That was the takeaway from Fox Sports commentator Greg Olsen’s Super Bowl LVII performance after the retired tight end slammed a late defensive holding call against Philadelphia Eagles cornerback James Bradberry. The hotly disputed penalty led to the Kansas City Chiefs’ game-winning field goal, despite the near-negligible contact and the overthrown pass from quarterback Patrick Mahomes to JuJu Smith-Schuster.
But while Fox’s rules analyst and former NFL official Mike Pereira insisted the refs got the call right on the field, Olsen refused to give him the benefit of the doubt.
‘I don’t know,’ said Olsen, a long-time Carolina Panthers star. ‘Mike, listen, I think on this stage, I think you let them play. Obviously, Mahomes thought he saw it. I don’t know; I think you let them play, finish this thing out. I don’t love that call, Mike.’
It wasn’t sports radio-style takedown that many football fans have grown accustomed to, but it did endear Olsen to the NFL audience, which has become critical of announcers’ reluctance to point the finger at officials. Furthermore, it raises the spectre of an airtime battle between him and recently retired Tom Brady, who has a 10-year, $375 million commentating deal with the network that begins in 2024.
Greg Olsen (right), 37, and his play-by-player partner Kevin Burkhardt (left), 48, were calling their first Super Bowl for Fox after the network watched Joe Buck and Troy Aikman leave for ESPN before the 2022 season. The next time Fox will air the Super Bowl will be 2025, by which point, Brady is expected to be the network’s top commentator
Fox Sports commentator Greg Olsen’s slammed a late defensive holding call against Philadelphia Eagles cornerback James Bradberry (left). The hotly disputed penalty led to the Kansas City Chiefs’ game-winning field goal, despite the near-negligible contact and the overthrown pass from quarterback Patrick Mahomes to JuJu Smith-Schuster (right)
Olsen, 37, and his play-by-player partner Kevin Burkhardt, 48, were calling their first Super Bowl for Fox after the network watched Joe Buck and Troy Aikman leave for ESPN before the 2022 season. The next time Fox will air the Super Bowl will be 2025, by which point, Brady is expected to be the network’s top commentator.
‘I wonder how Greg Olsen feels knowing this could be his first & last Super Bowl assignment?’ tweeted Syracuse communications professor and former ESPN producer Dennis Deninger. ‘Tom Brady has already been signed by FOX to take his job.’
New York Post sports media columnist Andrew Marchand also praised Olsen’s commentary for the following play, in which he realized Chiefs running back Jerick McKinnon had an open path to the end zone.
Knowing the Eagles were out of timeouts late in the fourth, Olsen wisely said ‘he’s got to get down,’ rather than scoring and leaving Philadelphia with nearly a minute of game time to tie or win the Super Bowl.
McKinnon did just that, dropping to the turf to set up the game-winning field goal, while making Olsen look almost telepathic in the process.
Tom Brady has a contract with Fox Sports to begin calling NFL games beginning in 2024
New York Post sports media columnist Andrew Marchand also praised Olsen’s commentary for the following play, in which he realized Chiefs running back Jerick McKinnon had an open path to the end zone. Knowing the Eagles were out of timeouts late in the fourth, Olsen wisely said ‘he’s got to get down,’ rather than scoring and leaving Philadelphia with nearly a minute of game time to tie or win the Super Bowl. McKinnon did just that, dropping to the turf to set up the game-winning field goal, while making Olsen look almost telepathic in the process
Tom Brady #12 of the New England Patriots meets with Greg Olsen #88 of the Carolina Panthers following the Patriots 10-3 preseason victory at Gillette Stadium on August 22, 2019
To Marchand, Olsen is Fox Sports’ Brady, the hard-working student of the procession who has worked hard to become so accomplished in such a short amount of time.
‘When you look at it, Olsen as a broadcaster has done what Brady did as a player — Olsen has earned everything he has gotten and came up huge in the biggest of games,’ Marchand wrote.
Former New York Daily News and New York Post writer Robert A. George felt that Fox would be foolish to promote Brady over Olsen.
Fox would be idiots to give Tom Brady the No. 1 analyst gig after the job Greg Olsen did this year (Brady is taking next year off — but that should just solidify decision in Olsen’s favor).
But not everyone was pleased with Olsen, who may have been wrong about Bradberry’s penalty.
‘Since apparently Greg Olsen gaslit everyone into thinking that was a bad holding call, here’s the jersey grab and pull by Bradberry on JuJu Smith-Schuster,’ read one tweet alongside a clip of the penalty. ‘Not egregious but a pretty textbook hold.’
‘Honest opinion,’ another fan began. ‘Greg Olsen’s call on the Bradberry hold is the reason the audience is upset. Had he explained via replay that the jersey was tugged and he impeded his route, there would be less argument. But Olsen saying ‘he had his hand on his back, I dunno,’ sways public opinion.’
Even Bradberry has conceded that he pulled on Smith-Schuster’s jersey.
‘It was a holding,’ Bradberry told reporters. ‘I tugged his jersey. I was hoping they would let it slide.’
For the time being, Olsen remains Fox’s top broadcasting crew, but the network is paying Brady extraordinarily well to drop him to second on the depth chart in 2024.
Even Bradberry has conceded that he pulled on Smith-Schuster’s jersey. ‘It was a holding,’ Bradberry told reporters. ‘I tugged his jersey. I was hoping they would let it slide’
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