ESPN is on the verge of completing a stunner and swiping both Joe Buck and Troy Aikman from FOX.
The New York Post reported Friday that Fox Sports has granted ESPN permission to negotiate with Buck and that a deal is expected to soon follow. Fox is reportedly letting Buck out of his contract, which expires after this season, as a measure of goodwill for his nearly 30-year run with the company.
Per the Post, Buck will sign a five-year deal with ESPN worth between $12-15 million per year, exceeding his current $11 million/year deal.
Buck is the face of Fox Sports, having called every World Series televised by the network and each Super Bowl it has aired dating back to 2005. The son of Jack Buck, he has during his Fox tenure become the preeminent voice of Major League Baseball, calling every single World Series this century. His move to ESPN means the end of that streak.
His departure marks a seismic change for baseball broadcasts, as the Post reported earlier this week that he is not expected to contribute to ESPN’s MLB coverage. Fox, which carries both the next World Series and Super Bowl, will now have to find new voices to fill those marquee roles.
Buck and Aikman, who have worked together on FOX for 20 years and called six Super Bowl games, immediately become the most renowned Monday Night Football both since the days of Al Michaels and John Madden on ABC. ESPN has tried many things with MNF since it began carrying the series in 2006 — from Tony Kornheiser to the “Boogermobile” — but has yet to restore MNF to the exalted status it had in the ABC years.
This coming season is the last of the NFL’s 2011 media rights deals. Starting in 2023, Monday Night Football will become a significantly higher-profile property with the addition of a pair of Super Bowl games, a Divisional Round game and flexible scheduling during the regular season.
Fox losing both Buck and Aikman is not an outcome many would have predicted at the start of the NFL’s media free agency. Aikman was widely expected to move to Amazon’s Thursday Night Football package, an agreement that would have allowed him to continue on FOX Sunday games. His decision to go to ESPN instead — and depart Fox entirely — has set off dominoes that continue to fall.
The current Fox #2 NFL team is Kevin Burkhardt and Greg Olsen.
[News from NYP 3.11]
