It may or may not be the “witching hour” for Scott Hanson at NFL Network.
Contract negotiations between NFL Media and NFL RedZone host Scott Hanson have “stalled,” according to Michael McCarthy of Front Office Sports. Per McCarthy, talks have been slowed by the NFL’s separate negotiations to cede management of its media apparatus, which includes RedZone, to ESPN.
Hanson, whose contract expired at the end of the NFL season, has been host of the NFL-produced version of NFL RedZone since its debut in 2009. (Andrew Siciliano hosted a separate version of RedZone for DIRECTV that ended after the 2022 season.) In his time as RedZone host, he has become synonymous with the whiparound show and arguably one of the league’s most popular broadcasters.
Last year, he was one of the hosts for NBC Sports’ whiparound show “Gold Zone” during the Paris Summer Olympics, further raising his profile.
Per McCarthy, Hanson is in talks with NBC Sports to reprise that role on next year’s Olympics. It is not clear whether those discussions are extending beyond the Olympics to include other on-air roles.
NFL Media has cut ties with a number of high-profile broadcasters, including Siciliano and Michael Irvin, amidst cost-cutting over the past few years. Though the league remains by far the most valuable property in all of American television, it has spent years trying to unload NFL Media, which in an era of cord-cutting is a rare source of vulnerability for the league.
