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🎤 QUICK START ✍️

📺 Jimmy Johnson retiring? The three-time NCAA football champion and two-time NFL champion received a video tribute from Fox during the network’s Super Bowl pregame show on Sunday from New Orleans. Asked whether this was it after more than 30 years on Fox NFL Sunday, Johnson said he was taking it “one day at a time.”

🎉 Randy Moss returns. The Hall of Fame receiver and ESPN analyst made his triumphant return to NFL Countdown early Sunday for the show’s Super Bowl coverage after a break to receive treatment for cancer on his bile duct and liver.

🏀 Dick Vitale calls first game in nearly two years at Clemson. The legendary ESPN announcer continues to battle cancer, working as an analyst when his docs allow. The broadcast crew and Tigers faithful welcomed him with open arms. Vitale’s return gave way to another touching moment from an ESPN legend on Sunday…

🏀 Hubie Brown called his final NBA game Sunday on ABC. The two-time NBA Coach of the Year walked away from broadcasting after 40 years in the booth across four networks. Brown’s final game came in Milwaukee, where his NBA coaching career began alongside longtime teammate Mike Breen, who helped orchestrate a touching game-long tribute to Brown’s career.

🚨LEADING OFF 🚨

Super Bowl blowout leaves Brady in the dust

Maybe Fox and Tom Brady were both due for some bad luck.

Five years before the thrilling Part 1 of this Eagles-Chiefs duel in 2022, Brady himself delivered one of the best performances in Super Bowl history on Fox airwaves. In that game, Brady came back from a 28-3 deficit against Atlanta, saving football’s biggest night from disappointment. The network was on a hot streak, with all the momentum of Brady’s solid postseason as a broadcaster (not to mention his seven rings as a QB) following them to the Crescent City.

Until last night.

After its first drive was ruined by a questionable offensive pass interference call (which Brady and rules analyst Mike Pereira rightly panned in real-time), Philadelphia pounced. The only problem was that early in the second quarter, the Eagles threw an interception, kicked a field goal, and ran back a pick-six, all within about five game minutes.

After a slow, quiet first quarter, Philly was suddenly up two touchdowns and running away with the game. By the time Patrick Mahomes threw his second interception just before halftime, and Brady came up for air, he had missed his chance to explain how the reigning back-to-back champs slipped.

The GOAT never got his hands back on the wheel until the blowout was complete in the fourth quarter. Needing to fill the air for a waning audience, Brady provided genuinely great insight on how it would feel for Kansas City to come up short. This team, he said, would never forget this loss despite its greatness for the past six years.

That’s the good stuff. Brady probably says that knowing that the Super Bowls his Fox teammate Michael Strahan and these Eagles stole from him, for instance, still plague him. It’s a tough spot to be in on your first Super Bowl.

Brady notably bragged that he knew this Chiefs defense better than the team does in the lead-up to the game and clearly was ready to talk about a much different version of the game than he got. It would have been nice to hear more perspective on the actual battle between Philly’s defense and the legendary Mahomes in real-time, but the game may have moved too fast for him.

That never happened when he was the one in Mahomes’ situation. But sometimes, you draw a bad hand and still have to make the most of it.

📣 SOCIAL EXPERIMENT 🌟

The Get Up crew might have had a little too much fun in the French Quarter, as Mike Greenberg and Co. completely flipped their Super Bowl picks from Thursday’s show to Friday’s show.

In a testament to how much ESPN cared about honoring Hubie Brown in the 91-year-old’s final broadcast on Sunday afternoon in Milwaukee, it worked to recruit former ESPN announcer Mike Tirico (now at NBC) for a live hit during the game.

Tirico praised Brown for his ability to educate fans and viewers over his many years calling games.

👏 INDUSTRY INSIGHTS 🗣️

• ESPN is trying again to air Luka Doncic’s debut with the Los Angeles Lakers on Monday night in L.A. after redoing its entire Saturday schedule to air Lakers-Pacers on Saturday afternoon, a game that Doncic and LeBron James both ultimately missed.

• NFL MVP voting caused some controversy as Josh Allen surprisingly took home his first trophy despite Lamar Jackson making First-Team All-Pro. ESPN’s Booger McFarland called out voters’ emotions while Domonique Foxworth critiqued Dan Orlovsky, and SiriusXM’s Jim Miller had some explaining to do after voting Jackson fourth.

• From one Fox alum to Fox’s new golden boy, Troy Aikman recalled asking Fox Sports CEO Eric Shanks for a similar freedom to invest in an NFL team and getting the green light. Aikman, of course, then defended Brady’s arrangement in an appearance on The Ryen Russillo Podcast from The Ringer.

✍️ AROUND AA ✍️

Jay Glazer sounds off

Jay Glazer isn’t afraid to say that criticism hurts.

The Fox NFL insider spoke with Awful Announcing’s Andrew Bucholtz (whose media coverage on-site from New Orleans has been fantastic) in the lead-up to Super Bowl LIX about what goes through his mind when fans and fellow journalists question his credibility.

Glazer told AA that when his reporting is questioned, his response usually is to look at the critic and think, “I want to f***ing take your head off.” Though his years of MMA training well up in those moments, he, of course, holds back.

More specifically, Glazer takes issue with how aggregation of his initial reporting always seems to take his info a step further than he did. When other sites rewrite Glazer's news, they hint at what might be coming. In the case of Glazer reporting that rival teams inquired about trading for Minnesota Vikings head coach Kevin O’Connell this offseason, many fans saw a hint that O’Connell could be gone, though that was never Glazer’s point.

“Man, I just got killed for something I didn’t say,” Glazer thinks now.

Check out the full feature from Andrew on Glazer from New Orleans.

️‍🔥THE CLOSER🔥

NBC comes next

Super Bowl LX is now less than a year away, with Santa Clara set to host the NFL world in 2026.

That game will be on NBC, with Mike Tirico and Cris Collinsworth on the call. Football fans are in good hands. That tandem already has one Super Bowl under its belt together and brings a ton of experience and a big-game feel to every call.

The studio show, though, needs work. A program that bills itself as Football Night In America and is typically one of the most-watched television broadcasts each week from September to January lacks one big thing.

Actually, it lacks any big thing.

A humble suggestion to the smart people at NBC Sports: Go bigger! The network has favored volume over star power filling out its football roster, and the result is a long, watchable show. But nothing pops.

Heading into the offseason and toward another Super Bowl, it would be great to see NBC invest in a can’t-miss icon for its coverage. ESPN has the Buck/Aikman booth and now Jason Kelce. Fox has Brady. CBS just brought in Tony Romo and JJ Watt. Amazon got outspoken former players Richard Sherman and Ryan Fitzpatrick.

There are plenty of options on the market — provided you can find a host with a stomach for the studio rather than pushing for an analyst job. From Robert Griffin III to Chris Long to Chase Daniel to heck, even Cam Newton, a new generation of former players is ready to break through. Take a page out of Netflix’s book and seize on what’s younger and more popular.

Think big! And what better time than when you are the home of the Big Game?