Sunday Night Football Pregame Westwood One's coverage of
Sunday Night Football begins with their weekly recap show,
NFL Sunday. The show begins at 7:30 p.m every Sunday night on most affiliates and is hosted by Scott Graham. The show consists of highlights and statistics from the previous games of the day as well as a preview of the upcoming Sunday night game live from the stadium. For the
2006 season,
NFL Sunday assumed a different format. The show was produced in conjunction with
NBC Sports, used its
John Williams-composed
Sunday Night Football theme song, and was regarded as more of a radio version of the television network's
Football Night in America pregame.
Al Trautwig was the initial host of the program, and an analyst from NBC would offer his own take on the game to come. Incidental music for game highlights came from
NFL Films’ library. Trautwig left the show before the season ended for reasons unexplained; Scott Graham would eventually take his place after Chris Carlin substituted for two weeks. (He eventually became permanent host in 2009.)
Play-by-play The play-by-play role for CBS Radio Sports' coverage of
Sunday Night Football was originally filled by
Jack Buck, who called the initial Sunday night games in
1987.
Jim Nantz took over for Buck, who was already calling
Monday Night Football for the network, the following season and announced games until
1990 when he was moved to television. Nantz was replaced by
Howard David for
1991 and continued through
1995, after which he replaced the retiring Buck on
Monday Night Football.
Brad Sham was hired away from his job with the
Dallas Cowboys to replace David for the 1996 season, and he stayed for that season and the following season before deciding to rejoin the Cowboys. Former NBC television announcer
Joel Meyers then took over and stayed until the
2005 season when he was replaced by Sunday doubleheader voice
Dave Sims, who had been his primary substitute. Sims remained in this role until the end of the 2012 season, when he traded places with Sunday doubleheader voice
Kevin Kugler. During Week 8 of the 2018 and 2019 seasons,
Tom McCarthy substituted for Kugler as the latter was calling games for Fox. During week 11 of the 2019 season, McCarthy again substituted for Kugler, as he called the Monday Night game (Chiefs-Chargers) from Mexico City for the network. For the 2020 season, after Fox Sports suspended
Thom Brennaman for inappropriate comments he made on air in his other job as lead broadcaster for baseball's
Cincinnati Reds, the network selected Kugler, who was employed by Fox already through his work on the
Big Ten Network, to replace him on their Sunday NFL broadcasts (Kugler remains with the network for select games and as a substitute play-by-play announcer). Westwood One announced that due to the ongoing
COVID-19 pandemic in the United States, they would utilize different broadcasters from week-to-week depending on where the game was emanating from. Westwood One elected to go back to having a single lead broadcaster for its Sunday night coverage for 2022; on March 30, 2022, the network announced that Ryan Radtke, who had been serving as the network's lead college football broadcaster and was one of the announcers used in the rotation for 2021, would fill the role.
Color commentary John Dockery was the initial color commentator for
Sunday Night Football, serving under Buck and Nantz. Beginning in 1990,
Pat Haden joined Dockery as color commentator. At the time, the Sunday night games were divided between
Turner Sports, with games airing on
TNT, and
ESPN. Haden was TNT's television analyst and thus unavailable to do radio broadcasts until the network's slate of games had completed, so Dockery would serve an analyst for the radio broadcasts. Once ESPN took over coverage, Haden joined the radio team in place of Dockery. The arrangement lasted until the end of the 1997 season, after which ESPN claimed exclusivity over the Sunday night broadcast. Both Haden and Dockery left the network after that season. Other color commentators include
Bob Trumpy, who served as
Sunday Night Football analyst from 2000 to 2004 and again from 2006 to 2007;
John Riggins, who was the color man for the 2005 season;
Jim Fassel, who was 2008's analyst;
James Lofton, who replaced Fassel in 2009 after he left for a head coaching job in the United Football League.
Jason Taylor replaced Lofton starting with the 2017 season due to Lofton moving to CBS television (Lofton remains with the network as a substitute analyst, primarily for its
Monday Night Football coverage). After not having a regular analyst for some time after Taylor left the broadcast, Westwood One decided to give the full-time position to
Mike Golic, the former ESPN analyst and radio show host who had recently joined the network, for 2022.
Monday Night Football The
Monday Night Football broadcast on Westwood One features its lead broadcast team, as the network has long considered Monday night to be its flagship NFL broadcast, even as the NFL now considers the Sunday night game (since
2006 when NBC launched their
Sunday night television package) its marquee "game of the week". As such, the team occupying this position stays together to call important playoff games and the Super Bowl.
Buck and Stram (1978–1985; 1987–1995) For many years (beginning in
1978), the CBS Radio/Westwood One coverage of
Monday Night Football was anchored by
Jack Buck on play-by-play, with former
Kansas City Chiefs coach
Hank Stram alongside him in the color position. They stayed paired together for nearly every major game covered by the network from 1978 until
Super Bowl XIX in January 1985. Since Westwood One now regards
NBC Radio's coverage of
Monday Night Football as part of its broadcast history Stram and Buck were regarded as temporarily replaced by
Don Criqui and
Bob Trumpy for the two years NBC Radio held the contract. Buck and Stram returned to the booth at the beginning of the 1987 season and stayed there until the end of the
1995 season, with
Super Bowl XXX in January 1996 marking their final game as a broadcast team after sixteen total seasons on radio. During their time as
Monday Night Football lead broadcast team both Buck and Stram worked on the television side as well. Stram had served as a color commentator on
The NFL on CBS prior to joining Buck on the radio and continued to do so from 1978 until CBS lost the rights to the NFL in
1993. Buck rejoined the CBS television coverage as a play-by-play man in
1982 (after having called games for the network from
1964 to
1974) and remained there until
1987. The duo worked together as a television broadcast team in
1982,
1983, and
1985.
David, Millen and Esiason (1996–2001) To replace the departing Buck and Stram for
1996, Westwood One promoted
Howard David from the
Sunday Night Football broadcast and moved
Matt Millen, who at the time was a color commentator for
Fox and a contributor to the Westwood One Monday night pregame show, into the booth alongside him. Beginning in
1998 and continuing until
2001, David served as the play-by-play voice of the
New York Jets for
WFAN and later
WABC, and would require a substitute when the Jets played on Monday night or in the playoffs. An example of the latter came in the
1998 NFC Championship Game;
John Rooney substituted for an absent David in
Minneapolis for Westwood One as he called that year's
AFC Championship Game for WFAN from
Denver.
Boomer Esiason joined David and Millen for the
2000 season after being fired by ABC from the
Monday Night Football telecast. It was the last season in the booth for Millen as he departed to take a position as President of the
Detroit Lions, a job which he received great criticism in and was eventually fired from in
2008. In
2001, David and Esiason were joined by CBS Sports' veteran reporter
Lesley Visser, who became the first woman to be an analyst on an NFL broadcast. Visser had previously become the first female sportscaster to preside over the
Vince Lombardi Trophy presentation, while covering
Super Bowl XXVI for CBS television in 1992. The pairing only lasted the one season, as Visser decided to leave the booth to focus on her reporting for both CBS and
HBO. It was also David's last season calling games for Westwood One until his
2009 return, as he became a full-time sports talk show host in Miami and the voice of the
Miami Dolphins beginning in
2002.
Albert and Esiason (2002–2009) For the
2002 season Westwood One chose veteran broadcaster
Marv Albert, who had last called NFL games for
NBC in
1997 and was best known for his
NBA broadcasting for
NBC,
TNT, and (at the time) the
New York Knicks. Esiason stayed on to be his color commentator. Since Esiason also joined
The NFL Today broadcast team for the 2002 season and CBS (at the time) traveled to the site of the AFC Championship Game, Albert and Esiason became the exclusive voices of the game. To accomplish this Esiason would call the end of each half with a wireless microphone so he could save time to go to the field level set CBS used for these games. Esiason has also done this in years CBS has carried the Super Bowl, but has not done this for the AFC Championship game since the 2005 game in Denver as CBS has not traveled to the AFC Championship since (until 2016). Beginning in
2007, Westwood One has employed a series of substitute analysts for
Monday Night Football. This was a change necessitated by the premiere of the
Boomer and Carton morning show on the network's flagship station, New York's WFAN, which saw Esiason and
Craig Carton take over the station's morning show following
Don Imus' firing and a job which, when combined with his CBS duties, has Esiason in New York six days a week. Esiason employs a private jet service to get him to and from Monday night games outside the
New York-
Delaware Valley area, but for games that require significant travel (e.g.
west coast games, certain games outside the Northeastern U.S. or games held outside the U.S.) he is unable to return to New York in enough time to rest and be ready for the start of
Boomer and Carton at 6:00 am, thus requiring a fill-in analyst for those games. Initially, Albert called the game with a rotating series of guest analysts on weeks that Esiason was unavailable. Beginning in
2009, Westwood One appointed
Kevin Harlan and
Warren Moon to serve as the backup broadcast team, with Harlan substituting for Albert on games he was unable to make due to other commitments (a role formally filled by Dave Sims) and Moon substituting for Esiason. The pairing ended following the 2009 NFL season, with Albert's last call being
Super Bowl XLIV in Miami. On June 4, 2010, Albert announced that he was leaving Westwood One to focus on his NBA broadcasting duties for TNT and the
YES Network. In
2011, he returned to calling NFL games for CBS television.
Harlan and Esiason (2010–2017) On June 29, 2010, it was announced that
Kevin Harlan would be succeeding Albert as Westwood One's primary play-by-play voice for
Monday Night Football, with Esiason continuing as color commentator. In
2010,
Randy Cross served as Esiason's substitute for select games, while
Wayne Larrivee filled in on play-by-play when Harlan was unavailable. The following year,
Dan Fouts replaced Cross as substitute analyst and stayed until 2014 when
Kurt Warner replaced him.
2016 substitutions In 2016, for the first time since being employed by the network, Esiason did not call the opening game of the season as it took place in Denver. Regular substitute Kurt Warner filled in for Esiason. During Week 7 of the same season neither Harlan or Esiason was available for the Monday Night game, Kevin Kugler filled in for Harlan as he was calling the International Series game in
London, England for
NFL Network, with Kurt Warner also filling in for Esiason (despite Kugler and Warner, the latter filling in for James Lofton, calling the Sunday Night Football game the previous night). For the Week 11 Monday Night game (
Texans-
Raiders) being played in
Mexico City, Armando Quintero and Benny Ricardo (both
Mexican-Americans) called the game instead of Harlan and Esiason/Warner. Kugler and Warner would again call the Week 16 Monday Night game (
Lions-
Cowboys), with Kugler filling in for Harlan as the latter called the Christmas Night game (Broncos-Chiefs) in
Kansas City (where Harlan resides in) with Lofton.
Harlan and Warner (2018–present) On August 9, 2018, it was announced that
Kurt Warner would be succeeding Esiason as Westwood One's primary color commentator for
Monday Night Football ending Esiason's 18-year reign in the
Monday Night Football booth, with Harlan continuing as play-by-play announcer. However, Esiason called the opening game of the 2018 season (
Falcons-
Eagles) as his final game for the network. For the opening-week Monday night doubleheader, the primary team initially split up to cover the two games. In 2014, for example, Esiason joined
Ian Eagle to call the early game while Harlan teamed with
James Lofton on the broadcast of the late game. However, this was no longer the case as of the 2018 season due to Esiason's departure, with Harlan and Warner calling the late game.
Pregame and halftime show host The
Monday Night Football pregame and halftime shows are conducted differently from usual pregames, as there is no other game action to recap.
Jim Gray presided over both the pregame and halftime shows, which are more feature driven and often feature guest commentators such as
Tom Brady and
Larry Fitzgerald, who contributes to the pregame show weekly with predictions and commentary. In addition to the Monday night games, Gray also hosted the studio shows for the Thursday opening game and the Super Bowl. For the Monday Night game held in Mexico during Week 11 of the 2016 season, Scott Graham co-hosted the pregame and halftime shows with Gray. Starting with the 2021 season,
NFL Network host
Rich Eisen succeeded Gray on this role while, in-turn, also relocating the Monday Night pregame/halftime coverage to Los Angeles from the network's New York City studios. Gray, Fitzgerald and Brady have since started a podcast titled ''Let's Go!'', which airs on Mondays during the season on
SiriusXM NFL Radio prior to the game broadcasts. Starting with the 2025 season, Mike Golic and his son
Mike Golic Jr. succeeded Eisen in this role while also extending the pregame show to 60 minutes.
Steve Tasker serves as the sideline reporter for
Monday Night Football.
John Dockery served as sideline reporter from
1999 to
2007. From 2008 to 2012, there was no official sideline reporter for
Monday Night Football.
Spanish language In
2005, Westwood One carried an alternate Spanish-language feed featuring
Clemson Smith-Muniz as play-by-play host and
David Crommett as commentator. Those broadcasts have moved to
United Stations Radio Networks.
Thursday Night Football In addition to its Sunday and Monday night coverage, Westwood One also is the radio home for
Thursday Night Football. Westwood One and its predecessors have always aired Thursday games in the past, but until 2006 those games were usually limited to Thanksgiving, rarely scheduled midweek games, and the season opening game beginning in 2002. When
Thursday Night Football was added to the NFL schedule permanently, Westwood One created a specific broadcast team to cover it. From 2006 until 2008,
Dick Enberg was the play-by-play man.
Sam Wyche was the initial color analyst, and
Dennis Green replaced him after the 2006 season. From 2009-2024,
Ian Eagle has been the voice of
Thursday Night Football for Westwood One and Dave Pasch, Tom McCarthy or Brandon Gaudin has worked as a backup play by play man for Thursday Night Football in 2021. After Dennis Green left to take the head coaching position with the
United Football League's
California Redwoods in 2008, Fox television analyst
Trent Green replaced him and stayed on until the end of the 2013 season when
Mike Mayock took over. As of 2022, Eagle's analyst is
Tony Boselli. The backup announcers for 2022 will be
Kevin Kugler (play by play) and
Jason McCourty (analyst).
Broadcast teams Westwood One employed two separate broadcast teams for the Sunday doubleheader. Over the years, the lead announcers included
Harry Kalas,
Howard David,
Dave Sims, and
Bill Rosinski among others. Analysts included
Trev Alberts,
Dan Reeves,
Jim Fassel,
Mark Malone,
Tony Boselli,
Jack Ham, and
Rod Woodson. NFL Films narrator
Scott Graham hosted all studio segments for the Sunday games on Westwood One, having taken this position once previous host
Tommy Tighe moved to ESPN Radio. In addition to his studio duties, Graham would also provide play-by-play on certain games. In such cases, either Jason Horowitz replaced him in the studio or Graham did the studio segments on-site. After Jim Gray's departure just before the 2021 season, Graham hosted the pre-game/halftime for that season's Super Bowl alongside
Willie McGinest.
Playoff coverage For the first two rounds of the playoffs, often the regular broadcast teams are mixed, due to Boomer Esiason's unavailability. During the wild card and divisional weekends, there are four games, therefore four separate crews are needed. Some of the other established crews call the less-popular games. For instance, in
2007,
Dick Enberg and
Dennis Green (from the Thursday night crew) called one of the wild card games, and Marv Albert called games alongside
Jim Fassel from the Sunday doubleheader team. In
2009, the teams were even more mixed – for example, Marv Albert called an opening round game with Dennis Green and a divisional playoff game with
Warren Moon. Typically, the first time the main crews are together comes during Conference Championship weekend, since Boomer Esiason has commitments with
The NFL Today. When he joined the CBS studio show, the crew traveled to the site of the AFC Championship Game every year; this meant the Monday night crew would be exclusively responsible for calling the game. CBS has not chosen to travel to the sites of the AFC Championship Game from 2006 to 2015, so Esiason stays behind in New York with the
NFL Today panel. In the first of those two seasons Marv Albert called the 2007 game in Indianapolis alongside
Sam Wyche. In
2008, neither Albert nor Esiason was available on championship weekend, so Dave Sims and Bob Trumpy moved to the AFC Championship Game in New England while Bill Rosinski took Albert's place alongside Jim Fassel for the NFC Championship Game in Green Bay. For
2009, Albert returned to the booth for Championship Sunday, calling the NFC Championship Game alongside Fassel with Dave Sims and Dennis Green responsible for the AFC Championship Game. The
2010 Conference Championship Games saw
Kevin Harlan and Warren Moon call the AFC Championship Game while Sims and James Lofton called the NFC championship Game. The broadcast teams have stayed together throughout the playoffs; this was made simpler with the addition of a permanent backup analyst for
Monday Night Football. For
2016, Harlan and Esiason called the AFC Championship Game, as CBS will be traveling to the 2016 AFC Championship Game in Denver for the first time since 2006, allowing Esiason to work both his
NFL Today and radio duties on-site. While Kevin Kugler and James Lofton will be calling the NFC Championship game. For the
2019 playoffs, NBC's
Mike Tirico and ESPN's
Brian Griese called the Saturday AFC wild card game, owing to the reduction of Westwood One to three announce teams for the primetime games in the regular season, who then covered the remainder of Wild Card Weekend's four games. Due to the expanded playoffs in
2021, which resulted in six games during Wild Card Weekend, Westwood One called in many of its backup announcers to cover the full slate of games. For the first tripleheader on Saturday, John Sadak and Ross Tucker call
Colts-
Bills, Ryan Radtke and Mike Holmgren call
Rams-
Seahawks, and Kevin Harlan and Ron Jaworski call
Buccaneers-
Washington. On Sunday, Brandon Gaudin and Rod Woodson call
Ravens-
Titans, Kevin Kugler and James Lofton call
Bears-
Saints, and Kevin Harlan and Tony Boselli call
Browns-
Steelers.
Other programming Westwood One, in addition to its game coverage and highlight show on Sundays, Mondays, and Thursdays, offers to affiliate stations four different NFL-related programs during the season leading up to the Super Bowl. The first to premiere is
Fantasy Football Forecast, originally an hour-long weekly program hosted by Kevin Kugler and James Lofton regarding fantasy leagues. This program premieres in late August and runs until the final week of the season and is now a two-minute feature hosted by Jason Horowitz. A second program,
NFL Insider, runs from the beginning of the season through to the Super Bowl, is a program hosted by Scott Graham, where he provided analysis of the week, present highlights of the previous week's action, and interview players and coaches. Scott Graham and
Mike Golic host an NFL preview show every week (appropriately called
NFL Preview), where they analyze each game in depth and provide information about what players and other factors will play roles in the upcoming week. This program runs through Super Bowl Sunday and is thirty minutes in length, but runs for an hour leading into the Super Bowl. A live radio version of
The NFL Today runs every Sunday morning before the main CBS version during the season, hosted by Amber Theoharis alongside rotating analysts. Warner also hosts a weekly podcast
The Kurt Warner QB Podcast (named after Warner himself), where he and Kevin Harlan analyze and review quarterback plays throughout the season. During the first months of the COVID-19 pandemic, the network also re-broadcast select NFL postseason games from past seasons, including
Super Bowl I,
Super Bowl XLII, and
Super Bowl LIV. Under the NFL's 2022 contract with Westwood One, it will also provide coverage of other "
tentpole" events such as the
NFL draft combine, the
NFL draft, the schedule release, and the
NFL Honors. ==Announcers==