CBS Sports kicked off a massive industry spending spree by luring former Dallas Cowboys quarterback Tony Romo to its NFL booth in 2017. Now, the sports outlet is likely to cut costs by parting ways with the popular color commentator.
“CBS Sports and Tony Romo have mutually agreed to part ways. We thank Tony for his contributions over the past nine years and wish him the best for the future,” the company said in a statement Friday. JJ Watt, who has filled in for Romo so far this season, will continue to do so alongside regulars Jim Nantz and Tracy Wolfson.
In September, Romo pleaded no contest to a charge of operating while intoxicated stemming from an incident in Milwaukee in July and expressed hope that he would be able to return to his NFL duties for the Paramount broadcast network Skydance. CBS Sports has placed the former Dallas Cowboys quarterback on leave after he was arrested following a traffic stop on Interstate 43 in Wisconsin.
On Friday, the announcer said he would “use this time to take a break, something I have never done before, and focus on my health and my family before moving on to my next opportunity.” He expressed pride in “what I have accomplished at CBS Sports over the past nine years. I approached my role as a game analyst the same way I approached everything in my life, with the desire to win and be the best I can be.”
Romo’s departure from CBS Sports might raise more questions than it answers. Its release opens up a prime position during the network’s NFL season at a time when the sport has become even more critical to the fortunes of the company that will soon be known as Skydance – the parent company resulting from the merger of Paramount and Warner Bros. Discovery. The combined company will have billions in debt, which could limit its ability to invest heavily in new talent.
Sports television networks have spent money to attract the NFL’s top advertisers, with Fox and Disney paying top dollar to land Tom Brady and Troy Aikman and Joe Buck, respectively. Many prominent announcing contracts are set to expire after the end of this season, including Aikman’s, but also that of Greg Olsen at Fox and Al Michaels at Amazon. The Athletic reported that ESPN had secured a new deal with Buck and that Amazon had signed tentative terms with Kirk Herbstreit, who also calls a college game at ESPN. ESPN and Amazon declined to comment on the status of the deals reached by these advertisers.
TV networks rushed to line up top talent to call games after the NFL reached a crucial 11-year rights deal in 2021. At the time, many TV sports chiefs believed they had to spend money to make money. Tony Romo broke new ground at CBS Sports after revealing a talent for predicting the game – nearly forcing CBS to re-sign the former Dallas Cowboys quarterback to a multi-season pact in 2020 valued at around $17 million per year.
Since then, most of CBS’s contemporaries have followed suit. When ESPN signed deals with Buck and Aikman, former Fox Sports mainstays, in 2022 to call “Monday Night Football,” it was seen as a crucial move that would help the Disney-backed sports media giant smooth over what had become a rocky relationship with the NFL. Amazon lured NBC Sports’ Al Michaels and ESPN’s Herbstreit to serve as the voices of “Thursday Night Football.” And Fox secured the services of none other than Brady, a move that ousted sportscaster Olsen.
People familiar with the market estimate that top football pit workers can earn between $15 million and $20 million per season.
CBS Sports may have other talent issues to juggle in the coming weeks. Ian Eagle, a newcomer who calls NFL sideshows for CBS Sports, also reportedly has a contract that is about to expire. He also calls NBA games for Amazon’s Prime Video.
Romo previously cited several back surgeries that prompted his retirement from the NFL as a factor in the recent incident, noting that they “left me in constant, debilitating pain” that “led to an addiction to painkillers, and my efforts to stop those medications led to an overreliance on alcohol.”
“None of this is an excuse,” Romo said. “These are my failures and I take responsibility for them.”
More to come….
Gn sports
