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Joe Buck is expected to leave Fox Sports for ESPN, where he will become the voice of Monday Night Football, The Post has learned.
Buck, 52, has been in the World Series for almost a quarter of a century and has been Fox’s assistant in six Super Bowls.
On Friday, Fox allowed Baku to speak to ESPN, according to sources. The deal is expected to close soon.
With Fox, Buck was left with a one-year, $11 million contract. Fox, however, fires him early, as a nice gesture for his years with the company. According to sources, he is expected to sign a five-year contract with ESPN worth between $60 million and $75 million.
On ESPN, Buck will join his longtime partner Troy Aikman at the MNF booth. The Post previously reported that Aikman left Fox to become an MNF analyst. According to sources, Aikman agreed to a five-year, $92.5 million contract.
At ESPN, Buck, in addition to being called “Monday Night Football”, is also expected to be involved in producing ESPN+ projects.
For the past year, ESPN chairman Jimmy Pitaro, a die-hard Yankee fan, has been shopping like George Steinbrenner to spruce up the once vaunted MNF booth.
Almost two weeks ago, The Post reported that ESPN and Aikman had agreed to a five-year deal worth $18.5 million a year. It hasn’t been announced yet.
Buck joins Troy Aikman on ESPNRoy Rochlin/Getty Images
Prior to last season, Pitaro added Peyton and Eli Manning to 10 MNF alternate broadcasts in a season. While the Mannings’ exact salaries are unknown for their famous Manningcast, it is at least in the Aikman area. Their recently renewed deal also includes Omaha Productions, which produces Peyton’s Places, and plans to add more alternative broadcasts for other sports. This complicates the calculation of Mannings’ exact bet per game.
However, the star power of Buck, Aikman and the Mannings will cost ESPN about $50 million a year. ESPN’s main stand over the past two years has been Steve Levy, Louis Riddick Jr., and Brian Gries. Grise has already left ESPN to become the quarterback coach for the 49ers.
ESPN wanted Buck and Aikman to compete in the 2027 Super Bowl. The network also believes it now has the star power to attract even better games from the NFL. This comes at a time when by 2023 the network will be adding games from 17 to 25.
When Buck moved to ESPN, it prevented Al Michaels from joining Aikman there. ESPN planned to consider Michaels if they couldn’t lure Buck. ESPN favored Buck over Michaels as they wanted his 2027 Super Bowl team to be in place.
Michaels, 77, was on the verge of being the voice of his “Thursday Night Football” coverage at Amazon. He wanted to know who would be his partner. Amazon is interested in ESPN football analyst Kirk Herbstrait.
Michaels is a free agent because NBC decided to replace him with Mike Tirico as Sunday Night Football’s leading man. Last month, Michaels called the Super Bowl for NBC.
Meanwhile, with Buck gone, Kevin Burkhardt is Fox’s in-house favorite in the NFL for back-to-back play, which is important on many levels, including because Fox has two of the next three Super Bowls live.
While Burckhardt is the favorite, Fox will have internal conversations about whether or not it should go after Michaels. During his career, Michaels made 12 televised Super Bowl appearances, the most ever with Pat Summerall.
If Fox promotes Burckhardt along with Greg Olsen, they could have a Super Bowl team that makes $3-4 million in total. Olsen was a rookie last year, earning around $1.7 million, according to sources. They could try to renegotiate the terms, however they won’t come close to the Buck/Aikman range. It wasn’t until Tony Romo’s landmark $180 million, 10-year, $180 million contract with CBS that Buck and Aikman were only able to move into that payroll field two years ago.
Other than Olsen, Fox may consider trading for NBC’s Drew Breeze or see if he can lure Tom Brady to the stand. He spoke with Sean Peyton, but more for studio work. He holds his top college football analyst Joel Klatt in high regard, but is not expected to move to the NFL.
Buck has been the voice of the World Series for 24 years. According to sources, Fox will be considering Joe Davis and Adam Amin internally, as well as ESPN’s Dan Shulman and MLB Network’s Matt Vasgersian. If Burkhardt is promoted to the NFL’s No. 1 team, the No. 2 spot opens up, thought to be open to Amin, Davis, and possibly American football player Gus Johnson.
Buck, 52, joined Fox Sports in 1994 and has been the face of the network. At 25, he was the youngest player ever to call the NFL full-time.
Just two years later, at age 27, he also became the youngest ever World Series player, as he stood behind the Fox mic when rookie Derek Jeter and the Yankees won their dynasty’s first title.
Two decades ago, in 2002, he, Aikman and Chris Collinsworth took over from Summerall and John Madden. They were together for three seasons before Collinsworth left for NBC. In 2020, Buck was named the recipient of the Pro Football Hall of Fame’s Pete Roselle Radio Television Award.
Now he’s moving to ESPN, where the two sides are expected to come to an agreement soon.