1. Thanks to the monster contract that CBS gave Tony Romo in 2020 (in the range of $17 million–$18 million per year), NFL broadcaster salaries have exploded. The contracts of many top announcers expired recently, and Romo’s deal was clearly used as a benchmark.
While covering this story over the past several weeks, I’ve gotten the same comment over and over from fans who are dumbfounded by the astronomical salaries being handed out: Nobody watches a game for the broadcasters.
During an interview on this week’s SI Media Podcast, I asked CBS’s Greg Gumbel, who was the network’s lead NFL voice from 1998 to 2003, what he thought about all the cash being given to the top broadcasters across the networks and he echoed that comment.