published on June 01, 2024 in celeb

Media Circus: Following MNF ouster, Booger McFarland ponders what comes next

Booger McFarland has lived a number of broadcasting lives since joining ESPN in 2014 to serve as one of the inaugural commentators for the SEC Network. He impressed ESPN management and got bigger roles at the network including as a college football studio analyst for ABC and NFL Draft analyst for ESPN2’s first-round coverage of the 2018 NFL Draft. That same year McFarland was named as “Monday Night Football’s” first-ever field analyst after impressing ESPN management during a long tryout process for the analyst position that included more than a dozen people auditioning for the role. He became part of a three-person show featuring Joe Tessitore and Jason Witten in the booth and McFarland working from a 10-foot high moving crane on the field. The network believed the chemistry would be great, especially given Tessitore and McFarland had a great friendship from their days at the SEC Network.

It did not work out that way.

Witten returned to play for the Dallas Cowboys after a not-ready-for-network-television debut year. McFarland moved from the field into the booth to work as a solo analyst with Tessitore in 2019 for “Monday Night Football’s” 50th season. Last month, The Athletic broke the news that Tessitore and McFarland would not return to the program for the 2020 NFL season (whenever that begins).

The “Monday Night Football” gig brings glamour (and a pay raise) but it can be an unforgiving assignment. McFarland was pilloried on social media – and ESPN did not help him with the inane crane idea – but prior to his MNF gig he was a terrific and prepared voice on everything he did. He now finds himself awaiting his next assignment and joined me this week for an extended Q&A.

How are you and your family doing and how is everyone’s health?

Thanks for asking. We are well. We are in Florida and obviously practicing social distancing like everyone else. Having kids at home the last couple of months, my wife has been the teacher mostly and I’ve been the PE teacher and better known around these parts as Coach Dad. I try to get my kids outside. We exercise and we run. I can be a little tough. I get a lot of complaining that Coach Dad is unfair and Coach Dad is too hard. We’ve been trying to make the best out of it just like everyone else. I’ve always lived by the theory that when life gives you lemons, you go make lemonade. Don’t complain, don’t frown about it. I think like all the other parents around the country, you’re trying to give them as much of an education as you can being at-home teachers.

How did you learn that you were not returning to Monday Night Football for 2020?

I got a call, and then we had a meeting. Within that meeting, I was informed. It didn’t happen when the news broke. It was a little bit before. I’m not going to get into exactly the timetable, but it was far enough in advance where it wasn’t a surprise for me.

How did you view the decision by ESPN management that you would not return to “Monday Night Football?”

It was a decision that they made. They made a decision that they wanted to go in a different direction. It’s kind of indicative in any business, and really indicative of the business that I come from — pro football. When I got traded from Tampa to Indianapolis, it was an eye-opening experience but you deal with it and move on. I’ve said often that my football life has prepared me for life after football, and it’s really held true each and every step of the way. With this decision, it was no different. We had a meeting and they said we want to move in a different direction. I said, “Can you explain and tell me why?” and when you go through those business scenarios as far as the why, you are not necessarily going to get what I think is their true feelings. What you get is we want to go in a different direction and it is nothing against you. We just want to change it up. I accept it and you move on. It was literally that simple for me.

Did you try to advocate for yourself to have one more season to see how it would go?

No, I did not. Because what I’ve learned at this point is kind of like when I got traded. You get the call and you are told that you’ve been traded and there’s no need to advocate for another chance because they’ve already made their mind up and moved on. By the time it gets to me, it’s kind of already come downhill. It was the same situation here. The only thing I really wanted to know was, okay, explain to me the why. Because I think in every situation in life, you need to learn from it. If you do that, you are better off. So I did not try to advocate. I just wanted to know what was the thinking and the why. I’m pretty sure that those conversations were held at a high level. By the time I got it, you know they’ve already moved on. So it was time for me to do that also.

You are very close with Joe Tessitore. You worked with him at the SEC Network and you have been close friends for some time. How did you feel seeing that Joe was also going to be reassigned?

Joe and I are like family. When Joe and I and Jason were put together, we were a team. Usually what happens, good, bad or indifferent, you’re viewed as a team. So I felt bad that not only was I not going to be on “Monday Night Football,” but also Joe because I realize that the play-by-play guy is different than the athlete. I didn’t go to school for this. I went to LSU to play football. I got done playing football and then it was, what am I going to do next? I liked talking to people and thought, let’s see if I can get into radio. I started doing local radio. This was kind of a second career. Whereas Joe, this has kind of been Joe’s lifelong thing as far as being a broadcaster and journalism. I don’t know for a fact because I haven’t asked him but I’m pretty sure he views it (the job) or felt different about it in some shape or form than I did. I felt bad for him because there’s only so many of these spots in this business. For him to have one and then for it to be taken away, I just feel bad.

The “Monday Night Football” job comes with a ton of scrutiny. You dealt with scrutiny obviously as a professional athlete but so often either you would trend on Twitter or we would see a ton of written commentary on your “Monday Night Football” group. What was it like for you for the first time in your broadcasting career, not your athletic career, to face that kind of scrutiny?

I go back to when I first realized as a young athlete that I was different. Not that I was better or anything like that, but that I was different. I was 13 and I was getting ready to go from junior high to high school. You’re the biggest fish in that pond — and it was different. The attention that I received was different and I didn’t necessarily like it. I was a short little fat kid with an Afro back in the day. Someone looking at me like I’m different, putting me on a pedestal, I was very uncomfortable with that. Fast-forward that. I get recruited and I go to LSU. At LSU, I started like 25, 30 games in a row and then I got benched. All the stories are written from a negative standpoint. That was really the first time that the “star” player had to deal with the criticism. I struggled for weeks. This was 1997. I struggled with that and it was a really eye-opening learning experience. But it taught me a lot. It taught me about where to view the criticism, how to view criticism, where to view the accolades, and how to keep them in perspective.

Fast forward to my NFL career. I am rolling, a first-round pick. As a defensive tackle you never want to see someone drafted at your position. So you see someone drafted in the first few rounds as a defensive tackle during your career and you think, “Okay, that’s probably not a good sign for you.” Then I get traded from Tampa to Indy and, woah, the negative things start being said like first-round bust and all of that. I was preparing throughout my NFL career for all the things that are going to happen to me in life. Because I truly believe sports are a great microcosm of the life we live.

So getting to your original question about the criticism. I’m seasoned to it. I’m hardened and I’m calloused to it, good and bad. I’ll give you an example. I think it was the Green Bay-Detroit game this past season and we had a really, really good conversation, John Parry and I, about the referees. I think it was a call on (Lions defensive end) Trey Flowers. I just gave my opinion and talked. I didn’t think the refs had done a really good job and John Parry and I went back and forth. A lot of people were really taken back because I was outwardly critical of the refs and called it how I saw it. People were like, “That’s a nice job.” Well that didn’t affect me one way or another because I’m just calling the game how I see it.

Anybody who says they don’t see the negative stuff is lying. As an athlete or broadcaster, we all hear and see different things. The key is, does it affect you and how can you not let it affect you? So I’ll tell you that I saw all the criticism and some of the accolades when they were there. But it didn’t affect me because I’ve learned over the course of almost 30 years, and I’m now 42, I’ve learned how to keep things in perspective and understand who I need to listen to, who not to listen to, where criticism comes from when I do get it, and how to pay attention to it. Back in 1997, it really affected the hell out of me. I didn’t know how to handle it. But in 2019 or 2020, it honestly doesn’t bother me.

What did you learn most from the Monday Night Football experience?

I think I learned a lot. You’re always going to be scrutinized. A lot of people talk about wanting to be the man in the arena. When you are the man in the arena or when you a part of a group and your broadcast team is in the arena, you’ve got to be able to deal with everything. There is a level of accomplishment and feeling as a player when you are on the field and there’s 100,000 people in the stands watching you. You never really get that when you leave the game. When you’re in an ‘A’ (broadcasting) job and you’re the only game on, it’s the closest I’ve ever been since I retired to having that feeling again. That is a super positive thing. Anybody who’s in that position, be it Al Michaels and Cris Collinsworth or Tony Romo and Jim Nantz or Joe Buck and Troy Aikman, you’re the only game on and everybody’s watching you. That is the closest you will ever feel to running out of the tunnel again. I felt that being on “Monday Night Football,” and that’s something I will never, ever trade for anything, regardless of the outcome.

As far as the technical aspect of it and people in the business or understand this, calling a football game, especially when you’re a standalone game, it’s way more than analyzing a football game. “Monday Night Football” is a game, but it’s also a show. It’s an entertainment show. So there’s so much more that goes into it than just football. If it were just football, yeah, it would be a lot simpler. People often say we just want the game and why does ESPN or CBS or NBC have to show all the graphics, all these different elements, all these different packages? Well, that’s because it’s a show. The director and the producers are putting on a show because guess what? This is entertainment. This is entertaining now for the masses.

So a play happens and you have probably 2 to 2 ½ seconds before you get an opportunity to speak, analyze, and know exactly what happens during the play. Then you’ve got to be able to intelligently explain to America what you see, maybe how it happened, and why it happened. If you don’t do it, the producer and director are moving on. So I think the one thing people don’t realize is the speed at which a broadcast happens. We often hear from athletes about the speed of the game. The speed of the game is tremendous. It accelerates exponentially from high school to college and college to pro. What I would say is that when you’re in the broadcast booth it’s even faster. Because not only do you have to focus on football, you have to focus on someone in your ear telling you we got this package coming up next. Meanwhile, all you’re doing as an analyst is looking at the football field and trying to figure out why was Lamar Jackson able to come around a corner? Is there something there where you can teach and explain to your audience? I think the biggest thing you learn and the biggest thing that you get comfortable with is the more you do it, the more you get used to the speed. Oftentimes you hear a football player say in Year 2, the game slows down. Well, I didn’t get an opportunity to get a second year to where the game could slow down even more.

We did two preseason games, 16 regular-season games and a playoff game. So we did 19 games and out of the 19 games we did, I’ve watched each one of them twice. They’re probably four to five moments that if you gave me a do-over, I would do them over. In Year 1 of doing the job, I feel pretty good about that now. It wasn’t perfect. I will be the first to admit it was not perfect. However, when you do 19 sessions of three-hour live TV and it’s your first year of doing it on your own and there’s only three or four or five moments that you want back, I’ll live with that. Those are the biggest things that you take away. If I get an opportunity to be a game analyst again, I’ll be better at it next time.

What’s number one that list, the moment that you wish you could have back?

Yeah, I’ll go to the last game, the playoff game with Buffalo-Houston. I think we had a really good broadcast overall and there many good moments from myself, Joe, John Parry and Lisa Salters. But when you get toward the end of the game and the moment is at its height and the game is in the balance, there was a call where it was a second down and I suggested on third down that they go up and run a draw and then spiked the ball, which would have then spiked it on fourth down and it would’ve been a turnover on downs instead of kicking the field goal. It’s one of those things where I talked about the speed of the game in the broadcast booth. I couldn’t see the down and distance mark and I was relying on the monitor and when I glanced at the monitor, the down and distance had not changed so I assumed that it was still in the previous down, which would have given me an opportunity to do what I wanted to do, run the draw on second down, spike it on third down, and make the field goal on fourth down.

You live and you learn. If I had that one to do over, I’d wait a beat and the down and distance would change on the screen. I wish I had that one to do over. But I don’t. You live and you learn. If and when I get an opportunity to do a job similar to that because there’s more broadcasting than just “Monday Night Football,” I know I’ll be better for it.

Do you expect Jason Witten to pursue a future in sports broadcasting when he’s done playing again?

I don’t know. For as much flak as the outside world gave Jason, Jason is one intelligent football player. I learned so much from him in the time that we spent together and the conversations that we had off the field and off-camera. I think Jason Witten can do whatever he wants to do. He can coach. He can be in ownership. If he wants to get back into the broadcast booth, he can. For people that say he was terrible in Year 1, I just want you to find me someone who in Year 1 of whatever profession they were in was at their best in Year 1. I don’t care how great you think someone is, nobody has been at their best in Year 1. There’s always going to be room for improvement in whatever you do. It’s just about are you willing as an organization, a boss, a president, a network, to take time to cultivate said talent or said employee.

You couple of years left on your ESPN deal. What do you hope is next?

Well, I cut my teeth in the studio so I’m looking forward to getting back in the studio whether that’s NFL and/or college football. I think ultimately that’s where I’m going to go. I tell people all the time that I’ve been doing studio work since I was 12. We just called it sitting around the porch and talking to your friends. My buddies would call me all the time back when I was in the studio and they’d say we’ve had this conversation like 100 times back in Louisiana sitting on the back porch whether it was talking about college football or talking about Tom Brady or Peyton Manning back in the day. So that’s like second nature. When you talk about the years of experience or your first or second year doing something, I’ve had so many years of doing studio work. Studio to me is like second nature. So I look forward to doing some form of that with the NFL and/or college, maybe one, maybe both. I’m not sure yet.

You played for LSU and were part of the college football group for the SEC Network. How do you feel about the prospect of college football coming back and players being asked to practice and play on campus in 2020?

Everybody is devising a plan to social distance or for social distancing. Ohio State is talking about instead of the Horseshoe being 110,000, we are going to have 25,000. So basically what you’re telling me is we’re going to try to create a plan for the fans to social distance themselves, but you are going to have 125 people on each sideline and then on the field with 22 people hitting each other and bleeding and sweating and breathing on each other, and the athletes are not going to social distance? It’s okay for them to kind of have that physical combat, but it’s not okay for the fans?

I just think in America right now, because we’re so deprived for entertainment, we’re trying to figure out a way for sports. Some sports, you can do it. Baseball, they’re trying to do it. I get it. Golf, you can do it. But football, man, you can’t social distance in football. In football, we’re going to social distance the crowd but it’s going to be okay for the players not to do that? I just think we’re going to convince ourselves that we’re doing the right thing because economically colleges and universities have to have football. Economically, networks, owners, billionaires, all these people have to have sports because of the impact that it’s going to play in our lives.

If I were a 17- or 18-year-old kid, I’m pretty sure I would want to go out and play. But as a parent, if I had a 17- or 18-year-old, the question I would ask is really simple: Why do we have the social distancing in the crowd but we’re not going to do it with my kid on the field? Until I’ve got a good answer for that, I am not sure I would allow my kids to play. It just doesn’t seem right to me that we’re going to make all these exceptions for the crowd but it’s like, hey, players, would you all jump on the field, hit each other, and bleed and sweat and run into each other. We’re only doing it for the economic impact and the entertainment. Because if this were truly about safety, here is what we would say. We would say, you know what, this thing has killed a lot of people. And there are a lot of people who have been affected. And we want to make sure that we don’t lose any more lives than we have to… And although we love our sports and the money and all these different things, let’s figure out a way to put sports on the back burner and try to save as many lives as possible.

People are going to make a lot of different arguments to support whatever side they are on. I just think the number one thing people can’t argue against is safety. I think that somehow, someway, we’re going to convince ourselves that it’s okay for a 17- to 21-year-old young man to play in stadiums that are half empty… Now an NFL player? You are a grown man. You are McFarland Inc. You are Brady Inc. You decide what you want to do. But we’re talking about amateurs here. As a grown man I can make that decision. When I’m a 17, 18-year-old kid, yeah, technically, I’m kind of grown. But guess what? I’m not necessarily to the point where I own my own company. I’m still under the supervision of a coach and still getting parental guidance from my folks back home. That’s a little different for me.

You played in Tampa Bay for seven seasons. You live in Tampa. You are very familiar with that area, obviously. What is that experience going to be like for Tom Brady?

I think it’s going to be really good. Tom Brady was in New England for so many years and he had to conform and do things the Patriot Way. He did it — and he won a lot. But I think anytime in life you get an opportunity to do something different, I think there’s an excitement. There’s a level of intrigue, there’s a level of curiosity. Can I do it a different way? Can I win without Bill (Belichick)? For the people who say that he has nothing to prove, I get that. He has nothing to prove about winning or about being the greatest of all time. But there’s a part of Tom Brady who wants to do it on his own. I think he has to prove that to himself, if that’s the only person he has to prove it to.

He’s going to come to Tampa and be in a position where I think he’s going to have more talent than he’s ever had collectively when you look at the tight end room, the wide receiver room, a young defense, and a chance to play in warm weather. I know he’s struggled down in Miami, but you can’t tell me that an athlete wouldn’t want to play in 75 degrees and sunshine the majority of your season. You’re going to enjoy waking up every day. You’re going enjoy walking outside. From a mindset standpoint, I think Tom Brady may be in the greatest place he ever been. From an overall athletic standpoint, yeah, he’s gotten older, but he’s going to have more weapons than he’s ever had. He’s going to enjoy this season. I don’t know whether they’re going to win a Super Bowl and I don’t think anyone knows that, but I think from an enjoyable standpoint, he’s going to enjoy this season as much as he’s enjoyed any season in his career, both on and off the field. When you’re in Year 20 and 43 years old, what more can you ask for? I think he’s got to pinch himself every morning when he wakes up.

The Ink Report

1. Jeff Neubarth is an old hand at producing exhibition matches featuring Tiger Woods and Phil Mickelson.

Neubarth helmed the winner-take-all match play event two years ago in Las Vegas between Woods and Mickelson, and on Sunday he was located inside a television compound just off the 18th hole at the Medalist Golf Club in Hobe Sound, Florida.

What he and has production staff pulled off was far different on Sunday than what viewers watched in 2018. Capital One’s The Match: Champions for Charity featured Woods and Mickelson joined by Tom Brady and Peyton Manning. It also featured some hellacious weather conditions in Florida and great work by the production team to make it work.

Sunday’s event was simulcast on TNT, TBS, truTV and HLN – the 2018 Match started as a pay-per-view event before technical challenges opened it to all on B/R Live — and the backdrop was significantly different given we are in the middle of a global pandemic. The end product was a very entertaining Sunday afternoon and early evening of golf and $20 million raised for coronavirus relief.

Neubarth, a freelance producer whose fulltime job is executive producer for Callaway Golf’s internal content team, said Turner Sports used more production trucks than normal to provide for social distancing for the crew. For instance, Neubarth sat about 12 feet from his director Steve Beim, which is much more distance than a producer and director would normally have between them in a truck.

“As you can imagine, our event footprint was significantly reduced to only include those crew members that were essential to the production,” Neubarth said. “Most of that personnel were hired locally for the event. The biggest challenge by far was the weather. We were prepared to try to do a lot with a little but the weather just complicated things. Hats off to our amazing Turner sports crew who didn’t miss a shot despite the conditions. The weather complication that had the greatest impact was on audio. We had the receivers hidden within camera gear in the golf carts, not unlike how NASCAR does in-car audio and video. The rain kept shutting down mics and receivers and our team had to react and they did an amazing job getting as many mics working as they did.”

Neubarth said there was a one-hour production meeting on Saturday with Brady, Manning, Mickelson and Woods. “We spoke about the charitable spirit of the event, the microphones and IFB’s (talkback device) they would be wearing, and answered any questions the players had,” Neubarth said.

The biggest praise of the day goes to the camera operators on the course. Neubarth said there were 10 total camera operators, including hard cams and handhelds and a tracer camera operator.

“I’m proud and lucky to have been associated with this event,” Neubarth said. “Steve Beim directed such an amazing show and was a true partner on the front bench to make sure we did a lot with the resources we had. We truly prioritized safety for the crew, the players, the talent and the members of the club. It was rewarding to help be a part of something that raised $20 million dollars. I couldn’t be more pleased and proud of the team effort.”

1a. On Monday, Turner said the golf event drew 5.8 million viewers across TNT, TBS, truTV and HLN, the most-watched golf telecast in the history of cable television. The Match peaked with an average of 6.3 million viewers from 5:45-6 p.m. ET.

2. News broke over the weekend that former NFL quarterback and current ESPN and Sirius XM analyst Ryan Leaf was arrested on a domestic battery charge in Palm Desert, California. An ESPN spokesperson said the company was declining comment for now. Leaf was hired by ESPN last year to be a football analyst. “Five years ago, sitting in a prison cell, I would have never imagined that I was going to be part of ESPN and the Disney Corporation,” Leaf said last July. “If you would have told me that, I would have said you are absolutely crazy. And I can’t believe it. I lay my head down every night with a ton of gratitude.” Leaf leapfrogged others to get a significant national job, the culmination of what ESPN execs hoped would be a feel-good story. That story has now taken an ugly turn.

2a. Sports Business Daily’s John Ourand had an interesting piece on sports networks looking to add crowd noise to games with no fans.

2b. ESPN announced plans to air a nine-part series on Brady (“The Man in the Arena: Tom Brady”) in 2021.

3. If interested in hearing the McFarland interview via audio, he and Barry Landis, the lead race producer for FOX’s NASCAR coverage and a producer on that network’s NFL coverage, are the guests for Episode 100 of the Sports Media Podcast with Richard Deitsch.

You can subscribe to this podcast on Apple Podcasts, Google Play, Stitcher and more.

4. Sports pieces of note:

From homeless refugee to chess prodigy, 9-year-old dreams of becoming youngest grandmaster. By Aishwarya Kumar of ESPN.com.
Malik Sealy’s legacy lives on 20 years after drunk driving tragedy. By Zach Braziller of The New York Post.
Michael Jordan: A history of flight. By Wright Thompson.
Running in the Age of Coronavirus. By Chris Ballard of Sports Illustrated.
Ryan S. Clark of The Athletic takes a look back at SportsNight.
Linesman Pat Dapuzzo suffered one of the most gruesome on-ice injuries in NHL history. It ended his career — and maybe saved his life. By Kristina Rutherford of Sportsnet.
Khari Willis played his entire rookie season with a secret. The Colts safety spent every night sleeping on a pullout couch at the hospital, where his twin boys — born 3 months premature, weighing less than 2 lbs each — were fighting for their lives. By Zac Keefer of The Athletic.
A seminal figure in 20th-century sports: Tommie Smith was on the cover of Sports Illustrated 53 years ago last week. The ’60s and ’70s covers of SI were often gorgeous art. Few cover lines. The image carries the cover.
The challenge of calling ‘ghost games’ from home. By Ian Darke of ESPN.
Chris Evert played tennis with a patience that’s in current demand. By Sally Jenkins of The Washington Post.
Gregg Jefferies’ complicated Mets’ failure looks different now. By Joel Sherman of the New York Post.

Non-sports pieces of note:

With months to live, high school senior marries. By Dana Hunsinger Benbow of the Indianapolis Star.
Astrid Kirchherr, Who Helped Create the Beatles’ Image, Dies at 81. By Allan Kozinn of the New York Times.
How Iranian hackers tried to phish me. By Holly Dagres of The Washington Post.
Turning The Camera From War to Family. By Paolo Pellegrin of the New York Times.
Via the Atlanta Journal-Constitution: The forgotten suspect, the DNA and the church murders that haunted a detective. By Joshua Sharpe.
The 100 Most Lost Songs Of The 1980s. By Sean Ross.
Want to Be More Productive? Try Doing Less. By Kate Northrup of the Harvard Business Review.
The U.S. Is Getting Shorter, as Mapmakers Race to Keep Up. By Alanna Mitchell of the New York Times.

COVID-19 stories

Heartbreaking and poignant. He Died at War. The Pandemic Gave Me Time to Grieve. By Kelsey Baker.
The coronavirus is coursing through different parts of the U.S. in different ways, making the crisis harder to predict, control, or understand. By Ed Yong of The Atlantic.
Coronavirus Devastates Black New Orleans. By David Benoit of The Wall Street Journal.
Via Karen Hao of the MIT Technology Review: There has been a huge upswell of Twitter bot activity since the start of the coronavirus pandemic, amplifying medical disinformation and the push to reopen America.
How to Keep Your Glasses Clear When Wearing a Mask. By Kevin Hand of Wall Street Journal.
Virus Threatens Chinese Traditions of Chopsticks and Family-Style Meals. By Amy Qin of the New York Times.
The Black American Amputation Epidemic. By Lizzie Presser of Pro Publica.
My Son Survived Terrifying Covid-19 Complications. By Dr. Cynthia Wachtell.
This thread by Ellen Barry.

(Top photo: Matthew Emmons / USA TODAY Sports)

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