Al Michaels has hit out at his critics ahead of the upcoming NFL season.
The veteran broadcaster launched Prime Video’s first full season of Thursday Night Football with Kirk Heibstreit in 2022 and couldn’t be blamed for having low energy given the slate of games afforded to the platform.
But he got stick from everywhere during and after his coverage of the insane Jacksonville Jaguars comeback against the Los Angeles Chargers in the Wild Card round on NBC.
The Jags managed to win the game after going into halftime down 27-0 but there was very little excitement coming from the broadcast booth amid the wild scenes.
Michaels, who called that one alongside Tony Dungy, received particular criticism for his description of the game-winning field goal that came at the death.
“Must have gotten a hundred texts from folks who were very happy to see me back on NBC,” he said in response. “Read some comments that we didn’t sound excited enough. Internet compost! You know me as well as anyone — no screaming, no yelling, no hollering. It’s TELEVISION! Ellipses and captions are [sufficient] when pictures tell the story.”
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With the 2023 NFL season approaching, Michaels is letting fans know that he does not care what they have to say about his job, especially the ones sitting in a basement.
“Look, sometimes I’ll take some S,” he told Sports Business Journal’s Tom Friend. “People say, ‘He didn’t get excited enough.’ What do you want me to do? Scream, holler, yell the game? That ain’t me. That ain’t [Joe] Buck, that ain’t [Jim] Nantz. I can’t pay attention to anti–social media.
“We live in a country with 330 million people. And if eight people rip you on social media, I’m going, ‘Huh?’ Now anybody sitting in a basement has a platform. You can’t let things like that distress you. I’ve been doing this for so long. And I wouldn’t be here at this point still doing a major package if I was doing it the wrong way.”
Fair enough, but Michaels would also do well to note that the critique didn’t only come from people on Twitter.
