UFC announcer Mike Goldberg made his NFL play by play debut this past Sunday during Detroit’s 17-3 dispatch of Minnesota, and Mike’s already apologized for his testy replies to no small number of Twitter critics. Just the same, he’ll not be working another pro football contest for Fox in the near future, and SBN’s Sean Yuille points to the reasons why, declaring, “FOX managed to outdo itself on Sunday with the worst broadcast of a football game I have ever witnessed in my life.” Keep in mind, Yuille’s almost certainly familiar with Mike Mayock’s work.
Goldberg and Brendon Ayanbadejo, had no business calling an NFL game, as evidenced by their constant mistakes. They repeatedly misidentified coaches and players — no, Golden Tate and Sam Martin aren’t on the Vikings — and it felt like they did zero preparation for this game. Actually, it felt like they were reading from an error-filled script and had no prior knowledge of either team. It was painful to listen to them on Sunday.
As if the announcing wasn’t bad enough, the camera work and directing were almost as bad. It was like FOX hired a bunch of high schoolers with no experience in TV and said, “Hey, come work this NFL game for us.” I don’t know how such a large company with such a big stake in the success of its NFL coverage can put out such an awful product, but FOX sunk to a new low on Sunday.