ESPN reportedly will be changing out its NFL “B” team. And a former member of the “A” team could end up on the crew.
Via Sam Neumann of Awful Announcing, Andrew Marchand of The Athletic said in a recent podcast that Steve Levy could become the “B” team play-by-play announcer.
Levy handled the “B” team duties in 2019, with Brian Griese and Louis Riddick. The next year, they became the “A” team. Two seasons later, ESPN landed Joe Buck and Troy Aikman from Fox. Levy slipped entirely out of the mix; Chris Fowler became the “B” team play-by-play announcer.
“I think Steve Levy has an outside chance,” Marchand said, per Neumann. “I think he’s somebody you got to put on the list. . . . [Dave] Pasch has the inside track when you talk about classic play-by-players for that NFL job. And then Levy is a guy who I do think there are people at ESPN who felt did him wrong when they replaced him with Fowler on that second team after Levy was on the No. 1 team.”
Marchand has reported that Mike Monaco and Bob Wischusen are also in the play-by-play mix, with Jason Kelce and Kurt Warner mentioned as possibilities for the analyst role.
It’s unclear whether the new-look “B” team will have two or three in the booth. Most recently, ESPN used Fowler, Riddick, and Dan Orlovsky for its second-tier broadcasts.
ESPN has routinely made changes to its secondary NFL broadcast booth. Once, they tried Mike & Mike (and Mike). If Levy gets the job, here’s hoping that no one in any of the games will end up with a bulging disc.