Tom Brady delays joining Fox Sports as Super Bowl looms

Brady told FS1 host Colin Cowherd he didn’t want to “rush into anything" and won't call NFL games for Fox next season.

Tom Brady has decided to take a year off, and won't join Fox Sports as an NFL announcer until the 2024 season.Read moreMONICA HERNDON / Staff Photographer

Updated Feb. 6, 2023, 3:06 p.m. ET

Published Feb. 6, 2023, 2:33 p.m. ET

Tom Brady is in no rush to begin his broadcasting career for Fox Sports.

The future Hall of Famer said Monday he plans to take a year off after having announced his retirement from the NFL last week. Brady said he plans to join Fox as the network’s top NFL analyst beginning in the 2024 season.

“Decompression’s important,” Brady told FS1 host Colin Cowherd on The Hurd. “For me, I want to be great at what I do — talking, even last week, with the people at Fox Sports, and the leadership there, allowing me to start my Fox opportunity in the fall of 2024, something that’s great for me.”

Brady, 45, said he didn’t want to “rush into anything” and that his goal is to be as good at announcing football games as he was playing in them over his 23-year NFL career, in which he amassed seven Super Bowl rings.

“It’s going to be a great opportunity for me to take some time to really become [great] at my Fox broadcasting job, which I’m really looking forward to, but also catching up on other parts of my life that need some time and energy.”

At Fox Sports, Brady would join the No. 1 booth alongside play-by-play announcer Kevin Burkhardt, who is preparing to call his first Super Bowl for the network alongside former Carolina Panthers tight end Greg Olsen.

It means that Burkhardt and Olsen, barring some unlikely change by Fox, will remain paired in the network’s top broadcasting booth at least through the end of next season. It also means duo will be spared from answering a million questions about Brady this week ahead of the Super Bowl.

“The reality is other than being asked in every media interview that I have done, and I mean this on or off the record, I have not thought about Tom Brady as a broadcaster...,” Burkhardt told Sports Business Journal. “I just felt like it was out of bounds for me to be doing this right now and living in the moment and then texting Tom on the side, like, ‘Can’t wait for you to come, buddy.’”

A Fox Sports spokesperson said the network had no comment on Brady’s remarks. Brady is not scheduled to be part of Fox’s coverage of the Super Bowl, pregame or otherwise.

If Brady does begin his broadcasting career in the 2024 season, he’ll get to call a Super Bowl in his first year in the booth. Fox will broadcast Super Bowl LIX in 2025, which will take place at the Caesars Superdome in New Orleans. Fox also has the TV rights to broadcast Super Bowl LXIII in 2029 and Super Bowl LXVII in 2033.