Has Mike Tirico Been Universally Crowned As The Best Broadcaster In The Business?

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Mike Tirico has obviously been in the sports broadcasting industry for a VERY long time, but his meteoric rise over the past fews has been something to watch. 

When he first arrived at NBC back in 2016, he had to wait behind Al Michaels and Bob Costas before he could fully take over the reigns of the network's sports coverage. It wasn't until 2022 that he was given the play-by-play job for Sunday Night Football, and since then, he's been on nothing short of a legendary run. 

This man calls America's biggest primetime sporting event every week in the fall. Now that NBC has rights to the NBA again, he's also the leading man for basketball play-by-play in the winter. He'll be the host of the Winter and Summer Olympics when one of those pops up every two years. He's called some golf, and simply for the hell of it, he hosts each of the Triple Crown events in horseracing. 

That's just a stupid résumé. 

And people can try and pooh-pooh it as much as they want, but what Tirico pulled off the other night is absolutely insane. He called his first Super Bowl, immediately went into hosting NBC's Winter Olympics show while still on the field in Santa Clara, and then he flew all the way to Milan to pick up hosting that same show in their studio abroad. I hope people understand how fucking ridiculous that is. Put rest aside. The amount of research and prep that goes into that must've been absurd.

The only other person I can think of who could pull off a feat like that is Chris Fowler, who has done similar jumps from football to tennis. But I can't remember another time where someone has juggled two sporting events of that magnitude in such a seamless way. It blew my mind. 

Which begs the question: Is it time for us all to just set it in stone that Mike Tirico is the best talent we have in sports broadcasting right now? He's all over the place, and he crushes everything he's in. Not to mention, he can still have a little fun while being so polished on the microphone.

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People at home definitely have very strong opinions of who's calling the games they're watching, and I genuinely don't know where those people stand on Tirico. I just know he's gradually put together one of the best careers that you could possibly have in the industry. It's pretty damn impressive.