Troy Aikman isn’t denying that there is rigidity between him and longtime broadcast companion Joe Buck over Aikman’s contract scenario.
The former Cowboys quarterback, who has been Buck’s NFL sales space companion since 2002 and moved with Buck to ESPN’s “Monday Night Football” in 2022, addressed the rigidity with Buck during an look on 96.7 The Ticket Thursday morning after Front Office Sports reported the two got into a pre-game argument on Monday in Los Angeles.
“There’s probably a time and a place for all that. I don’t know if now is the time,” Aikman said on the station, per the Dallas Morning News. “I don’t know if it’s hard to figure out kind of what happened. I’ll broadcast through this season and I’ll be a free agent at the end of the year and kind of see what happens. I’m looking forward to whatever the rest of this season does hold and the Super Bowl and all that and where my next landing spot may be.”
Buck, 57, “broke the ice” Monday with Aikman regarding the contract concern, FOS reported, prompting an argument that de-escalated. That took place before the pair called the Bills’ time beyond regulation win over the Rams. Videos posted online show Aikman and Buck on the subject before Monday’s recreation, though the argument wasn’t captured.
Buck has signed a new six-year, roughly $108 million contract, per The Athletic, while Aikman’s deal will expire after ESPN’s first Super Bowl broadcast in February. Aikman said he has not heard from ESPN brass regarding a new contract.
And his newest feedback, which point out wanting for his “next landing spot,” recommend he’s ready to transfer on.
The Athletic reported last month that ESPN was planning to wait to tackle Aikman’s contract scenario after the Super Bowl. It’s unclear why they needed to wait on Aikman and not Buck, unless ESPN merely desires to transfer on from the three-time Super Bowl champion.
Bringing Buck and Aikman in on big-money offers in 2022 solidified ESPN’s “Monday Night Football” sales space after years of failed experiments since Mike Tirico left for NBC following the 2015 season. The community cycled through Sean McDonough, Joe Tessitore and Steve Levy as play-by-players before signing Buck, with Booger McFarland, Jason Witten, Brian Griese and Louis Riddick getting probabilities as analysts after Jon Gruden returned to teaching following the 2017 season.
Letting Aikman stroll would deliver uncertainty back to the sales space, though perhaps ESPN has an eye on Greg Olsen, a looming free agent who was briefly Fox Sports’ No. 1 sales space analyst before Tom Brady joined Kevin Burkhardt in 2024.
Tony Romo is a free agent after parting methods with CBS earlier this month due to his July drunk driving arrest. JJ Watt changed Romo alongside Jim Nantz in CBS’s high sales space.
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