Tom Brady’s momentum has made him the quarterback on the field with the most fanfare, but Tony Romo’s success in the broadcast booth has made him the quarterback to watch this Sunday when he calls his first Super Bowl.
Romo said he isn’t nervous about it. In fact, he says it will be fun.
“The game calls itself,” Romo told CNN Business recently at CBS’ Super Bowl media day. “You prepare so you know all the stuff, but then kind of let the game tell the story.”
Since joining CBS Sports two seasons ago, the former Dallas Cowboys quarterback has become a hit with fans and TV critics thanks to his enthusiastic calls and his ability to correctly predict plays before they happen. The Wall Street Journal crunched the numbers recently and found that Romo’s accurate 68% of the time.
Romo said he just wants to help fans “enjoy watching the game” by expressing excitement in his calls.
“I just like the game more when you see someone like John Madden getting excited about a pulling guard kicking out the defensive end,” Romo said. “Those things are etched in my memory. You want to create that for people.”
He will be in the booth on Sunday alongside his announcing partner Jim Nantz, who is calling play-by-play for his fifth Super Bowl.
Romo is just one part of a huge production the network is putting together for Super Bowl LIII, where the New England Patriots will take on the Los Angeles Rams at the Mercedes-Benz Stadium in Atlanta, Georgia.
CBS will produce roughly 11 hours of programming on Sunday including “Tony Goes To The Super Bowl,” a telecast that charts Romo’s season-long journey to the big game.
Super Bowl LIII caps off solid year for the NFL. After two seasons of sluggish numbers, TV viewership was up roughly 5% overall during the regular season, attracting around 15.8 million viewers.
Romo believes that it was a “combination of things” that led the NFL’s ratings comeback.
“I just think there was a lot more great games and interest in the game,” Romo said.
Romo said the league’s viewership benefited from high scoring plays by big name quarterbacks such as Kansas City Chiefs’ Patrick Mahomes and New Orleans Saints’ Drew Brees.
What’s even more impressive is that the NFL bounced back at a time when there’s just so much competition for viewers’ attention.
That’s because the NFL is “the greatest reality show on Earth,” Romo said.
“It’s not scripted. You don’t know the outcome,” he said. “You have to tune in to watch it, and if you don’t, you’re late, and everyone else knows the story before you.”
