Welcome to The Signal, Box Score's Wednesday newsletter. This week, we're examining Tony Romo’s impact as an analyst and what his next move might be after nine years as the lead NFL analyst for CBS Sports.
Before officially parting ways last week with CBS Sports after a nine-year partnership with Jim Nantz, Tony Romo was on his way perhaps to a Hall of Fame broadcast career that eluded him as a quarterback in 13 seasons with the Dallas Cowboys.
In the booth, the four-time Pro Bowler exhibited predictive powers in situational football that earned him nicknames like “Oracle” and “Romostradumus.”
At the time of his departure from CBS, Romo, 46, was in the seventh year of a $180 million contract that he signed in 2020. While his sidelining now after an OWI arrest in July in his home state of Wisconsin is most likely not the end of his career, it does momentarily silence one of football’s most unique voices.
Over 21 years broadcasting with Pat Summerall, John Madden is widely considered the analyst responsible for showing fans how to watch football. And his Madden NFL video game has made head coaches and general managers out of millions of gamers.
But pay for NFL color announcers has experienced a major surge since the early 2000s when Madden began making $5 million annually for ABC. When Romo signed his deal in 2020, it reset the scale for top tier NFL commentators — more than doubling Madden’s peak of $8 million for Fox in 2003.
As a part of a record 10-year, $375 million contract with Fox, Tom Brady is making $37.5 million this season — more than double the next highest salary of $18 million earned by Troy Aikman at ESPN.
Romo, who would have earned $18 million this season, always drew mixed reactions from fans and colleagues. Nantz brought a reserve and charm to the broadcast, honed by 40 years in the tower at the Masters, while Romo was his goofy sidekick who prepared less and less for the games as the years went by.
Still, they were the broadcasting team with the sideline reporter, Tracy Wolfson, for last Thanksgiving’s game between the Dallas Cowboys and the Kansas City Chiefs, which attracted an average of 57.2 million viewers — the largest ever for an NFL regular season game, according to Nielsen. That record-setting audience may have more to do with the matchup than who the announcers were, but CBS did have their top team on for the game.
As a former QB and a proven announcer, Romo is certain to land a job somewhere soon. Name a well-paid football analyst and you will most likely find more than half the time that he has QB behind his name.
But where are people listening to these ex-QBs break down defensive coverage schemes, and what could that mean for Romo’s next stop?
A recent survey of 750 adults found that 39 percent of listeners muted their television broadcast to hear the radio calls, which tend to be local partisan broadcasters. Should a forward-thinking team create a fan-friendly alt-broadcast, where the announcers cover a single team like local baseball and basketball broadcasts?
Romo was often criticized for showing favoritism to certain players. If he went to work for the Chiefs or the Bills, he could show his affection outwardly for their quarterbacks. The Cowboys could be a great spot for Romo, too.
Or his knack for predicting plays before they happen might lead him to make his next move to a role in a live-betting operation that allows him to analyze real-time odds of what happens on every snap of the game. He’s already raised the bar on what NFL color analysts can earn on the major networks, now he could show a new path for them in the wild wild west of legal sports gambling.
In the past, Romo has expressed a discomfort with discussing sports gambling in a telecast, calling it “less pure.”
Before the 2024 Super Bowl, he said in an interview, “To me it’s a slippery slope. I grew up where we never talked about or thought about lines or anything like that in football.”
But could his departure from CBS change his mind? Through their ManningCast and partnership with Caesars Sportsbook, Eli and Peyton with their father, Archie, and brother, Cooper, are leveraging their football knowledge and brand for sports betting. Though the ManningCast’s ratings have declined early in the 2026 season, an alternative format like this for Romo, where he could forgo the gentility of a CBS Sports telecast for something more laid-back and offbeat, could be a great opportunity.
Who knows? He might end up finding a way to compete with the very same kind of telecasts that made him a bigger star than he ever was as a football player. 🎤
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