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Jim Nantz on prepping for NFL games: 'The way I'm wired, I read everything'

(Kirby Lee-USA TODAY Sports)

(Kirby Lee-USA TODAY Sports)

NEW YORK -Jim Nantz’s schedule got even more crowded this fall. After spending his spring and summer as the lead play-by-play voice for CBS’ NCAA Tournament coverage and anchor of the network’s golf broadcasts, he’s back alongside Phil Simms every Sunday to announce CBS’ number one national NFL game.

The big difference? From Week 2 through Week 8, he’ll now be doing that after also announcing the Thursday Night Football matchup just three days earlier. Nantz kicks off his NFL season in Pittsburgh on September 7 as the Steelers host the Browns, then will be in Baltimore on September 11 for CBS’ first Thursday Night Football broadcast, followed by the September 14 matchup in Green Bay between the Packers and New York Jets.

For The Win caught up with the five-time National Sportscaster of the Year at the NFL on CBS media day at the CBS Broadcast Center two weeks ago to get perspective on how his career has evolved over the years.

You’ve been on the job here at CBS for nearly three decades. What’s been the biggest change in how you approach it?

The job has changed so much. I always think of this when I come into the studio, but I auditioned for my job at CBS 29 years ago [in August]. The desk is about right where we are, maybe about five feet over here. It was the old NFL Today studios where Brent Musberger used to host the show. And I auditioned. Look at it now.

I was 26 years old, I was just a kid. I tried to act like I was older than I really was. But I’ve just seen the industry expand so much. The internet was a nonfactor then. ESPN was just a startup. You didn’t have this proliferation of sports television. It wasn’t on all the time. Weekends being on the network was a truly huge deal because people waited all week to see sports television. Everything’s changed.

Are there things you do now due to constantly emerging technology that you didn’t do in the past?

You learn through the process how to prepare in the best way possible for you. Everyone has their own style and approach to it. I’ve learned how to fine tune exactly how I need to be ready to go on the air. It’s a daunting task. If you prepare for the game, both teams send you reams of material. Just the way I’m wired, I read everything. I have to see everything. Now I’m going to have double that. I’m going to be doing Thursdays and Sundays. That’s the only concern I have right now. How am I going to process all this? And I will. I’ll figure it out.

As a broadcaster, you’re always learning. I got the great break to be the youngest ever to be hired at this network. I was 26, I’m 55 now. Hopefully I’ve learned through all the different generations of my broadcasting how to get better. How to be more authoritative. How to be more succinct. How to tell a story that’s more cogent. How to have more excitement in my voice. All of these things, it’s a process.

The research has changed because you have access to more information. In the old days it was like, “I’m doing a Seattle game next week, how can I get the Seattle Times brought to me down here in Connecticut.” It was a harder process. Now there’s so much information and I want to see it all.

Nantz and Simms have partnered in the CBS broadcast booth since 2004. (Kirby Lee-USA TODAY Sports)

Nantz and Simms have partnered in the CBS broadcast booth since 2004.
(Kirby Lee-USA TODAY Sports)

Are there different approaches for how you personally prep for a golf tournament versus an NFL game?

Golf is a different vibe. Golf is not something I do with a spotting board in front of me. I don’t have a Rory McIlroy box up here and a Tiger Woods information section here. I by and large do it kind of off the cuff. In golf, you travel to so many of the same places, same hotels and restaurants as the players and it’s not as transient of a sport. They can be there for 20 or 30 years. There’s turnover in college basketball rapidly.

In the NFL the careers are also unfortunately far too short. Some quarterbacks, a Brady and a Manning, I’ve been able to cover their whole careers. But the basketball and the football takes a lot of your own stylized board work. I believe in putting charts and color coded things together so I have at my fingertips during a commercial break the chance to look down and say “This is something I want to remind myself. If something happens with the Patriots running game, this is a story I want to tell.”

Golf gives you a chance to be a little more poetic about it as well.

Thank you. That’s what I try to do. It’s a longer form of storytelling, although it can be quick-cutting. “Let’s go back to 16.” But when you get to the end and you’ve got the last group coming up the 72nd hole, you can have a 20 minute stretch there where we’re not cutting away to anything. You’re really getting to the heart of that champion. What does this moment mean to them? I love that.

Golf is more of a fireside chat and the other ones are happening so fast that it’s rapid-fire storytelling. It’s extemporaneous speaking. We’re paid observers is how I term it. If I was doing one of those [broadcasting] bootcamps, I’d be talking about how if you were in school, a class you need at the high school level is public speaking. When the teacher tries to get you to do extemporaneous speaking, pay attention. That’s what you’re doing. You’re seeing something and it’s leaving your lips the moment you observe it. You have to make these sentences and storylines and the direction you’re going with it up on the fly.

Speaking of golf, you’ve covered Tiger Woods his entire career. With his recent injury history, how do you see his future shaping up?

I think he still has a lot of great golf to play. I think he made a very smart decision to shut it down and the next time you come out and compete there are no health issues at all. Everyone wants to see Tiger back healthy giving him a fair, real chance to play at the standards he’s set. People have got to understand he’s had enough injury issues to rank up there with NFL running backs, who have a very short lifespan in their careers as football players.

Tiger’s been through four knee surgeries, now this back operation. He’s had Achilles issues so his health has taken its toll. But this is a sport if you’re good enough you can have a very successful 30-year run. Remember he was dominating when he was just past the age of 20. If he can get healthy and the back comes back, he could be playing another ten years at a high level at a major championship. That’s 40 majors. So if anybody is going to tell you right now that he’s done, they don’t know what they’re talking about.

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