Tony Romo was arrested on July 23 on suspicion of operating a vehicle while intoxicated. Since then, his future as a CBS analyst has become murky. The network continues to be tight-lipped about the situation, but according to Awful Announcing’s Brandon Contes, there’s trouble lurking for Romo.
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“Al Michaels is the example that everybody goes to that he had the DUI in 2017 or whenever it was, but NBC stood by him,” Brandon Contes said on the publication’s podcast on August 29. “There was no public punishment. He wasn’t suspended, he wasn’t removed and they kind of just moved on.
“But at that point, NBC was happy with Al Michaels. NBC wanted to keep Al Michaels as the lead play-by-play voice of their NFL coverage. And it just seems like CBS might be looking at this as an opportunity to get out.”
Back in April 2013, Michaels was arrested in Southern California for making an illegal U-turn. He was charged with misdemeanor DUI, and spent around five hours in jail.
Romo was pulled over on July 23 this year after a deputy allegedly saw him passing cars through a gore area between interstate traffic and vehicles entering from an on-ramp, the Milwaukee County Sheriff’s Office said. According to the police report, Romo struggled with a field sobriety test after being questioned, and refused to take a breathalyzer test. He was taken into custody on suspicion of an OWI.
But how things unfolded afterward for both figures are very different. In September 2013, the network officially announced that Michaels would be at the microphone for NBC’s Sunday Night Football kickoff for the Chicago Bears vs Pittsburgh Steelers game. He continued as the primary voice of NBC’s Sunday Night Football for many years since then.
However, for Romo, he seems to have gotten into CBS’ bad books. They put him on indefinite leave following the arrest.
“It’s an evolving situation, and therefore we’re still assessing,” said CBS Sports president David Berson during a network event on August 12. “There is no timetable or final decision at this time. We had to consider the impact on our image and on our brand. That’s very important to us. Whether the games, marketing, PR, social, the focus should and needs to be on our presentation and not on any other factors.”
In Romo’s absence, CBS promoted J.J. Watt to the No. 1 broadcast crew from the No. 2 crew. The latter said on social media that the career move did not occur “not the circumstances you’d hope it would happen under.”
This week, it was reported that the Milwaukee County District Attorney’s Office formally cited Romo for three separate violations. Per TMZ, the citations are: first-offense OWI, unsafe passing on the right side, and possession of an open container of alcohol in his vehicle.
This situation naturally begs the question of whether CBS will be pursuing getting out of the 10-year, $180 million contract Tony Romo signed in 2020.
“There has been nobody in the history of my sports broadcasting watching that has been able to do what Tony Romo did,” Dan Le Batard shared his take on the situation on his podcast. “But the evolution of the game changes so much that once he lost that parlor trick, almost immediately, what was Tony Romo’s stock started going down with everyone, including his employers, who reportedly had an intervention because they didn’t think he was working hard enough at what he was doing.”
The Athletic’s Andrew Marchand believes that Watt has a good chance of continuing in the No. 1 booth, and it was “more likely [Romo’s] not back.”
The case will reach its first major checkpoint since Romo’s July arrest when he appears in court on Sept. 21. In the meantime, a spokesperson said they are already “communicating with CBS about next steps.”
