Mike Tirico to start calling NFL games for NBC for Al Michaels

After making a summer move to NBC, Mike Tirico will beginning play-by-play duties on Sunday Night Football.

Mike Tirico finally get his chance to call football games for NBC in Sunday’s Green Bay Packers Washington Redskins game.

Over the summer, Tirico made the decision to jump from longtime broadcasting home ESPN, to NBC. The timing of Tirico’s decision aligned with the announcement of NBC receiving eight games in the NFL’s Thursday Night Football package.

Tirico served as the play-by-play announcer for ESPN’s Monday Night Football coverage for a decade. Tirico’s decision to leave ESPN led many to speculate that he would become the NBC play-by-play man for NBC’s slate of Thursday night games.

But news broke shortly after his announcement of joining NBC that Tirico would not be calling any Thursday night games. Instead NBC, used Tirico as a host on their Sunday Night Football games through the season’s first ten weeks.

On Bill Simmons’ podcast, NBC color commentator Cris Collinsworth broke the news that Tirico would begin calling a few games down the NFL season’s final seven weeks. The decision to have Tirico order to prevent 72-year-old Al Michaels from calling multiple games per week.

Tirico and Collinsworth will call a four games this season, beginning Sunday with the Packers Redskins game. The duo will call the Thanksgiving night game with Pittsburgh and Indianapolis. The same week, Tirico will call the Sunday night game between the Kansas City Chiefs and Denver Broncos. The final game for Tirico will be an NFC East match featuring Philadelphia Eagles and the New York Giants on Thursday Dec. 22.

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Tirico will also call two games for the NFL Network. He will be joined by Doug Flutie to call the Saturday, Dec. 17 Jets-Dolphins game and the Ravens-Steelers Christmas Day game.