A-Rod gets unprecedented deal to join ESPN’s 'Sunday Night Baseball'

Liz Roscher
·Staff writer
Alex Rodriguez will be joining ESPN’s “Sunday Night Baseball.” (AP Photo)
Alex Rodriguez will be joining ESPN’s “Sunday Night Baseball.” (AP Photo)

The A-Rod renaissance continues! On Tuesday, ESPN announced that it had selected A-Rod to replace Aaron Boone as a “Sunday Night Baseball” commentator. The news was first reported by The Sporting News then confirmed by MLB.com’s Mark Feinsand:

A-Rod will be joining Jessica Mendoza and Buster Olney on the broadcasts, as well as the other ESPN new hire: Matt Vasgersian, who will take over play-by-play duties from Dan Shulman, who decided to leave “Sunday Night Baseball” at the end of the 2017 season. Vasgersian is a veteran baseball announcer who currently does play-by-play for Fox Sports and is a host on MLB Network. He’ll continue with MLB Network work as well.

A-Rod already works for Fox Sports during the postseason, doing pre and postgame analysis with Kevin Burkhardt, Frank Thomas and other retired baseball personalities like David Ortiz. A-Rod will continue to work for Fox Sports in the playoffs, and will do “Sunday Night Baseball” during the regular season. It’s a unique arrangement because ESPN and Fox Sports are rival networks. Though the key to this working could have been the timing of his two gigs: ESPN during the regular season, and Fox Sports exclusively during the playoffs. The two networks are sharing his talent, but at two different times of the year.

“I’m looking forward to this new chapter in my broadcasting career,” A-Rod said in a statement. “It’s an exciting time in baseball and now I get that front row seat to tell that story every Sunday night on ESPN as well as calling my fourth postseason on Fox where I started this journey.”

An interesting part of ESPN’s announcement with A-Rod: He’ll also work “on several upcoming ESPN specials, while also serving as executive producer of them.” The A-Rod empire expands yet again.

A-Rod has received rave reviews for his analysis on Fox Sports, but commenting on a live baseball game isn’t the same as an in-studio chat. But considering how well A-Rod has taken to broadcasting, there’s little doubt that he’ll also excel at this.

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Liz Roscher is a writer for Big League Stew on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email her at lizroscher@yahoo.com or follow her on twitter! Follow @lizroscher

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