Those Guys Have All the Fun - James Andrew Miller [308]
AL MICHAELS:
Within twenty-four hours of NBC getting Sunday nights, I knew Dick Ebersol had already told John how much he wanted him to come to Sunday Night and pretty much be the centerpiece of the package. It also became very clear to me that Ebersol wanted me to come to NBC as well, if there was a deal to be made, and he said just that in a conference call in June when they announced that John Madden was joining NBC.
As it turned out, we couldn’t come to an agreement. I was willing to take less money to go to NBC, but the gap between what I was making at ABC and what NBC was offering then was just too wide. So I agreed to sign with ESPN for Monday night.
When it became obvious that Gaudelli and Esocoff were going to NBC, there were a lot of sleepless nights, for me. I had met with Jay Rothman—he’d flown out here a couple of times—but John had made it clear he wanted me to be his partner at NBC, and when Esocoff and then Gaudelli joined him, they wanted it as well. I had no faith in what would be the new Monday Night schedule, but more importantly, I was without John, Freddie, and Drew. I knew in my heart that at that point in my life and my career, to start over with a completely different group of colleagues was not something I was going to be comfortable with, so at that point, my lawyer, Sam Fisher, and I asked ESPN for permission to negotiate with NBC.
SANDY MONTAG:
I went to George and asked, “Will you let Al Michaels out of his contract?” Al had one year left, and George said, “I don’t know,” because at that time it was going to be Michaels and Theismann in their booth. At the Super Bowl in ’04, I remember being with George and going to the booth after the game and having an awkward moment with George and Al. George wanted to hear it from Al directly. “Do you want out of your contract?” and Al said yes. Bob Iger had a good relationship with Al and said, “Okay, George, go ahead.”
From what I understand, the precursor to Mickey Mouse is a character called Oswald the Lucky Rabbit. It was an initial drawing, which was before Mickey Mouse, which the Disney family knew about. For some reason, it went to Universal Studios, and no one knew this, but NBC Universal owned the rights. George says to me at the time, “I’m going to give you a list of six things that we want. If Dick agrees to all six, we will let Al out of his contract.” The first thing he says is, “We want the rights to Oswald the Lucky Rabbit.” I go, “I can’t believe George Bodenheimer is making a joke at a time like this.” I’m up in my office and I googled “Oswald the Lucky Rabbit.” A mouse—a rabbit-y mouse—comes up, and I go, “Holy shit. Universal owns this character?” And the grandkids to Walt Disney knew that for years and wanted the rights back. Bob Iger knows this and says, essentially, “I’m going to deliver this back to the Disney family.” So that’s number one. I’m, like, “Unbelievable.” And then there’s a list of, like, five other things, like insular rights on something, some web thing, some US Open promo, whatever.
So then I call Dick, and he says, “So you have the list?” “Yup.” So I said, “First one, they want the rights to Oswald the Lucky Rabbit.”
Now Dick Ebersol in his infinite wisdom knows Oswald the Lucky Rabbit. So he called Ron Myer, head of Universal Studios. “What are you doing with this rabbit? Anything?” “No problem with the rabbit.” Then we worked the trade out.
AL MICHAELS:
I looked around and realized that I was one of the last guys standing from an ABC Sports operation that had basically been told to move on. There was a scarlet letter put on anyone who had been at ABC, with Freddie being Exhibit A.
To their credit, ESPN understood how unhappy I was and allowed me to go back again and see if an agreement could be reached with NBC. This time it worked. I wound up asking to get out of my contract with ESPN to sign for less money with NBC, even though