Al Michaels and Kirk Herbstreit will be the announcing team when Prime Video takes over the “Thursday Night Football” package in September.
Michaels moves to Prime from NBC. His contract with NBC ended last month after he was in the booth for his 11th Super Bowl.
“This is the new frontier in sports television and to be a part of the launch at this point in my career is both exciting and stimulating,” Michaels said in a statement Wednesday. “The NFL is the king of unscripted television, and I’m looking forward to joining Kirk to bring fans more dramatic episodes on Thursday nights this fall.”
Herbstreit, who has been with ESPN since 1996, will remain the network’s lead college football analyst and do NFL games for Prime. ESPN also announced Wednesday that Herbstreit had signed a multiyear extension.
Prime Video also announced Fred Gaudelli will be Prime Video’s executive producer for “Thursday Night Football.” Gaudelli will remain with NBC in an executive role.
“Al and Kirk bring unparalleled experience to our historic new Thursday Night Football game telecasts as we kick off our groundbreaking new agreement with the NFL,” said Marie Donoghue, vice president for Amazon Global Sports Video.
Amazon will pay $1 billion a season to carry the games for 11 years. Prime Video’s first regular-season game will be on Sept. 15. The NFL expects to announce its schedule in early May after the draft.
Prime Video will carry 15 regular-season games and one preseason game. Games will be available on stations in the participating teams’ markets, which is the same practice when they are on ESPN and NFL Network.
NBC has the opening game of the season and also Thanksgiving night. The final week of the regular season has two games on Saturday and the remaining 14 on Sunday.
The Prime Video move continues a shift in the top announcing teams on NFL packages.
ESPN announced last week that Joe Buck and Troy Aikman will call “Monday Night Football” after being Fox’s No. 1 team since 2002.
With Michaels going to Prime, Mike Tirico will call “Sunday Night Football” with Cris Collinsworth.
Rob Hyland — who has produced Notre Dame games and NBC’s “Football Night in America” studio show — will take over from Gaudelli as the lead producer of the Sunday night games.
