Paul Azinger says he’s happy it’s over, but that doesn’t mean he isn’t frustrated with how it ended.
The PGA Tour analyst opened up in an interview with GolfWeek about his final days with NBC, which saw his contract negotiations abruptly fall apart as the network decided to move in another direction last year.
Azinger said NBC made a contract offer and his agent was countering with a one-year renewal in an attempt to line up his contract with play-by-play man Dan Hicks.
It seems a shift in NBC’s management may have played a role in how the negotiations went down.
Sam Flood, the executive producer & president of production at NBC, had taken over the daily oversight of Golf Channel from Mark Loomis, according to the report.
Azinger also lost an ally when NBC Sports president Pete Bevacqua left to become the athletic director at Notre Dame.
“Sam Flood came in and was just, you know, just an a–hole about it,” Azinger told the website.
“All we were doing was making a counteroffer, and they said, ‘No, that was take it or leave.’ And I said, ‘Sam, was that presented to us as take it or leave it?’ ‘It’s complicated, Zinger,’ he said. I talked to him for 23-24 minutes and every time I would ask him a question, it would be like, ‘Are you upset or something?’ We had [the parameters of a deal] done. Are we not supposed to negotiate with you? And he wouldn’t say anything. And it was like, ‘nope, we’re moving on.’ There was never anything like ‘Zinger, this is all we can do. This is our best shot.’
“My poor manager he’s sitting there like, ‘What happened?’ That’s how it went down. We just wish it would have ended differently, because honestly, I’m kind of happy it ended.”
Azinger held the position at NBC for four years, following a lengthy stretch as ABC’s top analyst and a briefer one at Fox.
The 1993 PGA Championship winner says he spends a lot of time fishing, he’s not looking for another broadcasting job and he always has “something to do” to keep busy.
“Dan and I already had talked about it. I was ready to keep going. I thought I was gonna go for about five more years to be honest,” Azinger said. “I thought I would do at least one more year and then sign a four-year deal. They made the offer, my agent said ‘no, we’ll counteroffer the next day.’ And they said, ‘Sorry, we’re moving on.’ You know, it wasn’t a conversation with me, like, ‘What do you need Zinger? What do we need to do? Here’s our situation. You know, this is why we need you to accept this deal.’ There was no reason, it just was it’s complicated, it’s complicated. I was like, ‘How complicated can it be, bud?’ It’s money.
“For me to be able to do NBC was the greatest opportunity and blessing. I was the lead analyst at ABC, at ESPN, and at NBC and that was awesome. I’ve had two full careers and it was a great run. I’m so grateful that I had the chance to do NBC. I wish it could have ended up better for me. I was ready to keep going and I thought we were negotiating in good faith.”
Since Azinger’s exit, NBC has used a rotating group of analysts to replace him, with Paul McGinley, Curt Byrum, Kevin Kisner, Brandel Chamblee and Jim “Bones” Mackay all working with Hicks.
There does not appear to be a clear favorite to replace Azinger full time.
“Well, there was no plan going forward except to make the broadcast less expensive,” Azinger said. “I think they’re going to settle on whatever is less expensive.
“Everything since I got there was just budget cut after budget cut. Everything was to make the broadcast cost less money. We went from having towers to all in the same booth. We eliminated a couple of drones. Occasionally, you lose the airplane or the blimp and then you lose the speed shots, that one big camera that covers the ball, you know from the tee as it flies over the water. You know they’re gonna pour all their money into the Players.”
NBC Sports declined to comment to GolfWeek when reached for the story.
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