Chapter 10 - Looking for Terry

I have an announcement to make: I’ve agreed to do my obituary special for Netflix. This is going to be my final interview. The concept is that I’m going to sit in front of a camera for hours, answering every question, for a special that’s going to run after my death.

My only condition was that I had to be paid in advance.

While it sounds kind of morbid, the more I thought about doing it, the more I settled on the idea. Announcing it—hopefully way, way in advance—might even have some significant advantages. People are really going to be nice to me from now on because they know what’s coming.

I’ll be totally honest in this interview. I’m going to be brutally blunt. This is going to be my legacy to my children. I can say anything I want without worrying about repercussions. I’m going to tell them things about me that they never knew. I’m going to talk about my successes and my failures. I’m going to explain my insecurities and my immaturity.

Not too soon, though. My intention is to just keep on keeping on, doing the Fox show for as long as possible. I love that show and love those people. That’s my fall weekend family. I would do most anything for that show. I told our producers that if I could, I’d die on the show. I mean, just think of the ratings. Although admittedly, it would be tricky to schedule. But the ratings would be so high Fox probably would want me back to do it again. And I guarantee, the critics would find fault with me. They’d claim I mispronounced “Aaaarghhhh!” They’d say I was dying just for the attention.

The truth is when we started the show, we had no idea it would become an institution. Doing something innovative is always risky. There was the possibility that fans might see David Hill’s concept of treating professional football as entertainment like selling advertising in church. They’d think we were disrespecting the game. What’s made it work all these years is that we genuinely like one another. We really are friends. Curt Menefee once described us as just like any group of good friends who get together on Sunday to talk football but without the beer. It’s like we have our own little clubhouse and we’re inviting you to come on in.

There’s definitely a collection of strong personalities on our show. Every one of us has had measurable public success, but what makes it work, as Michael Strahan has explained, is that “No one worries about who gets more words.” We’re a championship team. Top-rated show every year, and we work hard to maintain that.

It started with Howie and me. What an unlikely pairing. Like Howie says, “We couldn’t be any more different.” I’m a Louisiana Baptist. He’s a Boston Catholic. I was a quarterback. He was a defensive lineman. I was a Pittsburgh Steeler. He was an Oakland Raider. In college I played in bowl games, and he went to Villanova. I have a considerable sense of humor, and he’s . . . Howie.

We spent the first couple of years trying to figure out how our personalities fit together. I was loose, ready for anything, and he was . . . Howie. There were moments when I might have crossed a line that I didn’t even know was a line at that time. But once we figured out those boundaries, it was our different personalities that made us work so well together. We both defined our roles. My job was to be the humor guy, the quirky character who’s having a good time and pleased as heck to be part of it. Howie’s job is to be the football guy. It works.

Howie likes to tell people that I’ve “ridden that Jed [Beverly Hillbillies] Clampett character all the way to the bank.” That’s not exactly true. An act will eventually get tired. You can’t fake it. I have the freedom to be me on the show, and I try to be the person the fans enjoy, but it’s not an act. I’m serious when I need to be serious. It’s not like I used to go into the huddle and tell a joke. I didn’t say, “A linebacker, a tight end, and an elephant walk into a bar.” I went into the huddle and did my job.

My job on the show is different. One Sunday I decided I was going to make that point. I told Howie, “I’m not going to say anything funny today. I’m not gonna laugh, and I’m not gonna smile. I’m just going to talk straight football.” He thought I was kidding about not kidding. For the entire first segment of the show, I was serious Terry, X-ing and O-ing my heart out, rather than good ol’ Terry. During the break the producer came down to see if I was okay. He thought, What’s wrong with Terry? He was worried about me.

Being serious is Howie’s role. Howie’s always prepared and always will be. We all prepare for the show. We have notes and conversations. Howie watches NFL Replay and looks over tapes and can tell shoe sizes of practice squad players. He doesn’t have to act it either. Another time on the air, Jimmy, Michael, and I got into a rhythm about the topic, and we were hootin’ and hollerin’ and laughing and having just a grand ol’ time. When it was Howie’s turn to talk, he looked into the camera and said seriously, “The Cincinnati Bengals right outside linebacker Will Pickens has been having trouble getting off a double team, and he’s going to have to play with a wrap . . .” When he was done, we cut to a commercial. I just stared at him. Just looked right at him.

He threw up his hands, “What?”

I shook my head. “You just can’t help it, can you?”

“Can’t help what?”

“You’re just boring.” And like everything else he does, he’s great at being boring. Howie works at doing everything well. Nobody is better at being boring than Howie. In fact, even years later, if he catches me looking at him, he’ll nod and say, “I know.”

I can poke fun at Howie because he knows how much I love him. We’re brothers. We’ve been working together for more than three decades. Although our playing careers overlapped just a little bit, we only played against each other once. In 1981 the Steelers were playing in Oakland. This was our big rivalry, and these teams did not like each other. Howie was drooling to get to me, and he wanted to sack me so bad. But before he had the opportunity, while throwing a pass, I smashed my wrist against a helmet, broke four small bones, and had to be replaced. Howie has always referred to me leaving the game before he could sack me as “convenient.”

Howie and I have shared a dressing room most of our years together. I like having a big guy like that as a bodyguard. Of course, there wasn’t anything Howie hadn’t already seen in the movies. We also have shared a bunk bed on an aircraft carrier.

Once, when I was on that USO tour with the secretary of defense, William Cohen, I got this great idea. What if we celebrated Veteran’s Day by doing the show from a military base or on board a ship? Cohen loved the idea and worked with David Hill to turn it into reality. We got permission from the Department of Defense to film the show from the supercarrier USS Harry S. Truman. To get there we had to fly to Rome. Neither Howie nor I had been to Rome, and Howie insisted we see the city. We went to the Colosseum. Howie had played most of his career in the Oakland Coliseum, but this was nothing like that. This was the lions’ home stadium. Then he said we had to go to St. Peter’s Basilica. He was very excited about it.

When we got there, I looked around and told him, “Sorry, Howie, it doesn’t look like he’s here.”

“Who?”

Who? Who were we there to see? “Saint Peter.” Da-dum!

Okay, did I tell you the one about the linebacker, the tight end, and the elephant walking into a bar? Look, I’m a good Baptist. I’d never even been inside a Catholic church. We stood in a long line to go inside. Howie was in front of me, and as we finally got inside, he was stunned into silence. I’ll let him tell you what happened after that.

“I was looking around St. Peter’s Basilica and I was in awe,” Howie said. “It was breathtaking, the most magnificent church I had ever been inside. It felt like trumpets were playing in my head. But suddenly, I felt water splashing on me. I turned around and there was Terry, a big grin on his face, washing his hands in the holy water.”

In my defense, I’d never seen anything like that in a Baptist church. We don’t use holy water to cleanse ourselves. We just ask everybody to uncock their guns. I’d never intentionally be disrespectful. I was walking into a holy place, and I thought they wanted to make sure my hands were clean. I never splashed him.

Afterward we took a helicopter out to the Truman. I loved that experience. On board Howie got the bottom bunk. I had to climb to the top one. Imagine that. No, wait, don’t imagine that. I like to have killed myself on that ship. I kept walking into steel steps. And every time I did, Howie would hold up his index finger and admonish me, “See, that’s what you get for playing with the holy water.”

Since that trip to Rome, the show has traveled around the world to honor our military. We’ve done it from the service academies and from military bases around the world. Wherever we go, Curt Menefee explains, “This is not a drop-in, drop-out. We spend all day Saturday with the troops. We meet with them, play football with them. They like to show us their toys.” Then he adds, “We try to keep Terry away from the dangerous stuff.”

Except for that one time. In 2009 we visited Bagram Airfield in Afghanistan. At different times, Rob Gronkowski, the newest member to join Fox NFL Sunday, had done an 11,000-foot parachute jump from a plane and a twenty-five-foot fall into the water from a helicopter. On our flight from Qatar to Afghanistan, we all sat in the back of a giant C-17 Globemaster. I assumed they seated us there so we could get off first. But suddenly, totally unexpectedly, the whole back of the airplane opened. I mean, literally, the back of the plane just opened. I saw the mountains below us, and I wasn’t looking out a window. I knew that wasn’t right.

Where was Gronk when we needed him?

I wasn’t about to ask if they needed my help getting down the wheels. So I did the only smart thing I could think of. I reached over and took hold of Howie’s hand. Now please, don’t ask me why I did that. Howie went through his whole career without ever protecting a quarterback, but somehow holding his hand made me feel better. Michael sat across from us and saw me grab Howie’s hand. He didn’t know whether to laugh or sigh. We watched as they dropped the cargo. Fortunately, we were not considered cargo.

The whole time we were wearing Kevlar vests and helmets, and after we landed, I asked someone why we had to wear that protection. “Snipers,” she said. Snipers! Apparently, the Taliban occasionally shot at these planes. Now, even as bad as things sometimes got back in Pittsburgh, that was never an issue.

Howie and I have done so many things together. In 2007 we did the analysis of the Sugar Bowl. It was an interesting concept. While Kenny Albert did the play-by-play, I analyzed the offense and Howie explained the defense. It was the usual Fox trying to do something a little bit different, something that might be fun. But this was new for Kenny. He’d never done a game quite like this before. We worked it out so we wouldn’t be constantly interrupting one another. At the end of the first half, we were congratulating one another.

“Oh man, that worked great!”

“We pulled that one off!”

“Way to go, us!”

Then Executive Producer Ed Goren came into the booth. He asked, “What the hell was that?” He was furious. He just ripped us up and down. “What is wrong with you? That’s the worst I have ever seen. Now clean it up for the second half.”

When he left, we just looked at one another. We weren’t used to being criticized. We’re pregame guys.

I felt terrible. I told Howie, “It wasn’t that bad.” I was trying to boost up both of us.

Then, minutes later, David Hill walked in, a big smile on his face. “Oh, man, that was terrific,” he told us. “You guys were amazing. That was fantastic. Just keep it up for the second half.” Then he left the booth.

Howie and I sat there in silence for several seconds. Then I pointed to the door and said, “I’m going with that guy!”

Jimmy Johnson had been with us almost from the very beginning. His role in David Hill’s scheme was to provide a coach’s overview of the game, and he was great at it. On weekends during the season, we stayed in the same hotel, and Jimmy and I would spend all day Saturday together watching college football. We had two TVs set up in front of two big recliners that I’d had put in my room, and we’d sit there all day watching games. At some point I’d order up a ridiculously large platter of nachos. My personal favorite is Texas-style nachos with chicken and steak on a layer of chips, covered with tons of jalapeños and cheese melted together, then on top of that another layer of jalapeños, pickles, more jalapeños, more chicken and meat doused in more cheese, then stirred. Oh my goodness, just writing about it, I can taste it. Jimmy would take a picture of the nachos and send it to Troy Aikman to make him jealous. And then some other people would wander in, and it was all football, all nachos, all day.

Jimmy and I once broadcast a game together too. This was another one of those times when Fox let us do something nobody had done. We were going to do the game without a play-by-play guy. And together Jimmy and I demonstrated why it had never been done before. Years later, ESPN would do a similar thing with the Manning brothers. They were just talking, but people could watch the primary broadcast, with play-by-play on a different channel.

Rather than the Manning brothers, Jimmy and I were more like the Brothers Grimm. It was awful. I’ll give you an example: As we watched silently, a receiver took a kickoff on the ten, ran up the sideline, cut inside, causing a tackler to miss, got grabbed by another defender and spun loose, twisted back inside as another man overran the play, threw a straight-arm to evade another tackle, and plowed into the end zone, deking and juking for an incredible ninety-yard return for a touchdown.

Jimmy finally said, “Wow.”

I agreed, “You sure said it, Jimmy.”

It was brutal, but we actually thought we did a good job. “Great job, Jimmy,” I told him. “We nailed it.”

“Great job, Terry,” he told me. “That was amazing.”

“That was fun,” I said. “Maybe we should do it again!”

We believed that until we walked into our production meeting the next morning and people started sympathizing with us. I remember the biggest compliments: “You guys did the best you could,” “Nice try,” and, “You really made people appreciate those play-by-play guys.”

This is how valuable Jimmy was to the success of the show. After our first two seasons, he accepted the head coaching job in Miami. Jimmy was born to be a coach. He wakes up in the middle of the night to give his pillow a pep talk: “You can puff up better than that, pillow!” But after a few years without ever reaching the level of success he had achieved in Dallas, it was obvious he was getting antsy.

We all wanted him back, though. David Hill had a plan. He got our researchers to start collecting stories of coaches dying young from heart problems. Coach Smith, forty-seven years old, heart attack. Coach Brown, fifty-one, fell over from a heart attack. Coach Jones, fifty-three, heart attack while driving. When he had a pile, he sent it by special delivery—but not to Jimmy. He sent it to Mrs. Rhonda Johnson.

David waited a couple of days, then called her. “I’ve sent you some reading material,” he said. “If Jimmy decides to retire, we sure would love to have him come back to the show.”

He was with us for almost the next thirty years. The next time he announced his retirement, we held a wonderful going-away party for him. It turned out to be the worst going-away party in history. Jimmy was reminded how much he enjoyed being with us, so he unretired for another year.

I am telling you right now, though, there was absolutely no truth to the rumor that David Hill also sent me a pile of press clippings, featuring retired people enjoying themselves on the beach.

Michael Strahan joined the program in 2008. I love the guy as much as a quarterback can love a defensive end. I describe him as the loudest mime in the world. The late comedian Alan King used to tell people that he’d bought his son a chemistry set, and after that, anytime he yelled at his son, he held up a test tube filled with something and would scream, “We’ll all go together!”

That has been my relationship with Michael from the very beginning. No matter what happens, we’re in it together. We had this camaraderie from the very first day we gave him half a cake to celebrate his divorce. We’re in this together, and dadgum it, we’re gonna have some fun! Here’s the truth: Michael gets me, and he has the ability to play off me. On the air I’d compare us to the comedy team of Dean Martin and Lou Costello.

Michael once told a reporter about working with me and Gronkowski, “It’s definitely not a Mensa session. I can tell you that. We’re not exchanging books.”

During the show Michael and I often make eye contact. When someone else is talking, we’ll exchange glances, and we know instantly what the other is thinking. Sometimes we have to look away so we don’t start laughing. Or, when I’m babbling about something, the camera will focus on Michael and his expression will be, “What the heck is Terry talking about now?”

No matter what circuitous path I follow with one of my stories on the show, Michael is always there to help make sense of it. Once, when I was talking about a game, I said, “There are very few things in this world that make me nervous. When I go through the airport later tonight, to get through the security line you gotta have a driver’s license. . . . If I don’t have that, and a lot of times I don’t, I panic.”

Michael has a whole dictionary of expressions. He can say more with one look than a Kardashian with an entire box of makeup. The camera cut to Michael, who had his totally confused what-is-he-talking-about-now expression on his face, as I continued, tying it together tighter than the top of one of Costco’s large plastic garbage bags. “Facing Pittsburgh today, if I’m Josh Allen, there’s panic written all over this.” Boom! Made my point.

Admittedly, everybody else was silent as they tried to respond to that. Then Michael said, “I’ll tell you what, every time you start your comments like that, I panic!”

When Rob Gronkowski joined the show, Michael pointed out that he’d have to find his own lane, a path that makes him different while fitting into the team. Gronk’s definitely different. He’s a combination of Howie’s stature, Michael’s charisma, Curt’s good nature, and, of course, my intelligence.

We welcomed him with a special segment. Jay Glazer, a man who once duct-taped an elevator door trapping the people inside, is our NFL inside guy. No one knows more about news and rumors than he does. So while we were doing a supposedly live segment previewing the game between the Cowboys and Buffalo Bills, Curt Menefee cut to Jay, who revealed he’d just been told by Cowboys coach Mike McCarthy that they were activating the great tight end Rich Russo. “And you guys know how big of a weapon Russo is for that team. . . . They are gonna put him heavily into that game plan. Expect a lot from Rich Russo.”

“That’s big,” Michael agreed, as the producer put up an illustration of Russo, “because Russo is a complete game changer. . . . Great blocker, great receiver, red zone threat.”

Gronk was silent. What was slowly becoming apparent was that he had no idea who Rich Russo was, which wasn’t surprising considering he didn’t exist. The fact that we made him up didn’t stop us from praising him. “I thought it was a stretch, though,” Howie agreed. “They were talking about [him being another] Tony Gonzalez. They talked about Gronk.” Howie shook his head. “I don’t think he’s Gronk.”

Giving Curt the opportunity to draw in Gronk, he turned to him and asked, “Where do you list Russo among the tight ends, playing today at least?”

Gronk’s natural enthusiasm kicked in. “He’s been out for a little bit, so he might be a little rusty coming back,” he said. “But I think they’re going to give him opportunities. . . . But also, they got [Jake] Ferguson as well.” He added with his usual great confidence, “They’re gonna be a 1–2 combo.”

I looked at Michael. He was holding in his laughter so hard I thought he was going to burst. I’m not kidding, tears were literally running down his cheeks.

So naturally, Jay pressed Gronk just a little harder. “Yeah, but here’s the thing: Ferguson has been the guy only ’cause Russo’s been hurt. You gotta admit, with Russo coming back, it just changes their offense.”

So Gronk admitted it, fully committed to this. “Yeah, but Ferguson has been showing that he’s the guy right now. They’re still gonna need Ferguson.”

Until then I had been silent. I thought it was time to explain why Russo had been out. “He’s the only guy in the league that has two fingers missing on his right hand,” I said. “That’s why he’s been out. And he’s back now.”

Even that didn’t slow down Gronk, who asked, “Yeah, so is that gonna affect him when he’s catching a pass?” Adding, “I don’t know . . .” He held up both hands showing all his fingers. “I still have all five of my fingers.”

That was it. We couldn’t hold back any longer. We all broke down. Gronk thought we were laughing at his finger math, so he quickly corrected himself. “Ten fingers! Ten fingers!”

He fit right in.

We’ve all learned how to be the characters viewers enjoy watching and play off them. I’ll give you a perfect example of my role. Curt asked each of us to write down a quarterback who had surprised us. I wrote down Sam Darnold, who was doing a great job in Seattle.

Howie answered first. “Darnold,” he said, showing his paper.

He stole my answer! I showed my response to Curt and accused Howie, “He’s reading my mail. He cheats. He comes in my room and steals my notes.”

Howie had the perfect response, drawing on the Terry the audience has known for more than three decades. “I can tell you this,” he said seriously, naturally, “the last place I’m going to cheat is off his papers.” Everybody gets the joke.

It’s what people want and expect from their TV friends. Years ago I decided I needed a change. I grew a goatee. It was the closest I could come to growing hair on my head.

A producer came into my hotel room and said seriously, “Terry, you gotta cut that goatee off.”

I refused. I was going through my last divorce and felt a need to hide behind something. I just wanted to be different. “What are you talking about? I’m not cutting this off.” Besides, I thought it made me look distinguished. Like an English teacher. I was gonna buy me a book and walk around so people could say, “Look, there’s an English teacher.”

“America is not used to seeing you with a goatee,” he said.

Or, apparently, a book. That’s not my character on the show or in my appearances. Since then, I’ve become what’s known as an institution. No, no, no, not in an institution. I’ve become an institution, a person who’s established himself over a long period of time. Basically, it means people have gotten used to seeing me on Sundays; my being there makes them comfortable, and they trust me.

An issue that feeds into that sometimes-befuddled character is the well-known fact that I sometimes have difficulty pronouncing names. That’s not intentional, and it’s absolutely never meant to be disrespectful. Some people put letters together in a manner that doesn’t fit easily inside my Louisiana mouth.

For example, I have to go real slow just writing down the name of the great center Olu Oluwatimi, so imagine me trying to pronounce it. Especially when I’m doing the rapid-speed wrap-up of games. Sometimes names just tumble out wrong. Think it’s easy? Okay, here’s a test to see if you could be a broadcaster. Say out loud the name of the wide receiver Elic Ayomanor. Go ahead.

Now, here’s the correct way of saying it: EL-lick EYE-yo-MAN-oor. Go ahead and tell me that you pronounced Ayo as Eye-yo. Now do you understand why my favorite franchise owner is named Jerry Jones?

My difficulty in correctly pronouncing some names has almost gotten me in trouble. I do study, learn, prepare, and write down the correct pronunciation, but because we’re providing a lot of game information in only a few seconds, there are times when my tongue gets there before my brain can catch up. That’s why I try to stay away from names and numbers and lean into the things that come naturally to me. It’s why I use my barnyard metaphors. It’s like when I go out into the pasture and spend twenty minutes explaining patiently to Lucy that she’s a cow and not a horse, which is why she can’t be in the competition, and she looks at me sadly with those big dark brown eyes and says, “Moooooo.” And that’s exactly why I sometimes mispronounce names.

I make mistakes. When you’ve been on TV long enough to become an institution, mistakes are going to happen. When I make one—if I get a score wrong, mispronounce a player’s name, report the wrong team—it becomes a headline. “Bradshaw Is Slipping!” “Is It Time for Bradshaw to Retire?” “Bradshaw Doesn’t Know Rookie’s Mother’s Name!” The reality is those kinds of mistakes happen to everyone as they age. I understand with all the ongoing conversations about CTE, people might wonder if it’s more than that. That’s fair. I wondered too, which is why Tammy and I had all those tests done. I passed every test—without cheating—and I didn’t have to retake any of them. I have the pictures to prove it.

There was one place where I got very fortunate. Here’s a true story: On live TV, I was making a point when I accidentally knocked over my cup of coffee. As I continued opining, Curt Menefee leaned over and naturally as can be began wiping it up with a tissue, cleaning up my mess. When we went to commercial, I looked at him and said something like, “I appreciate you taking care of me.”

Curt Menefee is our bandleader, our point guard, our moderator, and our quarterback. He’s our host and therapist, responsible for keeping the show moving, and for handling the transitions with the smoothness of Leonard Bernstein conducting the US Olympic ice-skating team on a Teflon rink. He’s the one asking the questions to promote conversations. He watches the clock and provides the platform for each of us to be ourselves. But what I have always appreciated is his ability to clean up after me when I go just a little bit too far.

When we needed someone to replace J. B., who left for CBS, I saw Curt’s name on the list and said, “That’s our guy.” (And if you’re reading this, Curt, remember that next time you’re calling on people to opine!) He may not have been a professional football player, but in our epic hotel room push-up challenge, he handily defeated one member of our crew. I don’t want to embarrass Michael by telling you who that person was, but Curt knocked out sixty-two push-ups.

Curt Menefee knows every general manager, every coach, and every player. Among his many skills, Curt speaks Bradshaw. Other people in that role might be Terryfied, but he handles it beautifully. He understands the point I’m trying to make with my stories and is able to interpret them for our audience. He’s like my personal safety net. Knowing he has my back enables me to go a little further, which is why when people start criticizing me, I tell them they really should be blaming Curt, not me. Without him there, I’d never have said that.

He knows what each of our strengths are and manages to put us in a position to show them off. I’ll give him the best compliment I can think of: He calls our plays. I can’t imagine what he does when he goes home after a weekend corralling us, but I suspect it begins with the words, “On second thought, make it a double.”

Even with all the humor, hoopla, and events—like Gronk jumping out of a perfectly good airplane—the one thing we never forget is that we’re a football show. Our job is to set the table for the feast to come. Our viewers expect us to be informative as well as entertaining. They want to know who’s playing, what to expect, what to watch for, and oh yeah, here are some surprises. We may have fun with the game, but we respect it. The one thing that all of us on the show have in common with our viewers is a deep love for the game of football. That’s our shared bond. That’s why we come together for several hours on Sundays. The game of football is endlessly fascinating and mostly unpredictable. Which is why we end up trying to predict it.

I can state that with our combined experience in all aspects of the game of football, as a group, we certainly know considerably more about it than the average fan. A lot of our viewers may have wagered on outcomes and hope we might offer some insight that gives them a better chance of winning. Here’s the truth about that: We’ve spent our lives playing the game, studying the game, and learning every little bit about it. We have access to charts and analysts and statisticians. We know how players perform in different temperatures. We may have spoken to players and coaches. Our lives have made us experts, but still, with all that knowledge, we have no idea what’s going to happen. That’s why when we make our predictions, we’ll disagree. That unpredictability is part of the beauty of the game.

Although I have to admit there’s one aspect of football broadcasts I don’t understand: the halftime sideline interviews with a coach or player running into the locker room. I love the expectation that after 140 years of these brief conversations, this is the first time we really are going to get some insight as to what went wrong, or right. This time the coach or player is going to explain what happened.

Your team is down 21–0, what do you need to do? “We need to get better in all three phases of the game.” Thank you, Coach. “We need to tackle better!” Thank you, Coach. “We need to score more points than them.” Thank you, Coach, back to you, Bubba. Trust me, if that coach knew what was wrong, his team wouldn’t be down 21–0. Those interviews are no more real than a reality show.

I’m waiting for the day a coach admits, “Our left tackle is playing like a dog, and I’m going to go in there and tell him if he doesn’t play better, I’m getting him a fire hydrant for his birthday.” But that’s never going to happen, which is why I think those interviews are a waste of time.

I also don’t especially like the postgame quick interviews with players. How did you feel when you scored the winning touchdown? “Felt good. Couldn’t have done it without my teammates.” Let me know when someone admits, “I gave the defender just a little push to get separation, and fortunately, the official didn’t see it.” Isn’t going to happen. Generally it’s like listening to pro golf announcers talking to the sponsor of an event.

I couldn’t possibly guess how many interviews I’ve conducted in my career, but I can count the number of really honest, insightful responses I’ve received on the fingers of both hands. Five! Okay, maybe a few more than that. We always try to interview coaches and players in the days before the game because we’re trying to gather material that will interest our viewers. What we mostly found out was that the people we interviewed didn’t want to be there. I mean, what are they going to say? “Listen Terry, now don’t tell anyone, but this is what we’re going to do Sunday.”

I’ve learned that if you ask the tough questions, you’re not going to get answers, and that person will never come back. Once while I was still at CBS, I asked Atlanta head coach Jerry Glanville, “What’s your response to being a phony?” To which he naturally gave me a phony response.

Becoming an institution also means I know what I can get away with, which is pretty much anything. I’ll tell you when I first got in trouble for being honest. During a press conference to introduce a Budweiser Super Bowl commercial, I was asked about John Elway. I said what I thought: Elway was good—but he had not yet won a Super Bowl—so I wouldn’t call him great. His coach Dan Reeves responded, “Terry must have had a lot of Budweiser in him when he said it.”

Meaning, I guess, you need a lot of alcohol before you can be honest on TV.

I didn’t back down. Eventually Ted Shaker told a reporter, “People now say, ‘If you want to know the truth, call Bradshaw. He’s brought a different dimension to the studio.’ ”

I’ve tried to do that. I took a chance on being who I really am, knowing that if it worked, it worked. And if it didn’t, what could they do to me? Take away my Super Bowl rings? I took pride in that comment when Ted Shaker said it at the beginning of my career, and I’ve tried to fulfill that since then. With some boundaries.

My mama is very busy running heaven, but I guarantee you I’d hear from her somehow if I intentionally said something to hurt someone. That’s just gratuitous meanness. I’ll talk openly about a performance and I’ll comment on actions, but I try hard to avoid being personal. Personal is Henderson criticizing my intelligence to gain attention. If I’m honest, I also have to acknowledge that people may be hurt by criticism. Having been criticized many times, I know what that feels like. As my several therapists will tell you, “It can take a toll.” But if I am going to be honest with viewers, I have to have the cojones to be critical when it’s called for.

When Jimmy first started with us, we all suspected he intended to go back to coaching based on the way he talked on the show. He refused to criticize anyone because he didn’t want to cause controversy. The fact that he was right down the middle on every issue was a strong indication that he wanted to get back on the field.

None of us set out to be critical of players and coaches. We know how hard they work. We know how fast the game is and what the stakes are. So we try to avoid it, but we also have to be honest.

The irony is that critics have criticized me for being too critical. I’ve always been the biggest target for criticism on the show. Okay, that’s also part of my job. And there are times on the show when I’m standing there with a funny thought or an opinion I know is going to create an issue, and I’ll hesitate, wondering, Should I be funny here? Should I say what I’m thinking? It’s like I’ve got the devil on one shoulder pushing me, saying, “Go ahead and say it, Terry. It’s really cute, and people will love it, guaranteed.” Meanwhile, the angel on my other shoulder is crying, knowing what’s about to happen.

Here’s the truth: I don’t know where these thoughts come from either. I was as surprised as anyone else when I welcomed viewers to our first broadcast one season by telling them, “I haven’t been this excited since my aunt taught me how to play spin the bottle.” Sometimes I won’t hesitate to say something silly just for the reaction I know is coming. One week when we were previewing a New Orleans Saints game I admitted, “I believe in voodoo, like all the people do in Louisiana.” Now, in reality, I’m not really into voodoo. Especially when it doesn’t work. But I love the image, and I said, “I spoke to a voodoo queen with a three-legged dog. She was a woman who actually has been dead for more than one hundred years, and she had mixed up a potion and . . .”

I want you to imagine the expression on Michael’s face as I revealed this. Believe me, it was worse. Then Curt demonstrated how little I’d changed in several decades, suggesting just like Dan Reeves, “Did you have a cup of something over here? Because I’m wondering what’s going on here.”

Oh, that little devil on my shoulder was laughing.

Some things in my life have changed over the years. I don’t like most country music anymore, for example. It’s crossed over into rock and roll too much to suit me. That old-time gloom, doom, lost love, and misery make me happy. But my habit of voicing my opinions on the show has not changed. And I’m not afraid to be honest about people I like. When the Cowboys’ Greg Hardy was suspended for assaulting a woman, I called out Jerry Jones for basically excusing it. I love Jerry Jones. I think he’s been one of the best NFL owners, but as I said, imitating Jerry, “That’s my boy. He can sack a quarterback. He didn’t mean to do it, and he won’t do it again. Here’s $20 million, bless your heart.”

What it comes down to is if I feel strongly about something, I’ll say it. I don’t care who it is. I’ll say it because that’s who I am, and maybe I’ll regret it. Which is also who I am. I also know people will respond. When I criticized Steelers coach Mike Tomlin, for example, he responded, “I grew up a Dallas fan. Particularly, a Hollywood Henderson fan.”

Every time I criticize a quarterback, like John Elway, Peyton Manning, Tom Brady, or Aaron Rodgers, I’m automatically accused of being jealous. Let’s be honest about that: Would I want to be revered and win five NFL Player of the Year awards? Well yeah, who wouldn’t? Do I want to be rich like they are? You kidding me? Of course. I wouldn’t mind living downhill from Brady, in hopes some of that cash might just roll down on me. John Elway once claimed I was jealous because of his salary. “He’s partially right,” I responded, “I did wish I had all that money and hair.” It had nothing to do with my comments, though. Quarterback is the one position on the field I know. It’s the glamor position, the money position, but it comes with responsibility. Maybe my experience makes me a little sensitive about quarterbacks, but if I don’t say what I believe, I’m not doing my job.

I sometimes say things I regret. At the end of Super Bowl LVII, it was my job to hand the championship trophy to Kansas City Chiefs coach Andy Reid. In the joy of the moment, as maybe a billion people were watching, I asked Andy—who is a large man—to “waddle over here” while later suggesting he “have a cheeseburger on us.”

I didn’t need the barrage of criticism to let me know that was a big mistake. That was one of those moments when I say, “The devil made me do it.” My words were insulting, and viewers rightly told me that. As soon as I could, I apologized, admitting “I am the worst there is” for saying it. The next day I called Andy and apologized, telling him, “I am so sorry. I had no idea I’d create such a storm.” He was totally gracious about it.

But a season later, we were previewing the Chiefs game with Washington, and I revealed some pretty interesting information: “The other day I texted Andy Reid,” I said on the show, “and I got a text back.” So far, so good. “I thought it was Andy Reid,” I admitted, “but it was some guy selling pigs.”

This time Michael was staring at me with his mouth wide open. I leave it up to you to decide why that was.

As soon as I realized no one had the slightest idea what I was talking about, I tried to explain myself. “But it sounded good. I shouldn’t have told you that so y’all would have thought I talked to Andy Reid, but I didn’t.” Well, honestly even then it didn’t make a whole lot more sense to me than it did to anyone else. Although one viewer commented, “If Terry had talked about this exchange for another fifteen minutes, I’d have listened to every word.” Me too, in hopes of finding out what I was talking about.

Maybe that’s part of the reason we’ve been the leading pregame show all these years. People tune in to see how bad I’m going to be that day. Like I mentioned to you chapters ago, people always slow down to see a collision.

I’d be remiss not to acknowledge the many other people who have appeared on our show or worked hard to make it successful. I would mention them all by name, but we’ve already established my difficulty with that. I mean this from the bottom of my heart, and I’d say it even if my contract wasn’t coming up for renewal: I’m fortunate enough to be part of a wonderful family that has made it possible for me to continue being Terry.

In recent years people have wondered if or when I intend to retire. In response, I want to point out that when Gronk replaced Jimmy Johnson we dropped about forty-five years of cumulative age. The group got a lot younger, which according to my math gives me at least another two years. I hear the talk about retiring, maybe after Fox does the next Super Bowl, maybe after the Jets win a championship, maybe after Halley’s Comet returns, but here’s my bottom line: I’m going to continue showing up every Sunday until they don’t want me, and then I’ll still continue showing up, banging on the locked doors until they let me in.

It’s taken me a lot of years to get to this page of my life. Growing up, the only thing I wanted to do was throw a football and be on a TV show with Howie Long. I never expected the rest of it. In a lot of ways, my life has been like that bouncing football I threw against the side of the garage. I never knew which way it was going to go. I just learned to jump on it.

It turned out the key to my success in life was the same as it was on the gridiron: When I got hit, I got up. I got sacked enough to write a book about it, both on the field and in life. There were times when I was hurt, both on the field and in life. But I got up and got right back in the game. Well, except for that one time they had to carry me off the field. Then it took me four weeks to get back, but I did it. I think that’s probably a pretty good message. After getting knocked down, success starts by getting up.

For me, getting up in life meant letting go of the anger I was holding inside and embracing the reality that God gave me the ability to make people happy. I thank Him for that every day. As I’ve written, smiles bounce back. They make me happier. It’s not a lot more complicated than that. If I need to put on my Terry suit to make that happen, if I need to be silly and goofy, if I need to be self-deprecating, that’s what I’ll do. There are still times my feelings get hurt, but mostly I hide it and accept it. There are still times when Roy pays us a visit, but he doesn’t stay long, and we don’t let him break anything.

The rewards for being who I am today have been enormous. It’s been the basis of my entire post-football-playing career. It brought me my Tammy. It has enabled me to be surrounded by a large, growing, and beautiful family. It has given me my Fox family. And it allows me to walk into a barn and feel complete.

I know as I go through my day I’m going to be confronted by a lot of people who want to shake my hand, share a few words, or ask for an autograph. Most of them are going to be smiling. I do my best to provide those seconds of happiness. I know when they go home that night, they’re going to tell someone, “Guess who I met today?” And as I say in my speeches, “When I lie down at night and think about my day, that’s mostly what I remember.”

I’m not suggesting you try the fourteen-day be-nice test. That’s much too long. But smiling is contagious, and I absolutely guarantee that. And, as I’ve learned, a day full of smiles, the love of a good woman, a barn full of horses, and a good short-iron game can definitely lead to happiness.

Believe me, I never thought I’d be able to write those words.