Mike Tirico to call Colts’ Thursday night game this season for NBC

In a bit of announcing news, the Sports Business Daily’s John Ourand reported today that Mike Tirico will call Thursday Night Football games for NBC this fall.

This comes as a change by the NFL, as previously the league had said that a network’s number one crew had to call the Thursday night game, which for NBC would mean Al Michaels and Chris Collinsworth and for CBS would mean Jim Nantz and Tony Romo. But the league has approved NBC’s request to use Tirico and Collinsworth on Thursday nights and Michaels and Collinsworth on Sunday nights.

This makes a ton of sense, as Mike Tirico is a very good announcer who has done a number of NFL games over the years as the former play-by-play guy for ESPN’s Monday night coverage. This allows NBC to use him for some NFL games while still letting Michaels call games each week too. That makes sense.

It also means, however, that the Colts will experience both of NBC’s play-by-play guys in the 2017 season. In week four they play a road game against the Seattle Seahawks on Sunday Night Football in a game televised by NBC, which would be called by Al Michaels and Chris Collinsworth. But then later in the season, in week 15, the Colts will host the Denver Broncos on Thursday Night Football in a game also televised by NBC, which would be called by Mike Tirico and Chris Collinsworth. So the Colts will play two primetime games on NBC this year but will see different play-by-play guys. Both Al Michaels and Mike Tirico are very familiar to NFL fans, though, so it won’t seem too different.