How Kevin Kisner landed the lead analyst job at NBC

December 10, 2024

NBC Sports activities has employed Kevin Kisner as its latest lead golf analyst.

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The courtship between NBC Sports activities and the community’s latest lead golf analyst, Kevin Kisner, began in December 2023, however it took greater than 9 months earlier than anybody dared to outline the connection.

Now in late September, it was time, in the end, for a hometown go to. As golf season bled into soccer, a convoy of NBC Sports activities brass together with golf head honcho Sam Flood, president Rick Cordella and government producer Tommy Roy made plans to go to Kisner at his everlasting house in Aiken, S.C. The purpose? To pitch Kisner on taking his broadcasting abilities full-time. After 9 months of tiptoeing round their curiosity — Kisner insisted on taking part in out the rest of his professional profession earlier than leaving for TV, whereas NBC dished lead analyst duties on the U.S. Open and Open Championship to Brandel Chamblee and Luke Donald — NBC was able to go all-in.

A full-time dedication wasn’t on anybody’s thoughts for too lengthy within the months previous September. Not after NBC introduced Kisner as non permanent lead analyst for a handful of big-time PGA Tour occasions (The Sentry, WM Phoenix Open, and Gamers) filling in for Paul Azinger. Not after Kisner impressed NBC Sports activities brass along with his efficiency, balancing his information of the professional sport along with his rib-cutting humorousness. And never even after Kisner loved the expertise sufficient to signal on for NBC’s protection of the season-ending FedEx Cup Playoff occasions, a three-week trial run that may intently mirror life within the full-time gig.

The reality is that neither social gathering was prepared for the following step. Kisner’s two years of remaining PGA Tour eligibility meant he wasn’t within the place to take the NBC job for many of 2024, and NBC was weary of the dangers posed by hiring a TV neophyte whereas its broadcast underwent a broader editorial reimagining underneath Flood. It will have been handy for Kisner to fill Azinger’s vacated lead analyst seat instantly, avoiding staffing complications with the U.S. Open and Open Championship broadcasts and confusion from the golf world. NBC most well-liked this path sufficient to discover including a full-time analyst in early ’24, however the job’s status and multimillion-dollar funding demanded a home-run swing. The community, maybe scarred from the tip of Azinger’s tenure, determined it was greatest to attend for the best pitch.

Flood, Cordella and Roy arrived in Aiken within the fall to seek out Kisner feeling open-minded. The clock was ticking on the 40-year-old professional, who now had only one yr remaining of PGA Tour eligibility courtesy of a lifetime top-50 earners exemption. He would get right into a dozen or so Tour occasions in 2025, however could be principally relegated to weaker-field occasions. If his play improved — unlikely for a participant of Kisner’s age (40) and size (181st on Tour in 2024) — his taking part in schedule would possibly fill, however that was unsure. However, if his play stored with its latest trajectory, he could be out there for many weeks of NBC’s PGA Tour protection in 2025, and his taking part in profession could be over in 2026.

In different phrases, if NBC was keen to work with him on the main points, Kisner was open to taking the gig.

“I’ve an amazing relationship with Sam Flood. I like the way in which he talks about issues. He’s very straight up, and that’s the way in which I’m,” Kisner stated. “My spouse and I sat down with [Flood, Cordella and Roy] for three-and-a-half hours and simply mentioned life. We talked in regards to the future — what we felt like was good, unhealthy, the best way to make golf higher, how they thought I might match into their staff.”

On the finish of the dialog, the choice was made. Kisner would tackle 10 occasions in 2025 and the everlasting title of NBC Golf lead analyst whereas sustaining part-time PGA Tour taking part in privileges. If his taking part in profession obtained in the way in which of the association, NBC could be versatile, and if not, NBC could be the beneficiary.

“They’ll work with me in 2025,” Kisner stated. “If one thing occurs the place I win and play nice, they stated, ‘that’s nice.’ And I’ll play extra golf. And if not, then I instructed them they’ve my full dedication in 2026.”

For NBC, Kisner was well worth the gymnastics. Of all of the analysts examined in ’24, Kisner had been the community’s prime performer. He was the primary exterior choice for what turned a rotating tryout within the lead chair all through 2024, and the candidate whose performances within the sales space drew probably the most buzz. On the weeks he joined the NBC staff, Kisner loved a energetic rapport with play-by-play man (and buddy) Dan Hicks, made headlines for his colourful critiques, and appeared to know the finer factors of research — amplify, make clear, clarify — rapidly.

“With all Tour gamers, I’m taking note of how they deal with press conferences and interviews, how they react with their caddies on the air,” Roy stated. “I’m all the time attempting to get a sense about whether or not they’re a superb communicator.”

“With Kevin, I began making makes an attempt to speak to him on the vary years in the past. I’d inform him, Hey, when the day comes that you simply’re able to name it a wrap taking part in golf, I actually suppose you may have an opportunity to be in our enterprise right here, and profitable at it.”

Even with Roy’s endorsement, Kisner’s entrance into the lead chair qualifies as an upset. The 40-year-old professional provides NBC one thing it hasn’t had in additional than 30 years: a lead analyst who isn’t a significant championship winner. That bucks many years of custom in golf TV, the place the prevailing sentiment has lengthy been that lead analyst jobs are restricted solely to these with main championship pedigree and a firsthand information of history-altering moments.

There’s a affordable argument that the apply is outdated. A few of the largest success tales in latest sports activities TV historical past have been gamers with less-than-historic statlines (Pat McAfee), whereas FOX’s $100 million contract with Tom Brady has proven that even all-time nice gamers can wrestle within the sales space. Stated in another way, an analyst’s background means nothing if their perception isn’t fascinating or informative.

“I would like the 12-handicap on the membership or on his sofa to go, yeah, he was proper about that, I’m going to strive that, or, that’s precisely what occurred,” stated Kisner, who is anticipated to name the U.S. Open, Open Championship and Ryder Cup for NBC in 2025. “After which I would like Scottie Scheffler or Max Homa or Brian Harman to go, Yeah, I did pull the heck out of that putt. Or, yeah, I made a horrible swing in that place. I would like everyone to say, that’s precisely what occurred. That’s why I’m sitting in that seat.”

Criticism is an artwork type within the lead analyst’s chair, the place the themes of criticism usually watch intently. It helped NBC’s confidence to know Kisner had a web within the largest moments. By the point Kisner signed his contract, the community had already determined to deliver again a giant broadcast experiment from 2024, the “odd-even” format, splitting play-by-play and analyst duties between groups designated to odd and even-numbered holes. The purpose of the technique, Flood and Roy stated, is to facilitate a dialog between broadcasters that followers can “eavesdrop” in on, quite than having broadcasters converse to the viewers at house. NBC hopes the shift to “odd-even” will make life simpler for Kisner as he switches to golf TV. It should simplify preparation, for instance, and create fewer, extra focused talking alternatives.

However Kisner isn’t anxious about flying off the deal with. Fairly the other. The most important drawback dealing with the networks is making one thing entertaining, he says, and his largest benefit is knowing the best way to bridge the divide between gamers leery of the media enterprise and a sports activities economic system that’s an extension of it.

“I feel there’s all the time been a story that there have been two sides, proper? The media after which the golfers. It was all the time just like the golfers didn’t need to reveal an excessive amount of, as a result of they didn’t need the media to mess up or image them in a nasty mild,” Kisner says. “The extra I’ve been on each side, the extra I notice the partnership ought to by no means be higher than now. The media is the most important speedy deal. The media rights deal for the PGA Tour is the most important moneymaker they’ve, and the gamers want to grasp that the higher they make the product on TV, the more cash they will play for, and the more cash they will make.”

These are the chilly realities of the sports activities enterprise, and within the scores-obsessed world of the PGA Tour, Kisner’s grasp of the media’s significance has lengthy made him an outlier. Good golfers earn paychecks, he acknowledges, however rich golfers earn eyeballs. That understanding is what pushed him into YouTube and podcasting properly earlier than NBC got here alongside, and it’s what’s going to give him a second life within the second-biggest golf TV job on the earth.

In Kisner’s telling, the best model of his new function at NBC is to function an emissary between golf’s two at-times conflicting camps: the gamers and the folks. Many broadcasters have tried their hand at serving to the folks perceive the gamers, however Kisner says he feels he might assist the connection work the opposite approach, too.

“Hopefully these prime gamers perceive that I’m their buddy first. I’m by no means going to do something to make them really feel disrespected or harm their model. I’m there to inform the reality,” Kisner says. “I’m going to inform it similar to I did once they’re sitting there with me within the locker room, and I’m additionally going to go play with them the following week, so I’m by no means going to make a controversial assertion simply to get clicks. I inform it like it’s, man, and that’s what I’ve completed my entire profession. Ask any participant, they know the place they stand with me always, and that’s what I plan to do within the sales space.”

After all, the reality has many shades, however Kisner appears uniquely adept at managing discomfort certainly heading his approach. He’s humorous in a approach that hasn’t graced golf televisions since David Feherty, and he’s already dreaming up methods to show the viewers rapidly into his nook, even when it means operating afoul of the FCC.

“I’m attempting to see if Tommy will let me do my on-camera with my shirt off,” Kisner says, referencing his now-infamous Presidents Cup guess with Max Homa. “Dan and I’ll go all the way down to our skivvies, and introduce me to the world.”

He pauses simply after he delivers the punchline, as if to carry for laughter.

It’s a showman’s contact, and that’s precisely the purpose.

You possibly can attain the creator at james.colgan@golf.com. To subscribe to GOLF’s media e-newsletter, click on the hyperlink right here.

James Colgan

Golf.com Editor

James Colgan is a information and options editor at GOLF, writing tales for the web site and journal. He manages the Sizzling Mic, GOLF’s media vertical, and makes use of his on-camera expertise throughout the model’s platforms. Previous to becoming a member of GOLF, James graduated from Syracuse College, throughout which period he was a caddie scholarship recipient (and astute looper) on Lengthy Island, the place he’s from. He might be reached at james.colgan@golf.com.