Kirk Herbstreit Reveals Why He Wanted To Call NFL Games

Kirk Herbstreit will be pulling double-duty this fall.

The longtime ESPN college football analyst will also be covering the National Football League for Amazon.

Herbstreit and longtime play-by-play man Al Michaels will be on the call for Amazon's "Thursday Night Football" games this season. 

In an interview with Peter King, Herbstreit explained why he wanted to call NFL games.

"I don’t know. I’ve done a couple games. I’m a college football junkie. Growing up in Ohio, my dad played at Ohio State. He coached with Woody [Hayes] and Bo [Schembechler]. It was kind of in my blood. I’ve always been an NFL fan but I’m very, very passionate about the college game. I’ve always just looked at the NFL game as I’m a fan of it. Never really was that guy that I have to keep climbing in my career, I have to get to the NFL. I was just never that guy," Herbstreit explained.

"Then ESPN asked me to do a couple games over the last couple years. I was kinda blown away by how much I enjoyed it. I really enjoyed working with the players, and the coaches. I was kind of taken aback by how receptive they were towards me personally. How forthcoming they were in my production meetings. Really, that’s the part about my job I love the most. It just put me in a very comfortable position as I was doing the broadcast because of being around Ben Roethlisberger, and being around the Steelers and the Giants and last year the Chiefs and the Broncos. Feeling the juice of a broadcast. There’s nothing really like that. It just had me thinking, maybe one day that’s maybe something I’ll do. When Amazon approached me about the idea, I was very intrigued."

It should be fun to watch him in the booth.