PHOENIX >> Greg Olsen and his teammates at Wayne Hills High School in New Jersey knew it was a big game when Kevin Burkhardt showed up for interviews to prepare to call their game on local radio over the weekend.
More than two decades later, Burkhardt and Olsen will be together in the booth for the biggest football game of the season.
They will call their first Super Bowl for Fox tonight when the Kansas City Chiefs take on the Philadelphia Eagles.
Burkhardt’s career began in North Jersey as the sports director of a tiny AM station. He called some of Olsen’s games when he was a standout at Wayne Hills.
As Olsen was winding down a 15-year NFL career, he expressed interest in becoming an analyst once his playing days were over. His audition with Fox ended up being with Burkhardt.
In 2017, while playing for the Carolina Panthers, Olsen was part of a three-person booth with Burkhardt and Charles Davis for a game when the Panthers were on their bye week.
In 2020, Burkhardt and Olsen worked five XFL games. After Olsen’s retirement in 2021, he joined Burkhardt again as Fox’s No. 2 crew on NFL games.
When Joe Buck and Troy Aikman moved to ESPN’s “Monday Night Football” for the 2022 season, they moved up to Fox’s top team.