Packer out as CBS basketball analyst
College basketball commentator Billy Packer, who has announced 34 consecutive Final Fours on network television and created a few controversies along the way, will not be
returning to CBS for a 28th season, The Miami Herald has learned.
CBS has decided to replace Packer, 68, with studio analyst Clark Kellogg on its lead announcing team.
An announcement is expected today, but CBS representative Leslie Anne Wade confirmed the story Sunday night.
CBS believed the time was right for a change and that Kellogg deserved a chance to work with Jim Nantz on the lead team. Packer, who had been going year to year with his contract, confirmed through a CBS official Sunday that he no longer will broadcast for the network but is pursuing other projects in basketball. Packer declined to comment further.
Packer's streak of working as the color analyst at every championship game since 1977 (and being a part of every Final Four broadcast since 1975) ranks among the most remarkable in network TV sports history.
Packer spent his first seven years at NBC, where he initially teamed with Curt Gowdy and, later, with Dick Enberg and Al McGuire in what has been considered one of the most
entertaining three-man booths in sportscasting history. He joined CBS in 1981 and has been paired with Nantz since 1991.
Packer had a serious, no-nonsense style — the antithesis of the approach taken by ESPN's Dick Vitale, the other announcer most often associated with the sport. Though he occasionally mixed in historical factoids, Packer stuck mostly to dissecting strategy and assessing players' strengths and weaknesses — a style that helped him win a Sports Emmy in 1993.
But Packer sometimes became embroiled in controversy:
* In 1996, he called then-Georgetown guard Allen Iverson "a tough monkey" but later apologized and said he was trying to praise Iverson's relentless play.
* In 2000, Packer publicly apologized to two Duke students for sexist comments he allegedly made before a game at Cameron Indoor Stadium. When students asked Packer to show his press pass, he reportedly said, "Since when do we let women control who gets into a men's basketball game? Why don't you go find a women's game to let people into?"
* In 2006, he blasted the inclusion of mid-majors in the NCAA Tournament. He repeatedly questioned the accuracy of Nielsen ratings and also blamed the NBA for raiding the sport of its young stars, which drew the ire of commissioner David Stern.
In college, Packer played guard and helped lead Wake Forest to the 1962 Final Four. He served briefly as an assistant coach at the school.
Kellogg, 47, was a Big Ten MVP at Ohio State and the ninth overall pick by the Indiana Pacers in the 1982 NBA Draft, but he played only five seasons before knee problems forced him to retire. He joined ESPN in 1990 and has been with CBS since 1993.
Greg Anthony, an NBA analyst for ESPN, is being strongly considered to replace Kellogg alongside Greg Gumbel and Seth Davis in the CBS studio.
