Troy Aikman-Joe Buck feud causing potential Super Bowl drama

During the lead-up to ESPN’s first-ever Super Bowl broadcast, the biggest story coming out of the House of Mouse-owned sports network has been the Shakespearean drama between “Monday Night Football” broadcasters Joe Buck and Troy Aikman. 

It has raised the question of whether the two would be able to make it through the season to get to the Super Bowl broadcast together. While they’ve kept up appearances on air, The Athletic’s Andrew Marchand suggested there was a “5 percent” chance that Aikman doesn’t make it to February.

“I’ll put that at 95% he does it, 5 percent he doesn’t,” Marchand said recently on “The Varsity Podcast” with John Ourand. “Look, they’re professional, but it’s ugly. We’re not helping [by] talking about it. We’re not helping [by] writing about it. … These things happen and then maybe it shifts internally, you know, they read an article in The Athletic and they say, ‘Wait, why aren’t we just bringing these guys in a room and figuring it out.’”

He went on to explain that the 5 percent skepticism stemmed from possible anger over who was leaking stories. 

“The other 5 percent from him not doing it is that people are like, ‘Wait, what the hell. Who’s talking? What’s going on. I’m mad now and da da da,’ and it causes it to go the other way,” Marchand said. 

The drama between the longtime broadcast partners has bubbled up over the contract renewal for Buck and the lack of one for Aikman. 

Previous reporting has suggested that Aikman felt betrayed by the way things played out before things came to a head early last month ahead of an “MNF” broadcast at SoFi Stadium when the two got into it. 

During Monday’s broadcast, there were no outright signs that there was a rift between them as the Bears and Seahawks played. 

“It is a chilly November night in Seattle, Washington,” Buck opened the broadcast.