Kevin Harlan, The Voice of Super Bowl LIX on Westwood One

Now joining us live on set, he is my, one of my favorite broadcasters and he is one of the best pound for pound broadcasters in the business.

He could call anything. I've even said this before, like Kevin Harlan can at any time talk about anything and I'm just all ears and I want to listen. The great Kevin Harlan is here with us. Kevin, how you been?

It's so good to see you. Well, we met here, right? Am I, am I back in the day, a long time ago? Yeah, well I was in, oh. I'm going back. College, I think?

Maybe, maybe. Yeah, and you gave me a very nice compliment. It was a, it was a long time ago and it's good to see you my friend. No, it's great to see you.

How's things been, alright? A little Super Bowl week? A little, yeah. Got a game to call on Sunday? Yeah, I do. I had a game last night in Boston with the Celtics for TNT and now down here in New Orleans and seeing all the familiar faces, which is always so much fun, but the enormity of the game and the prestige of the game and the honor to broadcast the game is always just so, it's overwhelming when you think about it. Yeah.

And I'm so happy. Your schedule's crazy and like if you were an NBA player, right, you'd be asking for load management days, but with what you do, NBA, NFL, all over the place, radio, TV, you know, why does this never get old for you just one week? Well, I think the challenge of always trying to do it your best and I don't know that I ever walk away from a broadcast feeling like, you know, boy I nailed that one or boy that one's going to be hard to beat. There's always, when I go back and listen or watch, it's always something I could improve on, something to try to get better. I kind of feel that in this business in particular, if you're not looking to improve and accepting the challenge and knowing that there are hundreds lined up in back of you to do your job, it would take that job in a second that you'll lose it. And if you don't stay on top of things and try to evolve, you're going to find yourself in trouble. So because I love the business so much like you do, I guess I kind of feel like I'm always looking to get better. So I hope this Super Bowl broadcast in a couple nights is better than the one I did last year and I hope the one last year was better than the year before. Finding some different way to tweak or turn or twist something into a better call than I did. And I love that challenge and I guess I'll know when it's time to stop when I don't feel that need to get better, to evolve and accept the challenge. You like the Tom Brady broadcasting. Seriously.

Because there's some guys, right? Eventually it's time to retire. For you, you sound as good as ever. Well, you're very kind to say that and I will tell you that and I'm sure you listen to your work too. The only way I think in any profession is to really analyze what you're doing and how you're doing it. And broadcasting is such a subjective business. It's not objective in any way. It's so subjective.

You put 10 people in a room, four like you, four don't and two don't care. And your goal is to make it so the four people that don't like you somehow maybe turn that page and say, you know what? That was a good call.

That was a good broadcast. And so I'm always striving. I don't want to cheat the business and I don't want to cheat myself. I don't want to cheat myself in terms of this is my profession. I've been broadcasting since I was 14.

I just want to make sure that I give it a go. I never want to look back. I'm sure you're the same way. I don't want to look back and say, man, I wish I had worked a little bit harder to get that game out. Preparation wise, I wish I had to give a little more effort during the game, shown a little bit more energy. I never want to look back at that. Now, I can step back and say, I gave it all I had. It may have been a little bit sick or bad travel schedule, whatever the case is. But you're always just trying, I'm always trying to one up the last broadcast.

And that's the challenge that I like right now. Fourteen-year-old Kevin Harlan. I'm sure you were in your room and you were doing tapes and things like that. I was doing games. I turned down the sound on the TV. I did that really when I was about 10 or 11 and then did it all through high school.

My parents thought they had a whack job in their hands. The door would be closed. The volume would be down. And here I'd be doing...

The guy is drunk. Yeah, yeah. I've been doing all kinds of games off of TV. And then in my mind, when I was that age, just a little guy, I pretend, all right, we got to go catch our flight.

I pretend that I was going to the airport and getting on a plane and going to my next game. It's so funny. You have so many iconic calls.

But I really hope, and I know the NFL probably won't like me saying this, but I really hope there is someone running on the field in the Super Bowl. Because the way you describe it on the radio for Westwood One, whenever a fan enters the field that you're not supposed to do, as good as it gets. Well, you're kind to say that. They both happened when the game has been boring and kind of out of hand. Neil Uplift.

So that has added to it a little bit. Do you guys stage that? If the game is boring, do you guys have like a guy that you go, okay, Ryan McGuire is going to organize someone to run on the field? No, no, no, no, no.

We can help you out there. Yeah, no. You just want to pay the bail. Yeah, I get the bail. No, no. I don't write anything down to say.

I don't think about if something funny happens, here's what I'm going to say to be cute about it. There's some guys that do that. I just have not done that. I've tried to do it organically. It works for them.

Doesn't work for me. I think anything that you've got written out sounds a little staged. It won't sound like it's in the flow of the broadcast. And I don't know that I'll ever do it again. Of course, you never say never, but those were unique circumstances when those guys came out. And I think people took it as being fun, yes.

Yeah. You can't please... You know this, especially on social media. You can't please... You do nothing wrong and people freak out. I don't go to social media. Vern Lundquist told me one time, he said, one of the biggest disappointments of my career. This is Vern Lundquist talking. He's like one of the sweetest people too. One of the nicest, kindest, sweetest souls you'll ever meet. He said, I went to social media after one of our college games and I looked up my name and I read what people were saying about me. For Vern?

Yes. And it broke my heart. He said, I told myself I'll never do it again. So with that in mind, when he told me that story, I said, I'm not going to look. I'm not even going to get caught up in it. So my wife or my girls will tell me, our daughters will say, hey, there's something being said that you should look at or this person had something really nice to say and it was a well-known person. But otherwise, I do not go.

I really don't care. And I just kind of plow ahead. That social media, man, that is a trap.

And if you're in the trap, it's hard to get out of it. But you know what? I'm actually jealous because it's kind of a generational thing too. Because yeah, it is. I mean, you're right.

And you're a young guy. I grew up in it. It's tough to ignore because no one loves criticism. Everybody likes some kind of applause or some kind of a bad boy. It could break some people though, man.

Oh, and it has. Like there's some people in our business where I go, you got to understand 50% of the people are going to love you, 50% of the people are going to hate you. So true. And if the bad tweets aren't coming in, you're actually not doing your job well because this is what I've always realized.

Whenever you leave a job, everyone that said they hated you, that's when they reach out, oh, I really miss you. Yeah. It always happens. Exactly.

Exactly. So you try to navigate it, especially. I just feel like I've got so much on my plate. The last thing I need is to sit there and read what some guy in whatever city America says about me. And then if you ever look on there as I've done, and he's got like 10 followers, I go, oh, come on. Why am I spending my time and my mental energy sitting and reading what this person is saying? If they like me, they like it.

And if they don't, they don't. I did not get in the business for people to like me. I got in the business as you probably did too, because you love the business. Not to get a bunch of praise and adulation and you know, plaudits. You get in the business because you love broadcasting, you love being a reporter, you love hosting a show.

I love doing games. You know, that's why you got in. But not to get some kind of affirmation from some guy in Nebraska. You know, to say, hey, that really sounded bad or that sounded great.

You know, you don't get in. Probably more New York. You know, Nebraska, they're too nice of you. New York has got a lot of opinions. Yeah. A lot of opinions. What stands out to you the most with this game from a coverage standpoint, storyline standpoint? Well, how much the Chiefs are a team. They're so connected. They don't have a lot of Hall of Famers.

I don't think pound for pound the roster measures up to the Eagles. But they've always found a way. They got that intangible that all winning teams have.

They always find a way. You can't teach it, you can't coach it, you can't practice it. And you know, Brady had that with the Patriots. Brady didn't play with many Hall of Famers. I look on that Philadelphia side. Look at all the terrific.

Oh, my God. Their offensive line, second to none. Defensive at some positions, second to none. The running back, the best in the league. The quarterback on any given Sunday is the best QB in the league.

He was the MVP a couple years ago until they lost. So this, to me, is the sternest test the Chiefs have faced yet in any of the previous five Super Bowls they've been in. To me, the Eagles have become America's team because they're the last hope for us to maybe see him sitting it down. You know, Cowboys fans will like that. The unfortunate thing is, the unfortunate thing is about the Chiefs is their dynasty is coming right in the heels of the Patriots dynasty.

Back to back crazy. It's stunning because this should not happen in the salary cap era. This should not happen in the era of parity. We should not be seeing dynasties. And if you look back at the Niners of the eighties and the Cowboys of the eighties and Pittsburgh of the seventies and Green Bay of the sixties and the Browns of the fifties and on and on and on, you saw teams that were loaded with Hall of Famers. I mean, they had like double digit Hall of Famers, but not now. Brady didn't play more than just a couple.

And Mahomes is the same way. I know you have to run. Just one last quick question for Kevin Harlan Westwood won.

How did you find out about the Luca trade? Because I was getting ready to come out here. I had an early morning flight. The alert goes out by Shams and I go, crap, I'm getting no sleep tonight. I was driving. I had landed at O'Hare and I got a rental car and I was driving down to Champaign to do my CBS Ohio State Illinois game Sunday afternoon. And it's about 11 o'clock at night and my phone is buzzing like, what is going on?

I look at my phone when I drive. So what is going on? So I pulled off to the side and I see this this thing from Shams who I do the 2K video game with. And I go, I don't know about this. Fake, right? Yeah. I thought, this is baloney. And then he reiterated it and then gave more details to it. And I go, oh my God, this is his official account. I don't think he's been hacked.

This is a deal. I get all of his notifications because he's so good, just like Woge. And we're stunned. Literally laid in bed that night just thinking, what does this mean for the Lakers?

Oh, they got a baton guy to hand off to now. Lebron Doncic on the most glamorous team in pro basketball. What's this do to the Dallas Mavericks? He took him to the finals last year. He's a five-time first team all NBA player.

To trade a guy who's 25, it must have been something pretty significant. We'll find out eventually. But I'm not saying egregious.

I think that's too hard a word. But whether it was conditioning or whether it was the max at 345 that was down the road when this contract's over, whether they just couldn't count on him health-wise, I don't know. I don't know what it was. But man, oh man, this just doesn't happen. And for the first time that I can recall, the NBA stole the NFL's number, right? They've taken the headlines over the last three or four days. Everyone's talking about it. I know it. I know it.

It's amazing. I know you got to run, but I just want to say this before I let you run. Obviously, you're one of the best broadcasters in the business, but I don't know if there's a better person in the business. Oh, you are a nice man. No, seriously, what you do for young broadcasters like myself and the nice things that you say, it goes a long way.

And any time someone asks me about Kevin Harlan, because people ask me a lot about you, I go, better person than broadcaster. And that's really saying something. Thank you. Thank you, my friend. So nice to see.

I'm so happy for your success. You're on this big time. Oh, my gosh. You're flying, baby.

Yeah, I've been fooling enough executives all these years. Oh, no, you are taking off. You are on it. Congratulations on all your success. I'm glad to call you a friend. You got it. Glad we're buddies. Thanks so much. Good to see you. I'm Kevin Harlan. Thanks for having me on Infinity Sports Network.