ESPN breaks fans' hearts instead of bank in Troy Aikman, Joe Buck drama | Opinion

The parasocial whiplash of witnessing a public breakup of two (mostly) beloved broadcasters who formed the most stable and long-lasting duo the league ever had hurts the heart more than the head for the people watching at home.But it’s gotta hurt way worse for ESPN.All the “Worldwide Leader in Sports” wanted was a Super Bowl. Now the two guys responsible for showcasing the event can’t stand each other? After telling others for decades how great of friends they are? This is the reality that has now emerged for Joe Buck, Troy Aikman and the rest of the network.Aikman’s deal expires at the end of the season, which for him and Buck is Feb. 14, 2027 – the date of Super Bowl 61 at SoFi Stadium in Los Angeles, California.Buck re-signed with ESPN, owned by Disney, prior to the season, with a raise that reportedly took him from about $15 million to north of $20 million annually. He has embraced the power of Mickey Mouse, doing tasks outside the purview of football, such as hosting “Good Morning America” and “Sports Jeopardy.” Aikman, meanwhile, works his NFL games and goes home – apparently while not being super friendly about it along the way – and wants in the neighborhood of $30 million annually while currently being paid $18 million.The timing and details of Buck’s new deal, according to multiple reports, appear to be the catalyst for the parting that is now playing out for all to see. Now it’s about whose side can disseminate the whispers fastest and with the most authority. Front Office Sports first reported that Buck and Aikman got into an argument in the booth prior to their call of the Los Angeles Rams’ loss to the Buffalo Bills on Oct. 12 and it's all snowballed from there. "I never thought you'd do it to me," Aikman told Buck, according to The Athletic.More: Troy Aikman implied he'll leaving ESPN. Where could he work next?Ryan Clark knows what it’s like to be on the outs with ESPN upper management.The former ESPN NFL analyst and Pittsburgh Steelers player said on his recent edition of “The Pivot” podcast that network executives are “trying to make Troy Aikman look like the bastard son” in the breakup. There was the pointing to the 2023 report that Aikman did not gel with the first set of behind-the-scenes folk after he and Buck bolted from FOX to ESPN in 2022 (this is also where it’s worth mentioning that Aikman left Buck, who was still under contract for another year before he was able to escape his deal, first).“It felt like brothers… like family. Somebody is trying to make Troy Aikman the bastard son.”Troy Aikman and Joe Buck are the best booth in football, and they’ve been proving it for more than two decades. Part of what made them special was the feeling that we were watching and… pic.twitter.com/ISEgX11FHo— Ryan Clark (@Realrclark25) November 7, 2026"I’ve been around there," said Clark, who was let go from the network in the middle of a taping of "NFL Live" over the summer as part of ESPN's layoffs. "I know how it starts to happen when they’re trying to build a narrative about you. I’ve been around there. I know what it is when they’ll have your back and support you through anything, even when you’re wrong, when they’ll come out and make a statement, we’re fully behind this guy. They haven’t done that with Troy. So I do feel like there’s a push to make him be the bad guy, whether he is or not. I know they have ways of maneuvering to protect him. And I know they have ways of putting people in positions where a narrative is built around them, so when they make their exit, they can seem like the good guy. Because I was a part of that."Still, Clark said, the pairing he saw up close at ESPN were "like brothers." Regardless of the posturing behind the scenes, the saga has gone from corporate headache to a storyline that won’t go away – and reappears weekly, and prominently, whenever Buck welcomes millions of viewers into the broadcast booth he shares with the former Dallas Cowboys quarterback every Monday evening.“This is not about Joe Buck and Troy Aikman,” Clark said. “This is about business. And it’s about business being done dirty. I want to see them continue. It seems like that’s an impossibility. But we can’t forget what these two men have meant to football for 25 years together. And my hope is – I love them both, I enjoyed being with Joe, I enjoyed being around Troy, as mean and surly as he could be sometimes – I hope they get to walk away with the respect of what they contributed to football together because I believe that’s important.”Agreed, “RC.” Maybe it’s because I don’t remember watching professional without Aikman and Buck calling the most consequential games of a given season. Maybe it’s because I care about these things way more than the average person should. Maybe it’s because for the better part of a decade these two men could not be interviewed without fawning over his partner. I often find the truth to be multiple and somewhere in the middle.More: Jason Kelce and 5 more candidates to replace Troy Aikman on 'MNF'ESPN will perhaps one day want back in on the business of Major League Baseball. Having a guy who has called 23 World Series on the roster makes sense in that endeavor. But handling the situation in this manner caught the attention of another famous ex-ESPN-er, Linda Cohn. The longtime former “SportsCenter” host said the situation was “a shame” that “could have been prevented.”"I still believe ESPN should have handled the contract situation better, but this latest reporting also makes me wonder whether a contract alone could fix what's happened,” Cohn said on “The Linda Cohn Show.” “I don't think it can at this point. If ESPN turned around tomorrow and said, 'You know what, Troy Aikman, you deserve as much money as Joe is making,' I think that it's fractured. The relationship is over, fractured.“ESPN now has a decision to make about what it wants from this booth beyond simply getting through this season. Because I'm telling you, these two have the experience to deliver a professional broadcast under difficult circumstances. I can't believe they have to, but after all these years together, it is really sad to think that getting through it, just getting through the broadcast, might be what this partnership has become.”ESPN has its reasons for moving on from Aikman. But to revert to “money” as the answer here is reductive; ESPN literally just paid $1.7 billion to expand college football’s postseason. The annual salaries for Buck and Aikman aren’t even tax write-offs – they are investments of goodwill.It wasn’t long ago that ESPN was wandering the wilderness of prime-time football. Buck sticking around means the “Monday Night Football” property will retain credibility. But starting next season, we’ll all be thinking about somebody else every time Buck jumps into the open of that night’s broadcast.This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: ESPN breaks fans' hearts instead of bank in Troy Aikman, Joe Buck drama | Opinion