What’s next for Scott Hanson?
The long-time voice of NFL RedZone had his contract for that show expire this offseason, and there has been talk about him potentially leaving for NBC (where he has won praise for hosting Olympics Gold Zone) or elsewhere. However, Hanson is still involved in several activities surrounding this weekend’s NFL Draft, which led to an opportunity for Awful Announcing to ask him about his contract situation.
Hanson has several official NFL responsibilities surrounding this draft, including helping to host a stage and crowd show on Day 3 to keep fans entertained and engaged during breaks between picks. He also has sponsorship work, including collaborations with home improvement chain Lowe’s to promote their “Draft Green Room Built By Lowe’s.” That includes interview opportunities with the media, which led to Awful Announcing speaking to him.
We’ll address Hanson’s comments on that front and his draft stage-show work shortly. However, the most crucial detail here may be what he said when asked for an update on the contract speculation and the chances he’ll host Red Zone again this fall.
“Negotiations are ongoing,” Hanson told AA. “The NFL has been great for me, and I’d like to think I’ve been very positive for the NFL. Everyone loves Red Zone, 99% of the people that watch Red Zone seem to enjoy my work. My desire is to stay hosting Red Zone, the NFL tells me they want me to keep hosting Red Zone. We just need to come to an agreement, and the process is ongoing. I’m very hopeful. It’s been 16 years and the trains are running on time, so let’s keep it rolling. But nothing official to announce right now.”
‘I’m like P.T. Barnum’
What Hanson can announce is what he’s doing this week. One of his key responsibilities will be the aforementioned “stage show” on Saturday, Day 3, which aims to provide a different and entertaining experience for fans in the gaps between picks.
“My big duty at the draft is Saturday Rounds 4 through 7, when some of the names that are being selected aren’t as familiar to NFL football fans,” Hanson said. “I’m up on the stage with some of my media colleagues, doing basically a stage show for the live 100,000 to 200,000 fans that will be here at the draft. In between picks, we fill up the time, because if you’re watching on TV, they’ll do analysis, they’ll do commercials, they’ll do other stuff.
“But if you’re here live watching the stage, you see a pick, and then there’s going to be five, six minutes until there’s another pick announced. So we go out, we do giveaways, we do trivia contests, we acknowledge some of the NFL super fans that are here. It’s fun: my old boss at NFL Network said that during the draft, I’m like P.T. Barnum up on the stage, welcoming everyone, saying ‘Hey, let’s have a great time,’ kind of making it a festival atmosphere.”
For Hanson, that’s an interesting and complementary change from his regular work, which involves talking to fans on TV.
“My draft experience is absolutely awesome. I speak to millions of people every NFL Sunday, but I’m looking through a piece of glass when I do that. Here at the draft, there are tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands of football fans, and we have one of the great things in our life in common, our love of the great sport.
“To be able to interact live, I suppose it’s like being a musician and recording in studio, which is great, but then playing in front of a live audience, there’s nothing quite like it. The NFL Draft is kind of my touchstone to the NFL fandom that I participate in in a one way street on NFL Sundays. This is a two-way street here with the give and take, and the energy, the juice, the enthusiasm of a live stage show. It’s a lot of fun.”
‘The biggest offseason spectacle in the sports world’
Hanson said it’s remarkable to see how the draft has become a key spectator event.
“The draft roadshow is the biggest offseason spectacle in the sports world. I don’t even think soccer has anything like this, and certainly none of the American sports have anything like this in their quote-unquote offseason.”
He said it’s especially remarkable, considering how this situation evolved.
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“So the NFL said, ‘We’ll take this on the road. We love New York City. We’ve been in New York City. We’d love to stay in New York City, but we’ll take it on the road and bring it to more fans and make it a festival, make it more than one auditorium, one arena being filled.’ “And now we’ve seen upwards of 700,000 people that came to Detroit last year. There is nothing like it.”
Hanson believes the draft is an experience worth attending for fans, especially given its focus on hope.
“To any football fan that watches the draft every year on TV, get yourself to an NFL Draft in person one time. Get here one time to experience the excitement, the juice, the energy. There’s nothing like it, because keep in mind, everyone feels like they’re a winner here.
“Everyone’s coming off their free agency moves, everyone mostly loves their draft picks and is projecting, ‘Oh man, we weren’t a playoff team last year, but we could be a playoff team this year,’ or ‘We were a playoff team last year, but we could make a deep playoff run this year,’ or ‘We made a bit of a playoff run last year, we can win the Super Bowl this year.’ Everyone feels that way. So the 32 fan bases so energized like this, it’s tremendous, and I think the draft is really the only environment in which that happens.”
Why Hanson is working with Lowe’s and their Draft Green Room
With the Lowe’s partnership in particular, Hanson teamed up with former NFL star Clay Matthews Jr. to showcase the Draft Green Room, which the company not only builds but also makes available as part of their Lowe’s Home Team NFL collection for fans to purchase this week.
From that green room, Hanson told AA the Lowe’s partnership is a natural fit for the league and him.
“It’s awesome to be here: I’m talking to you from the NFL Draft Green Room built by Lowe’s. They say NFL careers are born here. Well, like millions of football fans trust Lowe’s with their homes, the NFL trusts Lowe’s with the delivery room, if you will, for NFL careers being born.
“Lowe’s and the NFL have become synonymous more and more through the years. Folks love NFL football. They welcome NFL football into their home, and their home is built and shaped and improved by Lowe’s through the years. It’s a natural match, two great American companies coming together, and coming together around big-time events like this, whether it’s the draft or the Super Bowl or the regular season.”
The concept of a draft green room has long fascinated NFL fans. There are only select invitations offered, partly in response to some past moments where players remained on the board after their projected selections led to numerous camera shots of them. However, for players, Hanson thinks there’s still value here, especially in how it showcases their reactions to where they wind up— a sharp contrast to the decisions they made in high school and college —and the support they receive from their guests.
“This is the first time someone else dictates to them, ‘Your new home is going to be in New York,’ or Dallas, or Philadelphia, or Miami. And the emotions that get poured out are right here in the Draft Green Room. So I think that’s the value for the players, those who want to be here with their mom, their dad, their family, their girlfriend, their agent and all the people that we see.”
Hanson also thinks there’s notable value there for fans from seeing those reactions.
“The benefit of the green room for the fans is to see that emotion, to see that phone call when it comes in, to see the weight over for some young man who’s like, ‘Where am I going to go? Where? Where am I going to play? What’s it going to be like to become an NFL football player?’ And everyone, even casual football fans, can appreciate the moment when a player turns to his mom, or turns to his dad, turns to his best friend, their family, friends, and loved ones right here, and has that moment, that embrace of all the hard work that has led to this.
“And now let’s go walk down the tunnel. Go meet Roger Goodell. Stand in front of hundreds of thousands watching live in person and the millions watching on TV. That emotion: name something else outside of winning a championship on a field that could compare to that. It’s awesome.”