The Jaguars are part of the premier game in the NFL this week and the director of Sunday Night Football explains why Jacksonville could expect more games like this.
JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — It’s the biggest game of the season so far and you can watch it on NBC-12. The eyes of America will be on the River City when the Jacksonville Jaguars host the Baltimore Ravens on Sunday Night Football.
More than 200 people are part of a crew with 4 production trucks, miles of cables and dozens of cameras all to bring you at home the sights and sounds of Sunday Night Football. And the success of the Jaguars on the field is why the brightest lights in the NFL are here in Jacksonville.
Much like the team, the desire to have the Jaguars on national television is led by one specific player.
“The jaguars have number 16 Trevor Lawrence,” said Drew Esocoff, the director of Sunday Night Football, “he’s a star in the league, he’s got star looks, that’s where it all begins.”
Esocoff and the crew of Sunday Night Football will bring the action on the field to your tv at home. And after more than 2 decades at the helm of the most watched show in America, Esocoff knows how to coordinate a team of hundreds to work seamlessly on the fly.
“As John Madden once said when I worked with John, ‘you can not script a live show’, we have a plan and my job is to execute a plan like a quarterback would execute a gameplan,” said Esocoff, “I call the liveshots and then try to integrate all of the other elements of the show like graphics and music, that and integrating the crowd atmosphere and things like that, but really it’s to make the audio and visuals match is what I consider my number 1 job.”
Jacksonville knows that “it was always the Jags”, but what about the national perception of the team?
“Anytime you get a good team that has a good record and is playing a good opponent, exactly like you are this week, it’s a homerun for us,” said Esocoff.
Even if the game is coming from the 4th smallest tv market in the league.
“To introduce a national audience to a team they may not see as often as the Cowboys, Steelers or 49ers, I think is a positive for anybody involved,” said Esocoff.
When the lights are the brightest on Sunday night Esocoff will be in one of the production trucks parked outside of Everbank Stadium to make sure that the game in the stadium is brought to the tv screens of millions of viewers at home. He also said that more success by the team on the field will keep bringing the premier crew in the NFL back to Jacksonville for years to come.
