Boomer Esiason

At 63 years old, Boomer Esiason has this physical status:

College football career

Esiason played college football at the University of Maryland for head coaches Jerry Claiborne and Bobby Ross, as well as offensive coordinator Ralph Friedgen. Maryland was the only college to grant him a scholarship. He set 17 school records at Maryland. He had 461 of 850 passes (54.2 percent) for 6,169 yards and 42 touchdowns, with 27 interceptions. In 1982 and 1983, he received a two-time honorable mention All-American. He threw two third-quarter touchdown passes to lead a comeback victory over No. 1 in his last home game. ACC North Carolina and seal the ACC championship. He earned a B.A. degree. In 1984, she received the Distinguished Alumnus Award in 1999.

Professional football career

Esiason was drafted by the Cincinnati Bengals in the second round of the 1984 NFL Draft, surprisingly low considering his stellar college career. Mel Kiper Jr., an ESPN draft analyst, was still available in the second stages of the first round, according to Esiason's words, "going ballistic." In the first round, there were no quarterbacks drafted; Esiason was actually the first quarterback selected, but Steve Young had signed with the now-defunct United States Football League's L.A. Express. The Washington Federals ruled Esiason's USFL territorial rights, the league's lowest team.

In the first round of the same draft, Esiason's teammate, defensive end Pete Koch, was selected by the Bengals with the 16th pick. Koch was active in Cincinnati for one season and five in the NFL for five.

In a match against the Houston Oilers on October 7, 1984, he got his first pro debut in Cincinnati. He led the Bengals to a 13–3 victory over Houston on a rainy day and scored the game's first touchdown on a three-yard field. In a loss to the San Diego Chargers and future Hall of Famer Dan Fouts, he took over for Ken Anderson as the Bengals' full-time starting quarterback on September 22, 1985. Esiason, who was 6'5" and 224 pounds with a strong arm, was one of the late 1980s' most popular offenses but was still only good at 4,200 yards on 447 attempts and scoring seven touchdowns by this time in his career. He was particularly good at handling Bengal Head Coach Sam Wyche's "no huddle" offense.

Cincinnati defeated the New York Jets 52-21 on December 21, 1986, the team's final game of the 1986 season. In this game, he tied for the team's single-season passing record of 3,959 yards. It was Ken Anderson's last game of the Bengals' career.

In a 27-21 loss to the New England Patriots, he led Cincinnati to six straight victories to begin the 1988 season. The team finished the season 12-4 with the best scoring offense in the NFL, winning the organization's fifth AFC Central division championship. He finished the season as the NFL's best rated passer. Cincinnati won Super Bowl XXIII, beating Seattle and then Buffalo in the playoffs for their second appearance in a Super Bowl, and the San Francisco 49ers return to Seattle. Lewis Billups, a cornerback for the Bengals, lost without a single scratch in the end zone, which would have resulted in a Cincinnati victory. The San Francisco 49ers, led by former Hall of Fame quarterback Joe Montana, marched 92 yards on their last drive and scored on a touchdown pass to receiver John Taylor with 34 seconds remaining in the game. Esiason's last-ditch pass to wide receiver Cris Collinsworth was disallowed, resulting in a 20-16 loss for the Bengals, their second close loss to the 49ers in a Super Bowl.

As the Bengals defeated the Tampa Bay Buccaneers 56–23, he tied for touchdown passes in a game on October 29, 1989. With eight touchdowns in the game, the Bengals tied a team record.

In a 34-31 victory over the Los Angeles Rams on October 7, 1990, he threw for 490 yards (a single game team passing record) for a single game team passing record).

Esiason, a former Jets head coach Bruce Coslet, was traded to the Jets in 1993 for a third round pick, later guiding their offense until the end of 1995 under three different head coaches: Coslet, Pete Carroll, and Rich Kotite. In a game against the Buffalo Bills on October 8, rookie Everett McIver was seriously injured, and Bill Smith of the Bills raced around him, catching Esiason under his face mask as he began his 1995 season with the Jets. Smith was extremely concerned about Esiason's injury, and said he never heard a whistle blowing the play dead for the wrong start. Esiason sustained a serious concussion in the horrible crash, which kept him out until November 19. He is said to have been the first NFL player to enroll in a concussion research during the season. When he returned to the field, it was coincidently in a game against the Bills.

Esiason was released by the Jets but he later signed with the Arizona Cardinals as a free agent. With 522 yards in a 37–34 overtime victory over the Washington Redskins, he threw for his fifth best passing yardage day in NFL history on November 10, 1996. He starred in a fourth-quarter comeback against the playoff-bound Eagles two weeks later.

Esiason considered retirement in the off-season, but was contacted by the Bengals about one more season. He was surprisingly good after being recalled Jeff Blake midway through the 1997 season, throwing for 13 touchdowns with only two interceptions and a passer rating of over 106 for the season. With Blake under center, the Bengals were 3–8. They won four of their last five games and scored over 30 points four times, twice breaking 40 points in a 44–42 loss to the Philadelphia Eagles and a 41–14 loss to the Tennessee Oilers with Esiason at quarterback. Esiason was expected to return to Cleveland for two more years, but the Bengals wanted him to come back.

He played his last NFL game on December 21, 1997, in 1997. Darnay Scott, a wide receiver, was killed in a 79-yard play-action pass on Friday. In a 16–14 victory over the Baltimore Ravens, the touchdown was the deciding factor.

NFL career statistics

Esiason was one of the best quarterbacks in NFL history at his time, finishing in the top 10 in several statistical categories.

Entertainment career

Esiason has appeared in over 25 commercials, including ones for Diet Coke, Wheaties, Reebok, Samsung, Hanes, Doritos, Domino's Pizza. Among other TV shows and films, he has appeared in several television shows and films, including The Game Plan, Miss America 1999, Spin City, and Blue Bloods.

He appeared on Family Feud twice. He appeared in "Bengals vs. 49ers" on March 18, 1989, a recreation of their new Super Bowl match. In 1993, his second Family Feud appearance appeared in the show "NFC vs. AFC" was his second appearance in Family Feud.

In 1995, he wrote A Boy Named Boomer, a children's reader, and co-wrote (with Lowell Cauffiel) a 1998 book titled Toss.

On September 19, 1998, he co-hosted the Miss America Pageant with Meredith Vieira and co-hosted with Julie Chen on the CBS broadcast of the 2002 Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade.

On the May 29, 2011 episode of Iron Chef America, he and partner Craig Carton served as judges.

From 2012 to 2019, he has co-hosted Super Bowl's Greatest Commercials.

On the October 3, 2014 episode of Blue Bloods, he made a cameo appearance as himself.

On the Hallmark Channel in 2015, he became the Commissioner of the FFL (Feline Football League) for Kitten Bowl II and is still holds the position today. He has provided analysis and commentary for all the Kitten Bowls since Kitten Bowl II, which airs during halftime of the Super Bowl.

On Saturday, Esiason introduced Game Time With Boomer Esiason, a series of sports stars from the past.

Esiason, a color analyst on the USA Network's two-year broadcast of American Football (WLAF), partnering with Brad Nessler while still playing. Since his retirement from playing, he went back to broadcasting full-time. He appeared on ABC's Monday Night Football from 1998 to 1999. He was a color commentator. Following his release by ABC (due in large part to personal differences between him and play-by-play announcer Al Michaels), he was recruited by the Westwood One radio network to become the lead analyst for Monday Night Football and Super Bowl games. He devoted every Super Bowl from SB XXIV to SB LII in 2018, a total of 19, which is a broadcast record.

He left Westwood One after broadcasting the Thursday Night Football game on September 6, 2018. "I'm going to miss it," he was quoted as saying, "I'm going to miss it," he said, "but in the true sense, I'm going to have to get a piece of my life back." He currently works as an in-studio analyst for The NFL Today on CBS television, Inside the Football Game on Showtime, and host Boomer and Gio on WFAN Radio in New York and the CBS Sports Network. CBS Radio announced in September 2012 that he was added to their growing collection of experts to provide five sports news per day Monday through Friday.

He appeared on The Jim Rome Show once a week during the NFL season to preview the upcoming weekend's NFL action.

CBS Radio offered Esiason a one-week "try-out" as Imus' replacement on WFAN in April 2007, following Don Imus' firing. Craig Carton, a radio veteran, joined the station as the permanent host on August 13, with radio veteran Craig Carton as co-host. Boomer and Carton officially started on September 4, 2007. Esiason, an analyst with Westwood One, will watch the Monday Night Football game and then fly back to New York in time to see the Tuesday morning game. The Boomer and Carton radio show was the most rated morning show in all key demographics in the greater New York listening region, and was seen on the MSG Network from 2010 to 2013. Both Esiason and Carton appeared on the radio broadcast of a Brooklyn Nets basketball match on March 8, 2013. Since January 2014, the radio show had been simulcast on CBS Sports Network. Carton resigned from WFAN in September 2017, leaving Esiason as the sole host of the event, which was rebranded The Morning Show with Boomer. When Gregg Giannotti joined Boomer and Gio as a permanent co-host on January 2, 2018, the show became Boomer and Gio.

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