Ryan Clark has gone from a solid NFL safety to one of football’s top analysts. A staple for ESPN’s football coverage, it sounds like Clark could be moving on from the Worldwide Leader. Wednesday, Clark sent this tweet acknowledging his contract with the company is up. And that he’s prepared to move on.
Clark noted that he signed an extension with ESPN three years ago but believed it was for less money than what he was worth. On a mission to prove the company wrong, Clark has become one of the faces of the team’s football coverage. He’s able to break the game down from an X’s and O’s standpoint while relating the game on a personal level. He’s shared his story about battling sickle cell trait that nearly took his life as a player to his heartfelt commentary after Damar Hamlin collapsed on the field in 2022.
He hasn’t been afraid to make blunt comments about his former team either. At one point during the 2023 season, he strongly implied the Steelers should move on from Mike Tomlin, saying in December that change was the best thing for him and the organization.
“Mike Tomlin needs to figure out if this is the place for him because I don’t believe it is, the same way Andy Reid had to leave Philadelphia, and he’s now have had two separate Hall of Fame careers,” Clark said.
In between, he started The Pivot podcast alongside Channing Crowder and Fred Taylor, turning it into one of the most successful sports podcasts. He’s landed big-time interviews with notable athletes and his long conversation with Mike Tomlin in the summer of 2022 remains one of the best. Clark’s also become host of The CW’s Inside The NFL, perhaps a sign of him preparing for a post-ESPN career.
To be clear, Ryan Clark isn’t saying he’s definitively leaving the network. This is obviously a leverage ploy to get ESPN to pony up its highest dollar amount and it’s a smart business play. But Clark has enough star power that he doesn’t need to stay with ESPN. We’ll see where he ends up. Based on his stardom, he’ll have plenty of options.
