ESPN’s Joe Buck Previews This Season’s Awesome Slate of MNF Games

Joe Buck has a Monday night schedule that opens with a quarterback duel and then hands him two Rams games inside the first five weeks. He is not hiding how he feels about it.

The opener is the one everybody circled. Patrick Mahomes on one side, Bo Nix on the other. The catch, as Rich pointed out, is that both quarterbacks are currently working their way back to full health. Mahomes is already in 11-on-11 drills, hopping around with a knee brace on his leg. Nix is dealing with an ankle.

Buck expects both to be there. "That's a heck of a match-up to come out of the gate with, provided both quarterbacks are there."

Then came the segment Rich has apparently decided the show now owns. It is called Is He Back Yet, and it is about number 99 in your program.

Buck was careful to defer to the people who cover it every day, and then he gave his honest read anyway.

"If he wasn't coming back, it's a lot of noise, a lot of photo ops, pads," Buck said. He has watched Aaron Donald work out on Instagram over the past couple of years and reached the obvious conclusion. "He is just a freak."

Pair Donald with Myles Garrett and a revamped secondary with Chris Shula putting it together and Buck does not bother with qualifiers.

"They are going to be phenomenal."

The week three trip to Chicago is where things got funny. Rich wondered whether Caleb Williams would meet with Buck before the game, which is the kind of question that carries a lot of subtext.

Buck's answer was three words. "I don't know, man." Both of them admitted they are on edge about it. Buck moved the conversation along, which is its own kind of answer.

The genuine trophy on the schedule is Dallas at Philadelphia in week five. Buck noted he had that matchup every year at Fox and has not gotten it since arriving at Monday Night Football on ESPN.

"That's a big one for us to get."

Rich had a different game penciled in for the marquee. He was convinced the league would open with Bears at Seahawks on November 2nd as the banner-raising game.

"I really thought the league would put that as game number one," Rich said.

It landed in November instead. Buck is not complaining. "It's a good game. It's a great game."

The other Dallas date is at Seattle, which gives Buck two Cowboys games, both on the road, both against what he called playoff quality teams.

For a booth that has spent a couple of seasons taking whatever the schedule handed it, this is a different tier of inventory. Mahomes to open. Donald and Garrett twice inside five weeks. Dallas at Philly. Dallas at Seattle.

And a running segment that requires no name and no explanation. Is he back yet.