Paul Azinger on Replacing Johnny Miller: 'I'm Just Going to Be Me. It's Got Me This Far,...

[Dogfish Head]

IT'S OFFICIAL. PAUL AZINGER WAS NAMED as the lead golf analyst who will follow Johnny Miller at NBC.

Azinger is going to be busy in 2019. He will work the Masters for the BBC, the U.S. Opens for FOX, and the NBC golf telecasts beginning with the WGC-Mexico Championship in late February.

Azinger recently talked to golf writer Jeff Babineau at Gator Creek Golf Club. Here are a couple of Azinger snippets from Babineau's story for MORNING READ:

I'm not trying to fill Johnny's shoes. You can't fill those shoes. I'm different than him. I'm just going to go for being me. It's got me this far, right? I'll stir it up. I'll say stuff. It'll just pop up, like it does when I'm giving a lesson. But I'm not looking to carve my own path. I'm just looking to fit in. They've already established what they've got there. These guys are all experts.​

On Johnny Miller:

I talked to him for about 15-20 minutes. I asked him a lot of questions. I asked him about Tommy Roy. I wanted to know about Tommy Randolph [also in NBC production] … What is Dan Hicks like? All that. You've got to high-praise Johnny, because he's done it for a long time, and Johnny would tell it like it is. Johnny had this ability to inflect his voice; he'd be saying stuff you disagreed with, but because of the way he inflected it, you weren't so sure. He was an influencer. We phone-tagged, and we talked. We have a lot in common, really, but I'm not Johnny. I'm different than Johnny. He told me, 'You keep calling it like it is.' And that’s what I plan on doing.​

Azinger won a dozen times on the PGA Tour, including one major, the 1993 PGA Championship.


Source: Paul Azinger on Replacing Johnny Miller: 'I'm Just Going to Be Me. It's Got Me This Far, Right?'