During her halftime report on Sunday, Erin Andrews seemed visibly flustered and breathless, stating afterward that the experience made her feel like “puking” and “crapping down her leg.”
As an NFL sideline reporter for Fox, she was covering the Packers-Lions game with colleagues Tom Rinaldi, Kevin Burkhardt, and Tom Brady. On Tuesday’s “Calm Down” podcast, she explained that she usually has time to ask a coach two questions at halftime.
However, due to the lengthy ramp at Ford Field, she ended up having more time with Packers coach Matt LaFleur, managing to ask four or five questions instead.
With only one minute left before Fox went live again, she noted, “I’m like, ‘Oh my God, I’ve got to shore up my notes,’ trying to pull everything together.”
Andrews recalled feeling a rush of panic, thinking, “Wait, what did he say about going for it?” since she wanted to avoid misquoting the coach.
As she quickly replayed her earlier conversation with LaFleur in her mind, she realized she didn’t have the injury updates needed for the broadcast.
“So, I run. I’m literally standing in front of the camera when my producer tells me, ‘Erin, we’re gonna come to you first.’ It was nerve-wracking. I thought, ‘Oh my God, I don’t have the injury updates,’ and dashed off to find the PR people, while Kevin and Tom were already on air,” she explained.
Remarkably, Andrews made it back in time but felt she was stumbling through her report because of the running.
She reported LaFleur saying the team needed to “finish drives” and mentioned his frustration for not attempting a field goal on a fourth down situation from the Detroit 7-yard line, where Green Bay failed to convert while trailing 10-7 in the second quarter.
“I’m fully out of breath, which is so inappropriate,” she admitted. “It was silly, all because that ramp was so long. I started saying things like, ‘What did I just say? Wait, Kev, I just talked about the offense’—and then the play snapped. I told him, ‘Don’t worry, I’ll get it together after this play.’”
Andrews mentioned that Tom Brady reacted with an “Aww” while she was struggling with her report.
“He does that on-air because he knew I was having a tough time,” she noted.
Reflecting on the situation, she expressed regret, saying, “I just thought, how many people are watching, and I messed up like that. I know I can do better.”
Having been with Fox for 14 years, Andrews joined the network in July 2012 after working as a reporter for ESPN, where she covered the NHL and later focused on college football and Big Ten basketball.
