Al Michaels exasperated by flags

There were a lot of penalties in the first half of Amazon’s Thursday Night Football game this week.

How many penalties? Far too many for Prime Video play-by-play announcer Al Michaels.

As the flags flew in the first half, Michaels became clearly irritated, then channeled that frustration into some fun one-liners poking fun at the penalty-fest.

“It looks like June 14th here, otherwise known as Flag Day, as you know,” Michaels noted after one flag late in the second quarter.

A couple of minutes later, two flags flew on the same play.

“We’ve got another flag. You have two more flags in the backfield. No more laundry left … And any number of calls coming your way,” Michaels said.

The referee signaled penalties on both teams on the play.

“I’ll bet,” Michaels said.

When another flag flew a few seconds later, Michaels clearly sounded exasperated.

“You’re kidding,” he said.

Analyst Kirk Herbstreit noted, “It’s the eighth penalty, right?”

“It’s the 147th,” Michaels joked.

“Is this a world record for you in first-half laundry?” Herbstreit asked.

“Absolutely, without question,” Michaels responded. “You’re going to need some new flags to throw in the second half. These ones are filthy.”

On the very next play, flags flew once again.

“That is another flag. In fact, there are two. We wouldn’t lie to ya,” Michaels said.

It wasn’t just Michaels’ imagination there were an unusual amount of penalties Thursday night. There were 12 penalties in the first half; by comparison, NFL games averaged about 12 penalties over the past three seasons.

Luckily, Michaels got a bit of a break in the third quarter, with the first 10 minutes going flag-free.

“Flag is down, amazingly, the first one of the quarter,” Michaels remarked at the 5:16 mark in the third quarter.

[Awful Announcing on X/Twitter]

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