#Dan Patrick Inks Contract Extension with NBC Sports, iHeartMedia (Exclusive)

Dan Patrick isn’t retiring just yet.

The former ESPN anchor and radio host has inked a new multiyear contract extension with NBC Sports and iHeartMedia, which will keep his The Dan Patrick Show running through the end of 2027, he tells The Hollywood Reporter.

Patrick had stoked some speculation about his future when he said on his radio show last week that he would be retiring in four years.

“I did it backwards, that I announced my retirement then announced my contract extension,” Patrick told THR on Monday afternoon. “It’s sort of an Elton John Farewell Tour, where it’s going on for years, and I apologize for that.”

Patrick — who previously anchored ESPN’s SportsCenter and hosted his eponymous radio show for ESPN from 1999-2007 — struck out on his own in 2007, with iHeartMedia’s Premiere Networks syndicating his show across the country. He joined NBC Sports as a host on Football Night in America the following year.

His radio show began streaming on NBC’s Peacock in 2020. As part of the new deals with iHeartMedia and NBC Sports, Patrick will continue to host his daily show, which will also continue to be simulcast on Peacock.

“It just made sense,” Patrick says. “I like the people, I’m a creature of habit, stayed at ESPN 18 years, and I’m allowed to do what I want to do. And that — as a so-called artist — is, I think what we all strive for, and having that freedom with Peacock and iHeart I just thought I got four and a half more years left in me, I think least I hope so. And this is where I wanted to finish my career.”

Patrick’s show, which is an evolution of his former ESPN Radio program, sees him and his team (“The Danettes”) discuss sports and pop culture. Since adding the simulcast on Peacock, Patrick says they have tried to give the show a “voyeuristic feel” that would make it engaging to watch as well.

“You go in each day with a loose blueprint of what you want to do and how you want to do it, but it never goes as scripted, since it isn’t scripted,” he says. “The parameters are freeing, they’re fun, they’re loose — I don’t have a boss — and it’s up to us to create content that sounds good on radio, and looks good on TV. And that’s a great challenge and we have three hours to do it.”

As for what spurred on the decision to pre-announce his retirement four and a half years ahead of time?

“I just wanted people to know, instead of asking me all the time, ‘What are you going to do, how long are you going to do it?’ and I owed that to the guys that I work with that this was going to be it,” Patrick says. “I’ll be 71, I’m probably the oldest person in this genre doing this. And I just thought you know what? That’ll be that’ll be a good career and I can call my own shot.”