Mike Carlson
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Mike Carlson is the regular pundit of five's NFL coverage.
[edit] Career
Mike was working as a vice president of European operations for Major League Baseball before beginning his American Football broadcasting career in the UK. In 1991 he teamed up with Nick Halling to cover the WLAF for defunct satellite station Screensport, a partnership which continued during the early years of the league's successor, NFL Europe, on Sky Sports.
In 2002 the terrestrial station five began covering Monday Night Football for which Mike has been the regular analyst. Currently he presents coverage alongside co-hosts Martin Bayfield and Josh Chetwynd and also worked with former hosts Mark Webster, Simon Golding, and Colin Murray. As a journalist he contributes to weekly American football newspaper First Down and writes articles for both NFLUK.com and about NFL Europe for nfl.com.
He started his career in the UK as a sports editor for a television news agency before joining ABC Sports as their director of programming in Europe. On screen he has also appeared occasionally as a baseball pundit on MLB on Five hosted by Jonny Gould, a sport he previously presented on Sky Sports in the mid 1990s. He has covered a variety of other sports on television including Basketball, Poker, Soccer, and Lacrosse. He has also worked behind the scenes on the television coverage of both Olympic games and FIFA World Cup tournaments.
In addition to sport Mike has a love of cinema, authoring several books on the subject, has written for various newspapers about the arts, and is also a published poet.
[edit] Trivia
- Mike graduated from Wesleyan University in 1972 having majored in English & American Studies.
- He was a member of the last undefeated Wesleyan Cardinals football team, in 1969.
- As well as football, Mike also played Lacrosse alongside the current New England Patriots head coach, Bill Belichick
- A New England native, Mike is a fan of the Boston Red Sox baseball team and New England Patriots American football team.
- Mike also has a Masters degree in English Literature & Creative Writing from McGill University in Montreal.
- As a result of time spent in the city he became a fan of the Montreal Canadiens in the NHL and the CFL's Montreal Alouettes.
- He is married to the author Kristen Ellis and has one son, whose name is Nate.
