Kevin Harlan’s Call of a Cat Interrupting ‘Monday Night Football’ Was Predictably Great

In Tuesday’s Hot Clicks: Kevin Harlan gives us another outstanding call of an on-field diversion, what the Nats did after the Caps game and more.

“And the cat is elusive, kinda like Barkley and Elliott”

Brad Penner/USA Today Sports

Kevin Harlan might be the best play-by-play man in sports right now. He has strong competition from guys like Joe Buck and Jim Nantz but nobody gets as jazzed for an in-game diversion as Harlan. 

We’ve seen Harlan, who calls Monday Night Football on the radio for Westwood One, bring out his best calls whenever there’s something happening on the field other than the game. Who could forget his famous “The guy is drunk, but there he goes!” call from 2016? He takes these little banal moments of downtime and turns them into must-listen attractions by calling them like they’re going to decide the Super Bowl. 

So Harlan was ready for his moment when a black cat disrupted proceedings between the Giants and Cowboys last night. 

Here’s how Joe Tessitore and Booger McFarland called the action on ESPN. 

And here’s how Harlan upstaged them on the radio. 

AUDIO: There was a cat on the field. @Kevinharlan had the #MNF call for us.

It was beautiful. pic.twitter.com/4ShTBVaYRZ

— Westwood One Sports (@westwood1sports) November 5, 2019

If you want to know how good Harlan is at his job, just listen to the way he casually slips that CDW sponsor plug into his call. What a pro. 

Not everyone was so excited by the cat, though. Cowboys defensive end DeMarcus Lawrence, who weighs 265 pounds, says he was scared of the little kitty. 

“The first thing that crossed my mind was like: ‘[Expletive], they got bad luck now. It just turned on them,’” Lawrence told USA Today. “I was like: ‘Man, the game over.’ If a black cat runs on the damn field on a ‘Monday Night Football’ game, a black cat, you might want to call it quits, bro. Y’all’s luck is terrible.

“I hate cats, too, so I was like ‘[expletive], [expletive], [expletive]. Hurry up and get this cat before it gets to me.’”

The cat actually ended up being bad luck for the Giants. They were up 9–3 when the delay occurred and ended up losing 37–18. 

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Email dan.gartland@simail.com with any feedback or follow me on Twitter for approximately one half-decent baseball joke per week. Bookmark this page to see previous editions of Hot Clicks and find the newest edition every day. By popular request I’ve made a Spotify playlist of the music featured here. Visit our Extra Mustard page throughout each day for more offbeat sports stories.