NASHVILLE, Tenn. – Mike Keith is an excellent play-by-plan man: Exacting, detailed, colorful, enthusiastic.
Since 1998, he put all those skills to use calling 538 games for the Titans’ franchise. But last Sunday’s loss to the Jaguars was the final one. He’s returning to his alma mater to be the voice of the Vols in Knoxville, leaving behind what team president and CEO Burke Nihill called a crater.

It will be hard enough to replace Keith on fall and winter Sundays. No one can bring his institutional knowledge, a quality the Titans are placing increasingly little value on in other departments.
With the team coming off a 3-14 season with the No. 1 pick and a new, fangless GM soon to be hired, it’s Keith’s ambassadorship for the Titans that will leave the most glaring and immediate hole.
I’d imagine the Titans threw major money at him and offered to reshape his role in any way he wished and none of it could counter the chance, at this stage of the 57-year-old Keith’s life, to replace Bob Kesling, who replaced John Ward.
A wonderful tribute to @Titans legendary broadcaster Mike Keith @tennvoice of @TitansRadio.
— Jim Wyatt (@jwyattsports) January 9, 2025
Well done by @ashleynfarrell.
Mike will be missed by many, including me.
Best of luck with @VolNetwork.
🎥 pic.twitter.com/05cMSumSE9
No one currently with the Titans team can shake hands, tell stories, relate to fans and absorb grievances the way Keith did. No one applying for that job can bring the personality he did to those elements as vice president of broadcasting.
He goes straight to the Ring of Honor, an excellent move.
What does a team in this terrible state do when it adds the crater created by his departure?
The spin will be about the opportunity created. We'll circle back to a big offseason theme: Do we trust the franchise to find someone, or multiple people if it carves up the job, who can begin to try to fill his shoes?
I'll believe the team can only when it does.
As for Keith: I remember David Climer tipping me off that he was coming in 1998 and getting the scoop for The Tennessean. Despite Climer's praise, I had no idea what Keith could become.
It was always great to talk to him on the sidelines or give him a call for perspective. I love that he would take grief from me in good spirits and that we were friends as far apart as we wound up on the spectrum of looking in on the team.
But then, he is friends with everyone. I'll miss him a great deal.