Luke Kuechly spent this week in Australia.
The Carolina Panthers ' legendary linebacker is in a new gig: He's the color commentator for Netflix's NFL broadcasts.
That look him to Melbourne, where on Friday morning locally (and Thursday night in the United States) the Los Angeles Rams took on the San Francisco 49ers in Week 1 of the 2026 NFL season.
The 49ers surprisingly rolled to a 27-7 victory, and plenty has been written about the game.
One of the most intriguing aspects for Panthers fans was to listen to Kuechly on the call with play-by-play man Noah Eagle.
Kuechly already had experience calling Panthers games on radio, which both gave him broadcasting experience but is also a different beast than working on a national television broadcast.
All in all, Kuechly held his own.
Kuechly got an in-depth review from The Athletic's sports media writer, Andrew Marchand.
Marchand praised Kuechly as being part of an improvement for Netflix in simply embracing the sport itself that they were broadcasting.
"Netflix has learned a thing or two as it has gone forward, which included, Thursday night, the Los Angeles Rams versus the San Francisco 49ers from Melbourne, the first of five NFL games on the service's expanded schedule this season," Marchand wrote. "If you were to create in a lab a human being to demonstrate that the early lessons were received by Netflix, it would result in Pro Football Hall of Famer Luke Kuechly."
Marchand went on to write that "Kuechly's DNA is built on X&O chromosomes" and that he was "all about football first, second and third."
"Kuechly had great detail in his analysis," Marchand wrote. "His experience as a Carolina Panthers radio game analyst prepared him to get in and out in the proper amount of time. He was informative, though a bit dry. (We will take that every day of the week — and with the Thursday night game being held Friday morning in Australia, no one knew what day it was anyway.) No one wants analysts who are too distracting."
Marchand singled out a couple things he liked from Kuechly specifically.
"Analysts have talked about runners squaring their shoulders for decades, but Kuechly added at one point that it allows a ball carrier to easily go left or right," Marchand wrote. "It was a quick, subtle point that allowed a viewer to understand the game better."
Marchand added this: "In another instance, Kuechly explained how coaches teach to tackle high inside a team's own 5 so an opponent can't fall forward into the end zone. Simple, good stuff."
Kuechly will get a chance to grow as the season goes along as Netflix has four more games on the streaming platform through the end of the 2026 NFL regular season.
All in all, though, Kuechly is off to a good start.
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