Amanda Balionis shares her “favourite ritual” after leaving her golf job and joining the NFL

With the new NFL season kick-starting earlier this month, CBS reporter Amanda Balionis is back in the broadcast booth. She had recently announced her hiatus from golf coverage for the rest of 2024.

Balionis is one of the most prominent golf and NFL broadcasters. She spent most of 2024 covering the PGA Tour. However, she chose to take a break to focus on NFL matches for the rest of the year. The experienced broadcaster recently took to social media to share her "favourite ritual."

She shared a photo from inside the media center as numerous screens adorned the wall. The screens showed data analysis, different camera angles, ongoing NFL matches, and more. Balionis held a coffee mug against the laptops spread on the table. She geotagged the location as Charlotte, North Carolina. She captioned the picture with a football emoji, saying:

"One of my favourite rituals is back! Morning coffee in the truck. See you at 1pm on CBS."

Image via @balionis

While golf fans will miss Amanda Balionis in the FedEx Fall series, they can catch her on the NFL sidelines this year. The 39-years-old further shared pictures of her interviewing Chargers star JK Dobbins and Adam Thielen of the Panthers. The Chargers claimed a 26-3 win over the Panthers.

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"I lost a lot of sleep before that interview" - When Amanda Balionis recounted how interviewing Tiger Woods made her nervous

Amanda Balionis is a seasoned reporter now, who knows her way around the game. However, that wasn't always the case. In 2011, she had joined the PGA Tour as an in-house reporter and host. While working there, she was relativiely new to golf. To add to that, her "second ever sit-down interview" was scheduled with Tiger Woods.

While talking to Links Magazine some months back, she was asked which athlete or personality caused her to become the most nervous before an interview. She answered:

"Tiger Woods, for sure. When I started with PGATour.com, I think Tiger was my second ever sit-down interview. I’m very thankful the camera angle was from the waist up as my legs were shaking uncontrollably from nervousness. I lost a lot of sleep before that interview"

Before the 15-time major champion, the first PGA Tour pro she ever interviewed was legend Ernie Els just before he was inducted into the World Golf Hall of Fame in 2011.

"I was too new to the golf world to know that I should be nervous for that one (with Ernie). He just looked like a big teddy bear!"

She added that he has "always been so good" to her. In 2016, Amanda Balionis moved to Callaway to become the PGA Tour's in-house reporter. In 2017, CBS hired her as a part-time reporter. She was promoted to full-time reporter a year later.