UM’s Jason Taylor makes decision on Dolphins TV. And Nantz Final 4 farewell, media notes

Dolphins legend and Pro Football Hall of Famer Jason Taylor, recently promoted to UM’s defensive line coach, told me this week that he will be relinquishing his preseason Dolphins TV analyst job because it would be impossible to do both.

So who makes sense for the preseason TV gig alongside play-by-play man Steve Goldstein?

Four potential solutions for the Dolphins and CBS-4:

▪ Using radio analyst Joe Rose with Goldstein on television, and finding another analyst to work with Jimmy Cefalo on Dolphins preseason radiocasts.

This is what the Dolphins did with Taylor before he gave up radio duties last year to focus on his job as a UM on-field and front-office analyst.

This would be the safest route, because Rose has the most experience doing analysis of Dolphins games of any available candidate, and he’s good at it.

▪ Using one among Channing Crowder, O.J. McDuffie and John Congemi alongside Goldstein. All know the team well and all would be good candidates.

All have associations with the Dolphins; Crowder and McDuffie played for the team and appear on game-day studio programming. McDuffie and Seth Levit host a popular Dolphins podcast. Crowder co-hosts a WQAM afternoon talk show with Marc Hochman.

Congemi has appeared, for years, on CBS-4’s Dolphins postgame show and has considerable experience calling college football games on ESPN’s networks.

Any of these analysts could work preseason games on radio, with Cefalo, if Rose moves to television for preseason games.

▪ Using two among Crowder, McDuffie and Congemi alongside Goldstein. In our view, this option or simply using Rose on TV would be the best solutions.

There’s potential for more lively dialogue with two new analysts, instead of one, and it would ease the transition of Crowder or McDuffie if either is hired to work in a game booth for the first time in their lives.

▪ Kim Bokamper. The former Dolphins linebacker has forged a long local TV career, initially as a sports anchor for CBS-4 before moving to the Bay Area in California in recent years. He has been CBS-4’s preseason Dolphins reporter for many years and also handles on-site interviews on regular season postgame shows.

Moving Bokamper to the booth would make some sense; his analysis of team personnel is always thoughtful. But that would create another hole in coverage.

THIS AND THAT

▪ Tommy Hutton will join Paul Severino for the Marlins-Mets season-opening series, beginning with Thursday’s 4:05 p.m. opener on Bally Sports Florida, which will carry 159 Marlins games this season.

Hutton and Rod Allen will each call 50 or slightly more games alongside Severino, with Jeff Nelson and Gaby Sanchez handling analysis for the others. J.P. Arencibia was dropped from the TV analyst rotation.

If you missed it, here’s how Bally’s coverage of Florida teams could be affected by the bankruptcy filing of its parent company.

Meanwhile, the Marlins and WINZ hired Stephen Strom to replace new radio play-by-play voice Kyle Sielaff on pregame and postgame shows. He has on-air experience at FIU and Nova Southeaastern and also assists with Heat broadcasts.

▪ Jim Nantz, working his 32nd and last Final Four, said he’s giving up college basketball play-by-play because he wants to spend more time with his family, and because he goes months without a break from the NFL season to the West Coast PGA tour events, to March Madness, and then The Masters.

Ian Eagle will take over as CBS’ voice of the Final Four next year, but Nantz, 63, spoke of possibly returning for the trophy presentation.

“It’s a couple years in the making,” Nantz said on a recent CBS conference call, noting that he and CBS Sports chairman Sean McManus “and I first agreed that this would be the best time for me to hand it off to Ian.”

Nantz, a Houston native, hoped the Houston Cougars would make it to the Final Four, in Houston, because he attended school at the university and was actively involved in the basketball and golf programs as a student there. But he didn’t allow emotion to seep into his call of UM’s win against Houston last Friday.

“It’s very personal for me,” he said two weeks before the Cougars lost. “This team is not just my alma mater. It runs a lot deeper than that... If the perfect script comes together and the stars are aligned, April 3 will be a magical night.”

Nantz said: “When that ‘One Shining Moment’ farewell piece plays on Monday night, I think it’s the lock of the year that I’ll have tears streaming down my face. But they’ll be tears of gratitude for being able to be entrusted with it for so long and have had a front-row seat to so many special moments.”

CBS’ pregame show on Saturday begins at 3 p.m. Turner’s Ernie Johnson, Charles Barkley and Kenny Smith — staples on TNT’s popular NBA studio programming — will host the 4 p.m. to 6 p.m. hours with Clark Kellogg.

Among the features planned: A look back at Houston’s legendary Phi Slama Jama team with Clyde Drexler and Hakeem Olajuwon.

CBS and TBS alternate coverage of the Final Four; CBS gets all three games this year. Monday’s championship game is due to tip at 9:20 p.m.

▪ According to Nielsen, 5.2 percent of Miami-Fort Lauderdale homes with TV sets watched the Hurricanes-Texas Midwest regional final on CBS-4 on Sunday, about half of the rating for a typical Dolphins game. But the rating peaked at 8.7 during the final minute of the Canes game.

▪ Because Heat games take priority on WQAM, the UM-Connecticut Final Four game has been banished to 104.3-FM, with Canes voice Joe Zagacki on the call. The Heat will be playing Dallas on WQAM on Saturday night.

▪ The NFL tabled a decision — until May — regarding whether Amazon will get flex scheduling for Thursday night games in Weeks 14 to 17. Several owners have serious concerns about moving Sunday games to Thursday, and vice versa, with about two weeks notice for fans.

Twenty-four owners must approve late-season flex scheduling on Thursdays. SI.com’s Albert Breer said 22 are in favor of it.