Photo Credit: NBC Twitter
Ozzy Osbourne performed during the NFL season kickoff game, but NBC abruptly cut away from the performance.
The game between the Los Angeles Rams and the Buffalo Bills also featured Ozzy–or the first 30 seconds if you watched it on NBC. During the halftime performance at SoFi Stadium, NBC abruptly cut away to feature hosts Maria Taylor, Tony Dungy, and Rodney Harrison for the halftime report. Many people reacted with outrage on social media.
“Wtf was that? You say ‘here’s Ozzy Osbourne’ cut to him for five seconds then back to the half time recap no one cares about? Thanks NBC,” tweeted one fan at the network. By the time caster Maria Taylor introduced the show, the singer was already in the middle of his new song, “Patient Number 9.” While the sports casters recapped what everyone already knew, Ozzy sang his most well-known hit, “Crazy Train.”
“I cannot believe the NFL played interviews and highlights over Ozzy Osbourne’s halftime performance,” another writes. “That’s just blasphemous.” This performance marked the singer’s second time performing on stage since undergoing a surgery back in June.
The surgery was set to remove and realign pins in his neck and back. “Ozzy is 73 and any kind of surgery when you get older is difficult. This is quite major. He’s having pins in his neck and back realigned from when he had a fall back in 2019. He’s been in a lot of pain,” a source told Page Six at the time.
Ozzy fell in 2019 at his home in LA and required 15 screws in his spine. “I came down really, really hard,” he told Rolling Stone about his fall. Ozzy says he had gotten up in the middle of the night to go to the bathroom and tripped in the dark. He required a two-month recovery from the first surgery that inserted the screws. That surgery left him with nerve damage. In 2020, Ozzy revealed a diagnosis of Parkinson’s disease.