Faced with high-profile departures and rising competition from the MLB Network, the Hershiser move is part of the biggest revamping of ESPN's MLB coverage in years.

After 20 years of Miller and Morgan in a two-man booth on Sunday nights — when ESPN has the only MLB game played — that pair last season were joined by Steve Phillips. ESPN fired Phillips, an ex-New York Mets general manager, in October after a sex scandal involving another ESPN staffer.

"I think Joe and Jon understand the three-man booth now," says Hershiser, a three-time All-Star pitcher who also calls ESPN/ABC's Little League World Series and College World Series. "What Joe has come to appreciate is a third man gives him a chance to debate. And while Steve (Phillips) is one of my best friends in baseball — I adore him — there is a respect from where you're coming from that will be a little different for me because I was on the field."

With Peter Gammons having left ESPN for the MLB Network, ESPN's Baseball Tonight will add former manager Bobby Valentine, recently retired third baseman Aaron Boone and ex-Toronto Blue Jays general manager J.P. Ricciardi.

Hershiser left ESPN after two seasons to become a Texas Rangers coach in 2002 and was about to join its front office when he got a call from Chris Berman about returning and had to make "a fast and furious decision" to come back in 2006. Working Sunday night games, he suggests, is as good as it gets: "It's not always going to be Yankees-Red Sox, but you don't get any games where they rest the starters. And you have the ear of the industry."