Brace yourselves: The famous Collinsworth slide is not as it appears.

Play-by-play man Al Michaels, Cris Collinsworth’s partner in the NBC booth, explained to The Post that the booth is in fact too tight for the 6-foot-5 former NFL receiver to slide anywhere.

“The reality is the booths we are in, it is a very tiny, thin area in which the two of us have to sit,” Michaels said. “When we come on the air, we like to do it when I do the overview [of the game] in a one shot. Otherwise the other guy sits there for 30 seconds doing nothing.

“We’ve always done it that way and it works effectively. So, for Chris, he has to sit next to me because it’s not wide enough. So his torso might be next to mine, so he has to lean out at about a 45-degree angle. So, it looks like he’s sliding, but he’s actually angling in.”

The slide — alleged slide — became very popular on social media this season, prompting Michaels and Collinsworth to respond. Before the Rams and Eagles game on Dec. 16, Collinsworth “slid” in from the left, not the right. They were considering some more extreme options, however.

“We never thought anything of it, then it’s out on the internet and memes and the whole thing,” Michaels said. “I didn’t see it, but I heard about it from enough people. Then we decided, let’s have a little fun with it.

“We were trying to figure out a way to do it and thought maybe I’d turn toward the right, but he’d come in from the other side. We thought that’d be a little too much, but if nothing else, we’d figure to bring him in from the other side.”

Collinsworth and Michaels have now called 231 games together for NBC after finishing up their season with the Chiefs’ divisional-round win over the Colts on Saturday.