Saturday, Sep 6, 2008
Joe Theismann, insufferable on Sundays lately, should be a good match with Al Michaels on ESPN's "Monday Night Football." Plus: Why do announcers have to be men? And: Letters From Lost Fans.
Jul 27, 2005 | On Tuesday's conference call introducing the announcing team for "Monday Night Football" when it moves from ABC to ESPN in 2006, Al Michaels kept talking about how the words "Monday night football" resonate for him like no other.
"When I hear the words 'Monday night,'" he said, "'football' just follows.
When I hear Al Michaels' voice in the fall, it sounds like Monday night to me the way the voice of Pat Summerall used to sound like Sunday morning. (On the West Coast, the A game is usually a morning event.) So I'm glad Michaels will be moving over to cable.
I'm also glad when I consider the possibilities for ESPN, which employs a disproportionate number of announcers who make me want to shoot the TV. I shudder at the thought of being forced to listen to Chris Berman or Mike Tirico every week, or at the very least being forced to find a working radio.
Michaels will team up with Joe Theismann, plucked from ESPN's current Sunday night team, in a two-man booth. Suzy Kolber and Michelle Tafoya will be the sideline reporters.
It's a solid crew. Michaels is still as good as anyone, and Kolber and Tafoya are both excellent, though if their talents are wasted as solo sideline reporters, they'll be doubly wasted as a tandem. Get these women real jobs!
Theismann's the pick that's going to have tongues wagging for the next year and beyond. The former quarterback elicits powerful responses pro or con with, I suspect, the pro crowd tending toward casual football fans and the cons tending toward the hardcore.
I feel strongly both ways. I think the ESPN Sunday night crew, Theismann sharing color duties with Paul Maguire while Mike Patrick handles the play-by-play, has gone from enjoyable to unlistenable in the last few years.
ESPN executive vice president Mark Shapiro says Maguire will be part of the pregame show and Patrick will keep doing college basketball and pretty much whatever else he wants to do at ESPN.
Theismann and Maguire have become a bad vaudeville team, with annoying vocal tics -- "you wanna talk about ..." -- and tiresome in-joke squabbling. Patrick, a solid announcer, has at times become something of a moralist who always sounds like he's about to have a heart attack.
But I've enjoyed the work of both Theismann and Maguire in the past. They're both funny and they both have interesting things to say about football when they're not trying to play off each other for effect. I often disagree with the things they say, but I don't need announcers to just say things I agree with.
I think Michaels, a consummate pro, will bring the best out of Theismann. They both like to talk, so there's no need for a third person in the booth.
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