TV Football Analysts are stupid and we should fire them all - deadspin

[knapplc]

Absolutely love this article by Drew Magary at Deadspin. NSFW language.

It Took A Blackout To Show You How Truly Useless NFL Broadcasters Are. Let’s Blow Up The Studio.
I avoided the pregame shows yesterday. This isn't unusual. I never watch pregame shows for the same reason YOU never watch pregame shows. I showed up at my friend's house just as they were getting ready for Alicia Keys to spend eight minutes doing a national anthem/"Fallin'"/Jazz odyssey medley. And that was fine by me. I had avoided JB and Dan and Boomer and Shannon and Coach Cowher (ALWAYS Coach Cowher), and I was happy.

And then the lights went out.

If there was anything good to be had from last night's agonizing 34-minute Super Bowl delay (apart from everyone on Twitter, including me, furiously masturbating out one-liners), it was that it showed the world, in excruciating detail, just how bad networks are at presenting football. It was a naked stretch of time that laid bare just how worthless the majority of studio people and sideline reporters are. Will Leitch was right: Last night's B****** was a historic demonstration of vapidity. There was no information. There was no backup plan. The commercial stretches to fill time (drink Bud Goth!) were ENDLESS; it was as if CBS were terrified of letting its studio crew talk again. Everyone at the party I attended screamed for Charles Barkley to show up.

 

[GSG]

:lol: B******

Phil Simms was just awful last night. He'd say one thing, then turnaround and say the exact opposite.

 

[knapplc]

I used that time to put a table together and check out HuskerBoard/Twitter. I knew those idiots had nothing to say that I needed to hear. Glad I tuned them out.

I also avoided the entire pre-game nonsense, the Alicia Keyes song that vaguely resembled the National Anthem (I could only stomach about 15 seconds of it), and all the halftime gob they threw at my TV.

Thank god for DVRs. Best freakin' invention ever.

 

[beanman]

Absolutely love this article by Drew Magary at Deadspin. NSFW language.

It Took A Blackout To Show You How Truly Useless NFL Broadcasters Are. Let’s Blow Up The Studio.
I avoided the pregame shows yesterday. This isn't unusual. I never watch pregame shows for the same reason YOU never watch pregame shows. I showed up at my friend's house just as they were getting ready for Alicia Keys to spend eight minutes doing a national anthem/"Fallin'"/Jazz odyssey medley. And that was fine by me. I had avoided JB and Dan and Boomer and Shannon and Coach Cowher (ALWAYS Coach Cowher), and I was happy.

And then the lights went out.

If there was anything good to be had from last night's agonizing 34-minute Super Bowl delay (apart from everyone on Twitter, including me, furiously masturbating out one-liners), it was that it showed the world, in excruciating detail, just how bad networks are at presenting football. It was a naked stretch of time that laid bare just how worthless the majority of studio people and sideline reporters are. Will Leitch was right: Last night's B****** was a historic demonstration of vapidity. There was no information. There was no backup plan. The commercial stretches to fill time (drink Bud Goth!) were ENDLESS; it was as if CBS were terrified of letting its studio crew talk again. Everyone at the party I attended screamed for Charles Barkley to show up.

Well, he's pretty much spot on. Most of the guys they've got on CBS and ESPN make me want to whack them in the head with a hammer. They don't deserve that kind of money for what they do. Ridiculous.

 

[NUance]

I wonder why they don't have alternate sets announcers for stuff like this. They could have several sets of announcers geared towards the same video. That way you could select the announcers you like (hopefully).

The audio doesn't take hardly any bandwidth at all to transmit. They could send several audio feeds with the video and simply let the view choose who to listen to. It doesn't seem like this would be hard to do at all.

/ This would avoid the problem of synching up the video with the audio that you encounter when you listen to the radio while watch the TV with the volume turned down.

 

[beanman]

I wonder why they don't have alternate sets announcers for stuff like this. They could have several sets of announcers geared towards the same video. That way you could select the announcers you like (hopefully).

The audio doesn't take hardly any bandwidth at all to transmit. They could send several audio feeds with the video and simply let the view choose who to listen to. It doesn't seem like this would be hard to do at all.

/ This would avoid the problem of synching up the video with the audio that you encounter when you listen to the radio while watch the TV with the volume turned down.

Interesting idea. Maybe this will happen some day.

 

[GSG]

I used that time to put a table together and check out HuskerBoard/Twitter. I knew those idiots had nothing to say that I needed to hear. Glad I tuned them out.

I also avoided the entire pre-game nonsense, the Alicia Keyes song that vaguely resembled the National Anthem (I could only stomach about 15 seconds of it), and all the halftime gob they threw at my TV.

Thank god for DVRs. Best freakin' invention ever.

Simms and Nantz were out for most of the black0ut. They let Steve Tasker and Solomon Wilcox(?) handle it :facepalm:

 

[Creighton Duke]

Absolutely love this article by Drew Magary at Deadspin. NSFW language.

It Took A Blackout To Show You How Truly Useless NFL Broadcasters Are. Let’s Blow Up The Studio.
I avoided the pregame shows yesterday. This isn't unusual. I never watch pregame shows for the same reason YOU never watch pregame shows. I showed up at my friend's house just as they were getting ready for Alicia Keys to spend eight minutes doing a national anthem/"Fallin'"/Jazz odyssey medley. And that was fine by me. I had avoided JB and Dan and Boomer and Shannon and Coach Cowher (ALWAYS Coach Cowher), and I was happy.

And then the lights went out.

If there was anything good to be had from last night's agonizing 34-minute Super Bowl delay (apart from everyone on Twitter, including me, furiously masturbating out one-liners), it was that it showed the world, in excruciating detail, just how bad networks are at presenting football. It was a naked stretch of time that laid bare just how worthless the majority of studio people and sideline reporters are. Will Leitch was right: Last night's B****** was a historic demonstration of vapidity. There was no information. There was no backup plan. The commercial stretches to fill time (drink Bud Goth!) were ENDLESS; it was as if CBS were terrified of letting its studio crew talk again. Everyone at the party I attended screamed for Charles Barkley to show up.

Well, he's pretty much spot on. Most of the guys they've got on CBS and ESPN make me want to whack them in the head with a hammer. They don't deserve that kind of money for what they do. Ridiculous.

Marino deserves the money, but only JUST enough to pay off his mistress and lovechild.

 

[knapplc]

I used that time to put a table together and check out HuskerBoard/Twitter. I knew those idiots had nothing to say that I needed to hear. Glad I tuned them out.

I also avoided the entire pre-game nonsense, the Alicia Keyes song that vaguely resembled the National Anthem (I could only stomach about 15 seconds of it), and all the halftime gob they threw at my TV.

Thank god for DVRs. Best freakin' invention ever.

Simms and Nantz were out for most of the black0ut. They let Steve Tasker and Solomon Wilcox(?) handle it :facepalm:

I had it on in the background and I kept wondering why they didn't go to the studio. Did they send everyone home after halftime?

The whole thing was bizarre. They had absolutely no contingency plan at all, and that makes no sense.

 

[GSG]

I used that time to put a table together and check out HuskerBoard/Twitter. I knew those idiots had nothing to say that I needed to hear. Glad I tuned them out.

I also avoided the entire pre-game nonsense, the Alicia Keyes song that vaguely resembled the National Anthem (I could only stomach about 15 seconds of it), and all the halftime gob they threw at my TV.

Thank god for DVRs. Best freakin' invention ever.

Simms and Nantz were out for most of the black0ut. They let Steve Tasker and Solomon Wilcox(?) handle it :facepalm:

I had it on in the background and I kept wondering why they didn't go to the studio. Did they send everyone home after halftime?

The whole thing was bizarre. They had absolutely no contingency plan at all, and that makes no sense.

They should've sent everyone home and just broadcast the game without them. They kept letting Shannon Sharpe talk (butcher the English language). And then, Cowher wanted to put in Alex Smith

 

[knapplc]

I'm probably the only one old enough to remember this experiment: NFL game broadcast without announcers

It was boring, but that was back in the day without decent on-screen graphics and info. I wonder what it would be like if they tried this today?

 

[tschu]

CBS butchered that whole broadcast. Phil Simms having a job BLOWS MY f'ing MIND. Week after week he is awful in his analysis and his timing and his pacing. Nantz is fine; football isn't his element though, he's better a golf. But the preparation, their awful studio crew....ugh.

Nantz and Simms make me glad to hear Aikman and Buck. And that's hard to do. NBC has two winners in Al Michaels and Cris Collinsworth.

 

[GSG]

I'm probably the only one old enough to remember this experiment: NFL game broadcast without announcers

It was boring, but that was back in the day without decent on-screen graphics and info. I wonder what it would be like if they tried this today?

I think that would go over a lot better nowadays. Like you said, there are a ton of graphics now, and that goes beyond the clock/score. I wouldn't mind seeing them try it once every couple years or so.

 

[ZRod]

On a related tangent:

With Ray Lewis more than likely going to ESPN it could finally be their down fall (I could only hope...). Seriously the guy is a polarizing figure, obviously, but the majority of it is strongly negative. I'm basically done watching them for anything but college games, I just can't stand anything they do any more, and I think a good chunk of America probably feels the same way.

 

[GSG]

About the only thing I watch on ESPN is college football, college basketball, and Monday Night Football. Other than that I get all of my highlights and news online, and not necessarily from their site.