I’m the sort of person that gets all kinds of fired up for the season to begin. Then I turn on the TV for Week 1 and I realize the game I’m watching is being called by Bill Maas. You talk about a letdown after seven football-free months. So unfair.
But Maas is gone now, cast away by FOX to a life of obscurity and drug arrests. HOORAY! And now that ESPN has relieved Tony Kornheiser of his duties, we’re looking at one of the more pleasant NFL announcing landscapes to come along in quite some time. No Korny! No Theismann! No Maguire! Sweet, sweet relief. The only chance you get hosed this year is if big fat Tony Siragusa dumbs his way into your game. And really, what are the odds of that?
What’s that? Goose is part of the Cowboys’ Week 1 announcing team? GRRRRR.
The always indispensable Awful Announcing has gotten hold of the announcer lineups for Week 1. And, sure enough, the Cowboys-Bucs tangle will be presided over by Kenny “Son Of Bitey” Albert, Moose Johnston, and the Goose. Siragusa is unique among NFL analysts in that he’s deployed as a kind of sideline announcer/analyst hybrid. He’s two kinds of useless! Whee! “Hey guys, look at dis! Dey got free hot dogs down on the concourse!”
I, for one, don’t think any Cowboys game should have Moose Johnston on it. I know Troy Aikman is FOX’s top guy, so it’s unavoidable that he’d have to do a Cowboys game now and then. But the fact that FOX has two former Cowboys as announcers always elevates the risk of opposing fan’s complaining that the analysts are rooting for their old team. Personally, I don’t think Aikman or Johnston are biased when calling Cowboys games. But that doesn’t matter, because a lot of people will use it as an excuse to cry foul anyway.
Some other quick notes from the Week 1 announcing lineup: Favre’s debut with the Vikings will be called by Thom Brennaman and Brian Billick, and Gus Johnson does not yet have an analyst partner for the Colts-Jags game. Does he even need one? “Manning, looking downfield, THROWING DOWNFIIIIIIIELLLLLD… GOT IT!!!!!!!”
