NFL Monday Night Football

ABC made a smart choice in kicking Dan Fouts and DENNIS MILLER! Dan was O.K. But Dennis, Hey, let's face it, he was never a good fit.

ABC brings probably the smartest man in the NFL today, John Madden. With Al Michaels and John Madden in the booth, look forward to a great season on Monday Night Football

Nothing use to touch Monday Night Football when it aired for over 38 seasons!! The other two major networks would try different approaches to Monday night programming and to no avail!! The initial idea to Monday Night Football was that Monday was the day of returning to reveille, kids back in school, everybody back to work, and just a naturally depressing day for everyone!! Once Monday Night Football came on the scene, Bars were having drink specials, friends were getting together for football parties at their homes and there now entered a little lilt in everybody's monotonous Monday blues schedule!! I counted on some of the best games in the NFL to be on Monday Night Football, and it was a real treat if they had the Dallas Cowboys' games!! I am a big Dallas Cowboy fan!! I also thought they should have given a fat contract to Mike Barz for being the new host of Monday Night Football, bringing him on would have been great!! "Monday Night Football" was a spectacular idea, the new Monday Night Football is not as good, but, it fills the void somewhat!! My bone of contention with "Monday Night Football" on ABC: BRING IT BACK!!!!

As someone who has watched this program since its inception, it's kind of sad now to look back at its history. Those who didn't grow up with this "phenomenan," as it was called in the '70s, can't realize how big a deal this sports program was at one time.

In its glory days, "Monday Night Football" was THE event on television each week for any football fan. It wasn't the individual game that particular night. It made no difference who was playing - it was a chance to hear what humorous and/or controversial things Howard Cosell and "Dandy" Don Meredith would say each week. The play-by-play announcer, Frank Gifford (Keith Jackson the first year) was just a "straight man" for Cosell and Meredith.

Cosell played the bad guy and loved it, and Meredith played the "good 'ole boy," and had a pretty good time himself. I can say the latter because I was in the press box for a few Monday night games in Buffalo and "Dandy Don" was feeling no pain, let's just leave it at that. The ratings were so high that celebrities and politicians would frequently enter the booth for a halftime interview.

The significance of the sporting event went downhill when those guys left and it has never really recovered. In fact, as you know, it left ABC for ESPN several years ago. It also has a had numerous "color" guys. Few of them have ever been very popular and some were downright horrible.

I will have always have great memories of Frank, Howard and Don when this program was truly exciting and all of us fans couldn't wait for Monday night.

Those who feel or prefer that commentators of Football stick to statistics are more than likely not listening to any of them anyway, or at least not remembering any of them. I may note that there are 2 other commentators there to provide such or they can be gathered almost anywhere. Read the paper. I find Dennis Miller a fresh relief from some often boring material concerning # of 1st downs made by such and such on 3 & 7's during home games over the last 4 years only to find the stats irrelevant in this particular situation at this time against this new defense and with this new offense. Give him a chance. He isn't ignorant concerning the game either but just likes to give others their chance and expects the same from themand you.

Monday Night Football is definitely the best game sports programming on television. Now that they have Dennis Miller onboard he should take it to new levels of entertainment not done before in pro football broadcasting. Plus with a top of the line play-by-play announcer like Al Michaels and also Dan Fouts. Short of John Madden and Pat Summerall this has to be the best broadcasting team in football.