"NFL Network" anyone?

Wow, I'm surprised to be the first to post on this here. I know there are other DirecTV/NFL ST subs here, so what do you think? I have two DirecTV receivers w/ TiVo service w/ 2 tuners each, and one tuner has been tuned to ch. 212 since the debut on Mon. 8PM. This has renewed/enhanced my love for the NFL. I especially liked the video that Tony Gonzales of the KC Chiefs shot and the scene in the weight room where you see Dick Vermeil pumping iron. No wonder the man stays so young & vital.

 

Pro football isn't my favorite sport--baseball is--but I'd probably try to catch some of this channel if it was available on my cable. (Then again, to make room for it they'd probably have to apply even more compression to the other channels, which would likely piss me off so much that I'd boycott the new channel in protest. )

One disappointment is that, apparently, they *still* refuse to show actual game telecasts from the past. This is a squandered opportunity, IMO; NFL Films does great work, but there's something about watching a game unfold in "real time", just as you would have back in the day, that really gets the nostalgia juices flowing. Anybody who's watched an old baseball or college football telecast on ESPN Classic knows what I mean. Besides, who wouldn't love to see an old "MNF" game with Frank, Howard, and Dandy Don? Or an old Super Bowl broadcast with Ray Scott or Curt Gowdy?

 

I looked at it briefly, meh. Baseball>football for me, too.

I agree with the points above.

The NFL is way too full of themselves. "ESPN welcomes you to the following presentation of the National Football League." Only slightly pretentious. [/sarcasm]

 

About a month ago one of the local sports-radio blabbers was comparing baseball with football, and one of the reasons he gave for why the former "sucked", IHO, was that MLB has "too much hype" nowadays.

And the NFL is a model of tasteful restraint?!!

 

I'd LOVE to see the original MNF broadcasts, as they aired at the time, complete with Howard's Halftime Highlights (nothing MNF has done in the years since has ever topped that) and the occasional old Punt, Pass & Kick competition. Apparently, all of them still exist.

But Super Bowls are another story. It's well known that, even though two different networks (NBC and CBS) televised Super Bowl I, no videotape of either broadcast still exists.

Just a few years ago, NBC "re-discovered" its videotape, with sound, of one of the great non-Super Bowl NFL games -- the "Immaculate Reception" playoff game between Oakland and Pittsburgh in the AFC playoffs in 1972 -- and aired that play during a halftime show. It had a completely different angle on the play from the one in the NFL Films footage that is aired most frequently, and if someone were to slow it down (it wasn't shown on instant replay), it might answer the mystery once and for all: Was the catch legal? Then again, maybe we don't want to know.

 

Interesting that this would turn into a Baseball is better than football thread, but it's certainly leaning that way. Baseball clearly is a better game. Football is so flawed from a rules (and practical application thereof), any intellectual discussion would result in the obvious conclusion that baseball is the greatest "sport" ever devised (won't get into the "game" issue here). I'm a HUGE football fan, but even I can't keep up with all of the crazy (and sometimes way misguided) subtleties of the rules.

However, that said, I LOVE NFL football and look forward to the network coming to my digital cable. Definitely get the old games on---how 'bout an old Summerall/Brookshire telecast? Drunken Paul Hornung anyone?

The NFL is popular primarily for its triumverate gambling attraction: pools, fantasy, hardcore regular gambling on games. Take that out of the equation, and it would become a much more pedestrian phenomenon. Still nothing better than heading to Wrigley on a sunny afternoon than freezing your ass off in the rain and snow at Soldier and having to sit through the TV timeouts. It flows on my couch, not at the stadium though.

 

Nope, neither the first or second one exists on tape, which is a pity. But most of the others can be found in their entirety, including SB III (Joe Namath's "guaranteed" win)...complete with commercials! Tapes of these have circulated in fan circles for years; a representative offering can be found here.

Ideally, of course, there are better-quality tapes available in the archives of the NFL, or the networks. But they won't get televised without the league's say-so.