When it comes to "Monday Night Football," ESPN has tried everything except an announcer-less telecast.
No, we are not suggesting the Bristol Faculty go in that direction.
Especially now that there is reason for another change following Jason Witten, who failed to wow 'em (that's being kind) in his rookie season on "MNF," deciding to return to the Cowboys. We are recommending the suits jettison what's left of last season's team _ Joe Tessitore and Booger McFarland _ and bring in new voices.
Instead of chasing the next great "star," or going outside the box (i.e. the Tony Kornheiser years 2006-2008) ESPN should stay in-house, scan its roster of voices, and go with "home grown" mouths. The network should use cats who have already worked side-by-side. Our own search produced a solid team, one that has been together for four years at ESPN on college football. They are seasoned and define professionalism. And their passion for the games shines high-beam bright.
They are: Steve Levy and Brian Griese.
Glitz may not come to mind when you hear their names. Grit and craftsmanship should. Listen, ESPN has hired, and paid large green, to a "star," a Marquee Man like Witten, and what did it get them? Embarrassment? Taking the focus off the game, the only thing that matters, and putting it on the booth? The build-up and in-season hype suggested ESPN was telling us to "come watch our announcers" rather than come watch a football game. They even had McFarland riding up and down the sideline in some contraption as he provided analysis.
It's time for ESPN to go gimmick free. Make "MNF" be all about football and nothing but football. No doubt this would immediately differentiate the product from what other network's present.
Griese is cement-solid. He has been working college football for 10 seasons at ESPN. Last year he analyzed game one (Jets-Browns) of ESPN's "MNF" opening double header. Griese is an offensive mastermind who brings original insight to the mike on both sides of the ball.
His contacts around the NFL run deep. His father, Bob, the Dolphins Hall of Fame quarterback, was also an NFL and college football analyst for multiple networks (NBC, ABC, ESPN).
Levy, a SportsCenter mouth since 1993, also worked college football for four seasons (1999-2002) before returning to the booth in 2016. As a play-by-play personality Levy is himself, not full of himself (like Tessitore). In the booth Levy is apt to cut the pie at times but that's him. It works. He has a dry sense of humor and a big game voice that will fill the Monday night airwaves.
This just in: Like the NFL, sports TV is a copycat business. So, it's likely ESPN suits, despite having a solution right under their nose, will try and find another star. Although Panthers coach Ron Rivera said Greg Olsen (he has two years left on his contract) told him he wants to play next season, the Carolina tight end has attracted the attention of Fox and ESPN (before Witten returned to Dallas).
Does ESPN really want to go down the tight-end-with-limited-TV-experience road again? Does the Faculty want the media focus to be on yet another neophyte voice rather than "MNF" itself? Yes, Witten failed miserably. Do the executives who get paid big moolah to make these decisions want to be responsible for back-to-back failures?
If this now is all about the hunt to find the next Tony Romo, don't hold your breath. The last guy to burst on the scene like Romo was America's Everyman, John Madden. And yet he toiled on regional telecasts before climbing to the top of Mouth Mountain. Romo is a wonderful glitch in the system that paid off for CBS Sports.
It ain't happening again anytime soon.
ESPN needs to go shopping in its own store.
They can find Levy and Griese in aisle one.
