In the newest AA Podcast we welcome Tony Dungy of NBC's Football Night In America.  Tony won a Super Bowl as a player with the Pittsburgh Steelers and as a coach with the Indianapolis Colts.  He's also a best selling author with his first book Quiet Strength selling well over a million copies.  For the last few years, he's been a fixture on NBC's Football Night In America and helped make it the premier pregame show in the NFL.  In the podcast, Tony chats with AA about...

-The challenges he still faces as an analyst
-Tim Tebow and how his faith impacts his public persona
-Will Peyton Manning be in a Colts uniform next year and beyond?
-Which QB Tony would take heading into the Super Bowl: Brady or Eli?
-How to stop Rob Gronkowski and Aaron Hernandez.
-What the Giants and Patriots need to do to win the Super Bowl.
-Will he ever leave the studio and head back to the sidelines?

All that and even more NFL topics with one of the most respected voices in sports on this edition of the AA Podcast.  Follow Tony on Twitter here and check out all of our podcasts on ITunes.

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It is the most infamous incident in the history of sideline interviews.  It turned a legendary quarterback into a national punchline, embarrassed the NFL, spawned a hilarious website, and is the biggest moment in the career of a certain ESPN sideline reporter.  Several years later, the name of Suzy Kolber can't be mentioned without the name of Joe Namath following close behind.  Usually that's followed by either "I want to kiss you" or "I couldn't care less about the team strug-g-ling."  Let's take a brief stumble down memory lane, shall we? 

Looking back as it happened live, it's a bit disturbing how easily the broadcast booth laughed off Namath's mystifying behavior.  More than eight years later, Kolber spoke for the first time about interviewing a hammered Joe Namath live on national television as a part of the HBO special Namath, airing this Sunday night.  Here's some of her quotes as reported by USA Today:

"I felt like, 'uh-oh,' Joe is in trouble here and let's get him out of it... Get him off the air as quickly as possible." Kolber says she hasn't spoken about the incident "because I knew he wanted it to go away."

"when we first started talking and he was slow and deliberate and in his speech, what was going through my head was, 'Maybe it's just really cold.' And none of the executives in the truck were alarmed either because nobody said (to) stop. ... The direction in my earpiece was, 'keep going.' ''

"I think the way I felt about it at the time was that he's a really good guy having a bad moment that happened to be captured on national television."

For his part, drunkenly hitting on a sideline reporter gave Joe Namath a serious wake up call to turn his life around in the aftermath.  Given the history and quality of HBO Sports, the documentary should provide a compelling look at the life of Joe Namath.  But how much attention will be payed to the one moment that has defined him as a creepy drunk guy to a new generation of NFL fans?  

For her part, it's amazing how much grace Suzy Kolber has shown about the incident with Joe Namath after all these years.  A moment like that which lives in infamy can't be easy to deal with when remaining in that same role at ESPN.  It's a shame the Joe Namath interview will always follow Suzy Kolber's career like a shadow, but she's been able to move beyond that as a solid NFL reporter for ESPN.   

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NBC released a listing of various Super Bowl tie-ins for the programming on its variety of networks next week, and honestly, some of them are quite ridiculous. I'm all for dedicating all of your general sports studio shows to the game, but NBC Universal is going all out this year on seemingly every single one of their platforms. Take a look at some of these tie-ins...

Late Night with Jimmy Fallon: For the first time in the show’s history, Late Night with Jimmy Fallon will take the show on the road – to Indianapolis – for a total of four shows; including one first-ever LIVE Late Night with Jimmy Fallon show on Sunday night after Super Bowl XLVI.

Seriously? THE Jimmy Fallon is bringing his mediocre talk show on the road, and he chooses Indianapolis as the destination? Awesome. When Conan took his show on the road, he went to Los Angeles... you know, a big city that's known for entertainment.

Weather Channel: Jim Cantore will join NBC’s Super Bowl coverage from Indianapolis, and Wake Up with Al’s Stephanie Abrams and Al Roker will also be on-site reporting the Super Bowl headlines for Weather Channel.

This is Lucas Oil Stadium, where the game will be held. Notice anything interesting about it? Yeah, it's got a roof. So if the weather in Indianapolis is terrible during the week, they can just... take weather out of the equation by closing the roof, which is what I assume they'd do anyway. I really have no idea why Weather Channel reporters are reporting on weather for an indoor event.

Golf Channel: In anticipation of season two of his critically acclaimed series premiering Feb. 27, David Feherty will host a special Feherty Live stage show from Indianapolis Friday night, which Golf Channel will air as a one-hour special Saturday at 10 p.m. ET. And throughout Super Bowl week, Golf Channel’s popular morning show, Morning Drive, will feature various NFL guests, including former and current players and executives to talk Super Bowl predictions. Friday’s Golf Central show will include look-ins at Feherty’s rehearsals in Indianapolis and promote Sunday’s Super Bowl.

Feherty's appearance on CBS during the divisional games was strange, and it's a little stranger that the Golf Channel stalwart will be doing more NFL related stuff... for a channel that has nothing to do with the NFL. If you're tuning into the Golf Channel during the winter months, don't you think you'd be doing it to get away from nonstop football talk? Regardless, we can't hold any ill will towards Feherty, an AA favorite.

E!: The nation’s premier destination for celebrity and entertainment news will report from Indianapolis Wednesday through Monday with correspondents Catt Sadler and David Burtka.

Is there really going to be a lot of breaking entertainment news from Indianapolis, the home of... what, exactly? I know some celebrities will be heading to the game, but I don't think it's worth sending a couple of correspondents there. Then again, maybe we can get a hold of the complete list of media outlets given credentials, and analyze the most bizarre ones of the bunch.

For a network that only showed 2 hours of horse racing two years ago, the announcement that the Breeders Cup will not only return to NBC, but will be offered in a prime-time viewing spot is a welcome change for horse racing enthusiasts.

The Breeders Cup is likely considered the lesser-known of major horse racing events compared to the Triple Crown events including the Preakness, Belmont and of course the Kentucky Derby. But with viewership ratings up overall for all of horse racing (especially the Derby), it’s really a no brainer for NBC to extend their coverage of horse racing nationwide and bring it into primetime.  With NBC also looking to add more sports to the network and the NBC Sports Network, it's a smart move.

From the NYT: “NBC and the NBC Sports Network will combine to present nine and a half hours of live coverage of 15 Breeders’ Cup races over two days with horses from around the world competing for more than $25 million. The Classic, which has helped crown 11 Horses of the Year, will be run between 8 p.m. and 9 p.m. Eastern on Nov. 3.”

From 1984-2005, NBC held the Breeders Cup rights only to lose them to ESPN/ABC. In the new four year deal, it makes NBC the sole home for horse racing out of all the television networks. Something few networks can say in regards to any sport.

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Chicago Bulls color commentator Stacey King is excitable. A visit to his soundboard webpage and clicking on "splash!" a dozen or so times will confirm this fact. So it comes as no surprise that a majestic swooping lay up by Brian Scalabrine over E! superstar Kris Humphries in the second quarter of a lopsided Bulls/Nets tilt would produce a memorable call.

For you that just watched that clip and still do not trust your ears...here is a transcript.

King- "OOOHH, SCAL! THE WHITE MAMBA! DON'T DO 'EM LIKE THAT! DON'T SHOW THEM THE VERSATILITY! Show one side and go to the other. Boy that boy is smooth, Funk."

Scalabrine averages 1.4 points and 6.5 enthusiastic high fives off the bench per game. He's pretty much that guy you would make in create a player mode in a videogame after you've been huffing paint.

The White Mamba is pretty harmless these days, but that wasn't always the case. As a Pistons fan, I looked on in horror as Scalabrine's dominance put the Nets one game away from eliminating the eventual 2004 champions in a classic game that went into triple OT. Check out this line from that article,

"Scalabrine made all four of his 3-pointers, including one that gave New Jersey a 122-118 lead with about 40 seconds left in the third overtime."

See, Scalabrine can be cold blooded, like a mamba.

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With the Super Bowl approaching in less than two weeks, excitement is building not just for the game, but for the commercials.  If you aren't a Giants or Patriots fan, the commercials are one way to get your mind off your team not being in the big game.  Super Bowl commercials have taken on a life of their own over the years and draw in a sizeable portion of the Super Bowl's annual record setting audience.  Each commercial this year can cost a company between 3.5 and 4 MILLION dollars for just thirty seconds of air time.  

Thankfully, the folks at Next Media Animation, who you may know for their Taiwanese animation videos, have taken the time to instruct all of us on what goes into a successful, viral Super Bowl ad.  Key elements include...

-Talking babies
-Talking animals
-Hot women, preferably not wearing clothes
-Beer
-Beer playing football
-Nut shots
-Animals playing football
-Talking frogs, specifically
-Old celebrities
-Star Wars

Yup, that pretty much sums up every single successful Super Bowl commercial ever made.  Except this one.  I'm still trying to figure out though why everything in American culture is automatically funnier when seen through the eyes of Taiwanese animation...

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The news of Tiki Barber appearing on SNY over the weekend got us thinking.  No, don't worry, Barber didn't say anything in his coverage of the Giants/49ers game that actually stimulated any brain cells.  Instead, Barber's precipitous fall from the Today Show to a regional network got us to wonder where Barber ranked in all-time busts in the sports media.  There have been many flops in the world of announcing and analyzing sports.  Some were world-class athletes who became cringe-worthy analysts.  Some were athletes who flopped when given a stage even bigger than sports. Some were comedians or celebrities who brought more eyerolls than eyeballs.  Check out our list of the Top 10 Sports Media Busts and let us know what you think!

(10) John Sutcliffe - ESPN's Monday Night Football
-Our first entrant doubles as the most recent.  It's great that ESPN seeks to give crossover exposure to ESPN Deportes.  By all accounts, John Sutcliffe is a great journalist there.  However, when his time on the mothership came earlier this year as a sideline reporter on ESPN's Monday Night Football, Sutcliffe dropped the ball so bad that he was taken off the air midway through the broadcast.

(9) Bobby Valentine - ESPN's Sunday Night Baseball
-Bobby V was always a great soundbyte as a manager because of his wit and personality.  Naturally, one thought these traits would make a great transition into the studio or the broadcast booth.  And yes, when Valentine was hired to be a part of ESPN's Baseball Tonight stable, the move was met with excitement.  While Valentine never wowed the masses in the studio, he never really embarrassed himself.  As it turns out, Bobby V saved that for the booth as part of the revamped Sunday Night Baseball team in 2011.  Valentine was routinely panned by the masses on Twitter, with this out-of-nowhere rant on Cubs SS Starlin Castro Exhibit A.  Thankfully, the Red Sox saved viewers by hiring Bobby V as manager this winter while ESPN hired Terry Francona.  

(8) Joe Montana & Isiah Thomas - NBC Sports
-Though Montana and Thomas were all-time greats in their sports, NBC swung and missed when hiring the two as analysts in the 90s.  All the poise Montana showed as one of the greatest QBs ever never got the chance to show through his bland takes.  In fact, Montana gave analysis worthy of a man whose family was being held off-stage at gunpoint.  Meanwhile, Thomas's soft voice and stammered analysis made him a difficult listen, even when NBC pushed him as their lead NBA analyst.  

Apparently, the broadcasting of these two was so lackluster, YouTube is devoid of worthy clips.  But, thanks to the outstanding SI Vault, we have some perspective.  First, Montana in his own words, "In TV, nobody cares if you get it right; they just want you to yell, to seem definitive. It was the old, 'If you can't dazzle 'em with brilliance, then baffle 'em with b.———-.' I had to go."  Next, John Walters on Isiah, "His energy level wavers during a telecast, and he says "You know" too much, as in, "Yeah, you know, we, you know, Jordan when he guards you, you know, he shuts you down, you know?"

As promised, we at AA have been closely following Craig James' doomed political run in Texas.  What with the former ESPN analyst polling in at 4% and his unfavoribility numbers much higher, James' campaign has to be getting desperate.  Well, with the latest ad from the James campaign, it seems the disgraced analyst is making a direct, desperate plea to explain why he's running for Senate.  You know, that's an excellent question.  Why is this ex-football player running for Senate, besides the fact he's a corrupt, lying buffoon?

As always, James talks about Washington being "off its rails" and that he will fix the problems with "simple solutions" and "common sense."  Of course, I'm sure simple is a word many would use to describe what must go on in the mind of Craig James.  

James also talks about going outside of his comfort zone, you know, the zone that involves getting head coaches fired, fighting your petulant son's battles, and rumors of dead hookers.  That's exactly the type of life Franklin and Jefferson and the rest of the Founding Fathers imagined, right?  We might soon be able to add perjurer to that list as well.  

There's no official word from James if he's filimed his latest ad straight from "Real Street".  However, in a letter to President Obama before his State of the Union, James encourages him to "deal with the issues that face the American people living on Real Street."  We're working to confirm if James' next letter was to Santa Claus asking for a new BB gun for Christmas.  Don't stop now Craig!  I'm sure the Real Street Express will take off very soon... maybe even to 5% in the polls!

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A recent tidbit in a lengthy Sports Business Journal article on sports media shed light on the highest paid announcers in sports.  Often, contract situations with announcers and other on-air personalities are kept tight-lipped.  Remember the pure shock last year at the announcement that Gus Johnson was leaving CBS?  None of the networks, nor the announcers comment on contract details, especially how much money is being dished out.  That's why it's such a big deal when details like this are mentioned publicly.  Naturally, the top earners at each network are of little surprise.  Al Michaels at NBC.  Jim Nantz at CBS.  Joe Buck at Fox.  But who is the top paid sports TV personality?  That answer may surprise you...

While no one could provide exact figures, multiple broadcast talent experts said that of the hundreds of people working in on-air sports jobs, there are a handful of on-air personalities who make the most money, and none is a former professional athlete. Four men stand above the crowd and are considered the highest-paid broadcasters in the U.S., these experts say: Bob Costas and Al Michaels at NBC, Joe Buck at Fox, and Jim Nantz at CBS. According to multiple sources, Costas, Michaels, Buck and Nantz each earns in the range of $5 million a year. Several sources said that of the four, Costas earns the most, as he works not only multiple major sporting events for NBC, but he also works for MLB Network.

I'm actually quite astonished Costas makes more than the triumvirate of Buck, Michaels, and Nantz.  What Costas does, he does amazingly well (except for those SNF halftime lectures), but he doesn't really do much.  He hosts SNF and Triple Crown coverage along with special events (like the acclaimed Jerry Sandusky interview), but his TV time is relatively small.  Honestly, when was the last time Bob Costas did play by play coverage of a major nationally televised sporting event?  The 2000 NBA Finals?  I assume Costas makes the majority of his money as the face of the Olympics, which is where most of NBC's money goes anyways. 

As far as Buck, Michaels, and Nantz go, these are the immovable fixtures enthroned at the top of each network and they ain't goin anywhere anytime soon.  These three announce most of the biggest events in sports - the Super Bowl, World Series, NCAA Tournament, Sunday Night Football, and The Masters to name a few.  But what about the next level of broadcasters?  SBJ also reveals who is in the second tier of the highest paid announcers...

I have to give Kris Humphries credit for accomplishing the impossible.  He replaced LeBron James as the most disliked player in the NBA.  Humphries has had to deal with getting booed every time he touches the ball when the New Jersey Nets play on the road.  Not because he predicted to win seven championships.  Not because he committed any crimes.  Not because he abandoned his hometown team or asked for a trade or had his jersey burning in any streets.  No, because he was married to Kim Kardashian for the approximate length of time Chip Kelly was head coach of the Tampa Bay Buccaneers.  

But now, Kris Humphries has to move on with his life as a serviceable NBA big man.  However, he remains loathed by sports fans for a sham wedding to one of the lowest lifeforms on the planet, reality television stars.  I assume there's also a section of the population, however tiny, screaming "how could he do that to Kimmy!!!"  Nevertheless, Kris Humphries is evidently going to go down the long road of recovering his image by ditching his public relations team and focusing on his basketball career.  Here's details from The Hollywood Gossip...

The New Jersey Nets power forward/E! star has called it quits with Anderson Public Relations, TMZ confirms, following disagreements between the company and the Humphries over how to best promote the latter off the court.

Kris' relationship with Anderson lasted 73 days, so, hey, that's an improvement of 24 hours for the guy!

Sources say he now wants to focus solely on basketball, which ought to be welcome news for the woeful Nets.

The source of Humphries' divorce (too soon?) with his PR team is evidently this disaster of an interview with GMA co-host and ESPN alum Josh Elliott.  You can't blame him for trying to stay away from any sort of spotlight in that regard, although I'd love to be a fly on the wall on those discussions of improving Kris Humphries' public image.  I suppose he could fall in love with a Perkins waitress, although that's kind of been done before.

I hate to admit this, but after watching Kris Humphries "perform" on Kourtney & Kim Take New York (don't judge me!), he actually makes me feel sympathy for the Kardashians.  I shudder at typing those words.  Who knows, maybe it's clever E! editing trying to save face for Kim and Kris Humphries is a fine gentleman who can go on to a popular NBA career after this little speed bump in Hollywood.  Then again, maybe Kris Humphries is just an idiot...

(via The Hollywood Gossip)

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