Adventures in Announcing

I got carried away with breaking down the Lions' defense yesterday, so I didn't talk much about the game. One point about the viewing experience that I wanted to bring up but never got around to was the incredibly bad play-by-play on the Fox broadcast. It was like going to see a play and for some reason King Lear is wearing white Nikes under his otherwise impreccable period garb. It was a nagging flaw throughout the game that kept on cropping up and distracting me from the action.

My initial impression of Fox's play-by-play guy for the Lions game was not favorable. Mike Goldberg decided to show up to the game with his thin hair slicked back and wearing a short, grizzly goatee. The overall look was more like the guy taking bets on the game, not a man who planned on showing up on television.

Fortunately you mainly hear the play-by-play guy, you don't have to see him. This is where he really shone. A couple examples: He mistook a Vikings receiver Greg Jennings for Golden Tate, the Vikings' punter for the Lions' punter, he called Minnesota's coach Mike Zimmer "Dom", presumably thinking of retired & long-time Yankee's bench coach Dom Zimmer (hilariously getting the incorrect sport, city, and vitality of the coach in question). He also mistakenly referred to Minnesota's coach as "Jim Caldwell" who is actually the Lions' coach, and that Norv Turner (Minnesota's OC) was calling plays for Detroit.

My favorite slip ups were how inaccurate he was in calling out yardage. Joique Bell had a first down run he called as a "7-yard run" when Bell had clearly gotten past the first down marker. There was another run that ended easily a yard shy of the yellow line that Goldberg excitedly declared "powers for a first down!" I get screwing up names your first day on the job (although presumably he would have prepared ahead of time by going over the rosters several times), but anybody should be able to tell the difference between an 11 yard run that crossed the yellow line from a 7 yard run that didn't.

Apparently Goldberg's biggest sin wasn't being the worst announcer ever but the way he responded to his critics, after which Fox sent him packing. His twitter response cost him his job, not his incompetence. This article makes an excellent point, that Fox would be better served by moving someone actually familiar with football, like Pam Oliver, to the announcer's booth. Is football so testosterone driven that Fox would rather have a guy with zero NFL experience calling games over a woman with 20 years on the sidelines? Am I asking a stupid question?