TVSquad

NBC's press tour day continued with a panel on Sunday Night Football.

When it concluded, panelists including Tiki Barber, John Madden and Al Michaels tossed out signed footballs to 10 or so lucky members of the press. Score! I caught the ball thrown to me by 2006 Super Bowl champion Jerome Bettis, formerly of The Pittsburgh Steelers, now an NBC sports analyst.

In my dreams. It actually sailed over my head to a journalist behind me. "Fumble," he said as he scooped it up.

Sometimes press tour swag can be elusive.

(S01E09) After a week off, the Panthers have another big game. And although there was a lot of hype about how tough this game would be in the promos, the game itself was almost an afterthought. As the show moves along there is less and less focus on the actual football. If my clock is right, we didn't get any actual game footage until 53 minutes into the hour. And that's fine by me. All three of the stories from this week were great, and the little bit of the game that we did get covered everything we needed to know.

First up, lots of development for the William's family. The Smash on steroids story seems to suffer from some of the time issues that the Street recovery does. It's all happening a little fast. Given that he just started on his cycle last week, I don't think he should be seeing a skin reaction or whatever the episode during his workout was. I'm willing to accept that time moves faster in Dillon though, because I really liked the William's family story this week.

The ESPN sports show host (and subject of that lame Jason Alexander sitcom from a couple of years ago, Listen Up) makes his debut tonight on Monday Night Football, a preseason game between the Raiders and the Vikings, and he's a little worried about it. As he says in a not-so-subtle way in this New York Times piece, "I'm going to bomb."

Maybe this is just a way of lowering expectations. He's not going to bomb or be terrible. I mean, Tony, it can't be any worse than Listen Up, can it?

From John Madden to Sarah Paulson, Bradley Whitford, and superheroes on the small screen (where they really flourish) -- here are the five things I'm looking forward to this Fall TV season:

1. Lex, Lana, and General Zod love triangle: Forget Bryan Singer's not-too-bad film, forget the foul and execrable My Super Ex-Girlfriend, Smallville does comics right. And no ditzy bimbo sidekick for television's Lex Luthor, who appears to have won the heart of Clark's ex, Lana Lang, over the course of last season, and now he's possessed by the Superman II film villain, Zod. That's character development that movies, (even 2 hour 45 minute movies) just don't have time for. A Smallville cast addition: Jimmy Olsen? Who cares. And is that freckled goofball the best they can do as a love interest for adorable Chloe (Allison Mack)? Also, I'm thankful the suits passed on Aquaman. There's a reason Aquaman is the fake movie on Entourage -- the very idea is just ridiculous. A superhero should have powers that at least outweigh his weaknesses. (Has gills and the ability to bond with lobster and other entrees, but can't be out of water more than one hour?) Now, Justin Hartley is freed up to play Green Arrow on a Smallville arc. Come to think of it, cut Chloe a break and hook her up with Green Arrow.

Well, it wasn't the proverbial bucket of balls, but it was close. A day after ESPN announced a Monday Night Football team from which Al Michaels was consipcuously absent comes official word that NBC has signed Michaels to rejoin John Madden in the booth for their new Sunday night football package.

But NBC didn't get Michaels for nothing. According to the SI.com article, ESPN and its parent company, Disney, received the following items in exchange for Michaels, who was under contract with the cable network: the cable rights to the Friday broadcasts of the next four Ryder Cups, "increased usage of Olympic highlights" (whatever that means), and the rights to the cartoon character Oswald the Lucky Rabbit, which appeared in silent Disney cartoon shorts in the late 1920s.

(More detailed information can be found in this USAToday.com article.)

In a development that surprised no one, ESPN has announced that Mike Tirico and Tony Kornheiser will join Joe Theismann in the booth for their version of Monday Night Football, set to debut this fall. Because Kornheiser also co-hosts the popular ESPN show Pardon The Interruption, this means that Tony and his PTI compadre Michael Wilbon will take the show on the road every Monday during the football season, airing the show from the location of that night's game.

So, what happened with Al Michaels? Wasn't he supposed to be doing MNF next year? Well, considering the fact that a) he has also been removed as ABC's number-one NBA announcer (to be replaced by Mike Breen), and b) there have been rumors floating around that he wanted to break his newly-signed ESPN contract and join John Madden on NBC's new Sunday Night broadcast, chances are good that Super Bowl XL was the last game Michaels called in his thirty-year ABC career. No official announcement has come out yet, but expect to see Michaels on the Peacock Network next fall.

More information can be found in this Reuters article, with actual quotes on Michaels from ESPN executives included.