TVSquad

Today was the very last day of the press tour here in Beverly Hills. It was "TCA Day," with members of the association (including me) going to the Warner Brothers lot to visit the sets of ER, Pushing Daisies, and Chuck, where we spoke to cast members and producers (Oh, we went to the set of America's Best Dance Crew, but let's just forget I mentioned that one). Then we bused it over to the Fox lot, where Joss Whedon showed us around the set of Dollhouse, and the entire cast of King of the Hill gave a table read of their 250th episode. All this fun will be in upcoming posts later this summer.

Despite some of the griping you may have seen from me, it's been lots of fun. It's just a very tiring experience. Case in point: On Monday, NBC decided to close out the press conference portion of the tour by having us sit through ten panels, five of them after lunch. Here's a wrap-up post that goes over some of what went on yesterday that I haven't already covered.

NBC's Football Night in America is something like too much of a good thing. The network seems intent on stuffing the Sunday night broadcast with everything but the kitchen sink.

When Tiki Barber retired from the New York Giants, he joined their broadcast. Same thing with Jerome Bettis of the Pittsburgh Steelers. Then Keith Olbermann, a sports guy before becoming the host of MSNBC's Countdown, was inserted into the show. And that was on top of the three mainstays Bob Costas, Cris Collinsworth and Peter King.

Now, you can add one more star to the constellation. Dan Patrick is joining Football Night in America. Patrick, formerly the main man at ESPN -- and Keith's longtime partner on Sports Center as well as Dan's radio show -- will be paired up with Olbermann again and will be slotted in as pre-game show's co-host.

There's no question that Patrick will be an asset. His 18 years at ESPN proved that, and I admired his maverick spirit when he bolted the comforts of Bristol, Connecticut and set up a new deal with his radio show.

Long before ESPN was the worldwide leader in sports, ABC sportscaster and newsman Jim McKay was the voice of American sports. ABC sports legend Jim McKay died today at the age of 86; the cause of death was not revealed. In the annals of television history, Jim McKay is among the giants in sports broadcasting: a twelve-time Emmy winner, an iconic presence on The Wide World of Sports, the man who said the words, "the thrill of victory, the agony of defeat." He was the moderator of twelve Olympics and a broadcaster who gave the best he had in every television show in which he was involved, be it the Kentucky Derby, the British Open, or any of the other hundreds of events he covered.

If Jim McKay had just done that, he'd have a great legacy. However, when he was confronted with the task of anchoring the events that unfolded at the 1972 Munich Olympics, when the Israeli athletes were taken hostage by terrorist and killed in a commando raid, Jim McKay rose to the occasion.

As Bob Sassone wrote in his report about Inside the NFL ending its HBO run last February, the NFL was reporting that the show would find a home on another network. It has. And I can tell you now that Inside the NFL will be appearing weekly on Showtime. It'll be a collaboration with CBS Sports and NFL Films. That said, I think we can expect to see CBS talent on the show.

In its most recent edition on HBO, Inside the NFL was hosted by Bob Costas, with expert input by former players and current broadcast analysts Dan Marino, Cris Collinsworth and Cris Carter. Costas and Collinsworth are NBC employees, and Carter is part of ESPN. That leaves Danny Boy. And yes, he is a CBS guy, a regular commentator on The NFL Today every Sunday during football season. I'll bet you right now that Dan will be on the show.

Inside the NFL is a unique weekly highlight show -- one of the best ever -- because shows the games up close from the viewpoint of NFL Films. Those cameras get inside of the game more than TV cameras. They're films, not TV and the production values are like a documentary film. As a longtime football fan, I'm really glad that Inside the NFL will go on. This year will be its 32nd on the air.

Anyone catch the live broadcast of Costas NOW last night? I was lucky enough to get a few tickets and went to the live taping in Manhattan with my girlfriend. And I really do mean lucky. Not only did we get seated in the front row, but we were seated right in front of all the panelists. Everyone. Joe Buck, Cris Carter, Mitch Albom, Mike Tirico, Michael Wilbon, John McEnroe... the list goes on. And of course, Bob Costas was only a few feet in front of us on stage. For a sports and TV fanatic, it was very impressive. So why am I writing about it? The town hall format of the show covered a lot of hot topics in sports, but there were a couple segments that really stood out because they directly relate to what we're doing here at TV Squad -- blogging and athletes' (or in our case TV celebs, writers, and producers) reactions to the media.

• TNT has NBA Playoffs all night.
• At 8, ABC has a new According To Jim.
• CBS has a new NCIS at 8, followed by a new Shark.
• FOX has new episodes of American Idol and Hell's Kitchen.
• There's a new Beauty and the Geek on The CW at 8, then a new Reaper.
• At 9, ABC has a new Dancing with the Stars, then a new Women's Murder Club.
• PBS has a new installment of Carrier at 9.
• Discovery has a new Deadliest Catch at 9.
• Hallmark has the new movie The Good Witch at 9.
• BBC America has a new Last Restaurant Standing at 9.
• At 10, NBC has a new Law and Order: SVU.
• FX has a new episode of The Riches at 10.
• Sci-Fi has a new ECW at 10.
• HBO has a new Costas Now at 10.
• Also at 10: MTV has a new A Shot At Love with Tila Tequila.

Check your local TV listings for more.

There are probably two reactions to that headline:

1. No big deal, I didn't really watch that show anyway.

2. There's a show called Inside the NFL?

Actually, there's a third reaction possible, when you realize that the show has been on for 31 years! I had no idea the show was on for that long, nor did I know that HBO has existed for that long. I wonder how many people had cable in 1977?

• At 7, USA has coverage of The U.S. Open.
• At 8, CBS has a new Power of 10.
• NBC has a new Most Outrageous Moments at 8, then new episodes of Last Comic Standing and Dateline.
• At 9, Fox News has a Republican debate from New Hampshire.
• TBS has two new episodes of House of Payne at 9.
• There's a new Mythbusters on Discovery at 9.
• The History Channel has a new Lost Worlds at 9.
• HBO has a new Costas NOW at 9.
• At 9:30, HGTV has a new Design on a Dime.
• At 10, FX has a new Rescue Me.
• Food Network has a new Dinner: Impossible at 10.
• Fox Movie Channel has Revenge of the Nerds at 10.
• Also at 10: Bravo has a new Top Chef.

Check your local TV listings for more.

I'll admit I was first "miffled" by most ambiguous ending ever in the history of series endings. But I'm beginning to come around to the the side that sees The Sopranos finale as "brilliant" rather than "lame." David Chase left us wanting more, and that's pretty awesome. Besides, according to Ken Levine, it could have been a lot worse.

On his blog, Ken, a veteran sitcom writer, hilariously reminds us just how annoying The Sopranos finale would have been on network television. For starters, a countdown clock would have run across the bottom of our television screens for at least a month leading up to the finale. The two-hour finale would have been preceded by a one-hour clip show hosted by Bob Costas. Janice would have gotten her own spin-off called Widow With Children.

Keith Olbermann has a new gig.

Or should I say "another gig," as he'll still be host of MSNBC's Countdown. But he's going to add a co-hosting position on NBC's Football Night In America, the pre-game show that airs at 7pm on Sunday nights before the NFL game that NBC telecasts.

Olbermann has a long history in TV sports, having hosted ESPN's SportsCenter with Dan Patrick years ago (he was one of the models for the characters on Sports Night) and his own show on FOX Sports Network that was good but didn't last too long. This will be his first job in network sports in several years, other than what he does on Dan Patrick's radio show. Olbermann will join Bob Costas, Cris Collinsworth, Jerome Bettis, and Tiki Barber, who started on NBC this morning.

[via TV Newser]

The Olympics is usually a ratings juggernaut for NBC, but not this year. Since the Winter Olympics began a week ago, the games have been clobbered by new episodes of Grey's Anatomy, American Idol and Lost. In fact, the ratings have dropped every night since Opening Ceremonies and Olympics viewership is down 36% since Salt Lake City in 2002.

The Olympics. An event where athletes from every country in the world gather to compete in sports. It's a time of unity. Of heroes. Of peace. Somebody needs to clue Brian Williams in.

He joined Bob Costas as the commentator for the Opening Ceremonies of the Turino, Italy Olympic games last night. And I almost through threw the remote control through the television set. Williams felt the need to share his news knowledge with the rest of us by mentioning some not-so-happy news events related to specific nations as they paraded into Olympic stadium. Denmark? Williams mentions the cartoon that triggered riots in Muslim nations. China? He talks about human rights and environmental standards. Iran? He says that country's leader has called for the destruction of Israel. I much prefer the interesting factoids about the nations, their Olympic history, and notable Olympians.

His comments were unfair to the athletes of those nations. The news and controversy surrounding certain nations lately are not representative of the athletes who are competing.

**Apparently, the Daily Nightly commenters agree.

That's 17.3 days of Olympics coverage, people. And most of it is going to be focused on figure skating. The Olympics run for 17 days (from February 10-26), but NBC will not be playing the events around-the-clock. Instead, it will spread its coverage out during daytime, primetime, and late night viewing hours on six stations: NBC, USA, MSNBC, CNBC, NBC HD, and Universal HD. In comparison, NBC had 375.5 hours of coverage during the Salt Lake City winter games four years ago.

Bob Costas will return as primetime host for the winter games, his seventh year with NBC Sports. And, to feed the needs of all those ice skating fans, Dick Buttons will host Olympic Ice, a daily report on the games' most popular sport. NBC is also prominently featuring David Pelletier and Jamie Sale in their coverage. The Canadian couple, who just got married, were a crowd favorite in 2002 when they ended up tying for gold with the Russian pairs skaters.