1. There have been 5 NFL playoff video games this weekend, however just one featured a broadcaster new to the postseason.
With NBC airing two playoff video games over the weekend, the community assigned its normal Sunday night time group of Al Michaels and Cris Collinsworth to the Steelers-Chiefs. NBC gave Saturday’s Raiders-Bengals game to its Notre Dame crew of Mike Tirico and Drew Brees.
And fairly frankly, that simply wasn’t truthful to Brees. Notre Dame soccer at 2:30 within the afternoon on a random fall Saturday just isn’t almost as vital as an NFL playoff game. Brees was not prepared for the stage.
It wasn’t that Brees was unhealthy. He simply introduced nothing to the desk. He didn’t give the viewer any sense that he was calling a playoff game. He fully whiffed on breaking down a number of horrible calls by the officers and simply didn’t provide any in-depth evaluation all through the game. He was extra Jason Witten than Tony Romo.
Tirico did all of the heavy lifting whereas Brees remained silent during a few of the greatest moments of the game. As a result of he was a fantastic quarterback during his profession, Brees, after all, was good at breaking down a few of the quarterback play from Joe Burrow and Derek Carr, however you’ll want to do greater than that as an analyst. It’s essential to provide technique, dig into a few of the controversial moments, name out errors. Brees did none of that.
The blame for this doesn’t fall solely on Brees. NBC actually had no enterprise giving him this task. Brees has solely been calling faculty soccer video games for a yr and NBC determined to present him an NFL playoff game? That was a attain and NBC deserves numerous the blame for the extreme backlash Brees obtained on social media during the game.
Once more, this was Brees’s first time calling an NFL playoff game, so he ought to be reduce some slack. In the event you’re NBC, it’s important to imagine Brees will enhance over time. However in the event you’re NBC, you also needs to see that enchancment earlier than giving Brees a playoff game and exposing him to 25-30 million viewers as a substitute of the 2-3 million individuals who watch Notre Dame video games.
2. This can be a savage tweet which you can ship to any of the Cowboys followers in your life.
3. No person has loved the Cowboys loss and mind-boggling game-ending blunder greater than Stephen A. Smith.
4. Lots of people have been questioning why CBS carried Sunday’s Niners-Cowboys game as a substitute of FOX, particularly after Troy Aikman acquired salty about it during the Eagles-Bucs game.
This is why CBS had the Niners-Cowboys matchup.
5. The Rock is coming to the ManningCast tonight.
6. A brand-new SI Media Podcast dropped this morning and this week’s present options an interview with Richard Deitsch, who beforehand hosted the present. Deitsch, who now works for The Athletic, mentioned the state of podcasts, what makes an excellent podcast and what makes an excellent host. We additionally talked about sports activities media information objects, together with the disappointing scores for the school soccer nationwide title game and the NFL’s being arrange for a monster postseason relating to viewership.
Within the weekly “Traina Ideas” phase of the podcast, Sal Licata, from WFAN and SNY TV in New York, and I talk about the NFL wild-card matchups, sports activities betting coming to New York, Cobra Kai and way more.
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7. RANDOM VIDEO OF THE DAY: Saturday Evening Reside spoofed Contained in the NBA and Covid’s influence on the league.
Remember to atone for previous editions of Traina Ideas and take a look at the Sports activities Illustrated Media Podcast hosted by Jimmy Traina on Apple, Spotify or Stitcher. You can too observe Jimmy on Twitter and Instagram.
