Joe Buck and Troy Aikman will make Monday Night Football relevant again

SFGate

Before its move from ABC to ESPN in 2006, Monday Night Football was "the most exalted part of the NFL broadcast portfolio," says Drew Magary. "You could even argue that MNF, conceived by original NFL Commissioner Pete Rozelle and brought to life by ABC executive Roone Arledge, is the reason the NFL is now a television behemoth. It had the best games. It had no competition elsewhere on the dial. And it had the best announcers over the years: Al Michaels, Howard Cosell, Don Meredith, John Madden, uh … OJ Simpson.  MNF was an event. Every week. But since the move to ESPN, watching Monday Night Football has been an exercise in pain. The Sunday Night Football telecast stole away Michaels and Madden and all of the cool matchups, too. Sunday Night got the flexed-in games and the advertising riches that came with them. Meanwhile, ESPN operated as if Monday Night still mattered, fawning over itself as it presented a slate of Thursday night-quality games to an exhausted football public. The games sucked and the presentation was even worse." Magary insists Buck and Aikman will bring back MNF to its former glory. "Maybe you hate Joe Buck," says Magary. "That, frankly, is none of my concern. I’m already out as a Buck fanboy, but I’d also argue to entrenched Buck haters that our man has 20 years at the helm of FOX’s NFL coverage AND their MLB coverage in his back pocket. Those 20 years aren’t so easy to blow off. Buck knows exactly what he’s looking at when he’s calling a game. He’s seen it all before, and his experience bleeds into his work in terms of both his ability to dispense information and his bone-dry sense of humor. Those qualities give Buck an edge over most of his peers not only in terms of performance but in how you, the viewer, perceive the game you’re watching." ALSO: Joe Buck returns to Fox hours after his official departure.