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Broadcast blog

Blow-by-blow account of Fox's Super Bowl coverage

Posted: Monday February 7, 2005 3:13AM; Updated: Monday February 7, 2005 3:33AM
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By Richard Deitsch, SI.com

You have to be committed (more like should be committed) to write a real-time broadcast blog, but SI.com's Richard Deitsch chronicled all the hits, misses and pylon-cam action from Fox's coverage of Super Bowl XXXIX. The game marked Fox's fourth Super Bowl broadcast (1997, 1999, 2002, 2005) and its third involving the Patriots.

Pregame

6:12 p.m.: Here's the scene at Janet Jackson's official Web site prior to kickoff (I'm compelled to check it out as an ode to Super Bowls past): There's an offer to sign up for the official Janet Jackson online team -- The Damita Pros. I decline. There's also news of a new CD will hit stores March 30. Somebody better update this site. That album came out a year ago.

6:15: p.m.: The Shield star Michael Chiklis introduces the Patriots. What, Ben Affleck was booked?

6:16 p.m.: Will Smith (hawking his new film Hitch) introduces the Eagles.

6:16 p.m.: Advantage, Eagles.

6:16 p.m.: Finally, after a bloated eight hours of pregame fodder (and an overabundance of American Idol judge Randy Jackson and weather-annoyance Jillian Barberie), we're two minutes away from getting started.

6:18 p.m.: Somebody lied. The Fox Super Bowl broadcast guide said that kickoff was 6:18PM. Instead, I'm getting a pair of lame commercials for Ford and McDonalds.

6:29 p.m.: Quite a moving tribute to the heroes of World War II, but at this rate the game will kick off on March 17, 2006.

6:30 p.m.: Still nothing new on Janet's Web site, though I learn that the song Sexhibition starts off with the following lyrics: "I ... cause I want to sexplore you/I ... put my hands up on you (Babe) I ... wanna feel your sexplosion. I ... And I'm gonna take you on a sexcapade." How could Paul Tagliabue & Co. missed the warning signs.

6:34 p.m.: The coin toss. Pats call heads. Eagles win the toss. We must be close, right?

6:36 p.m.: Kill me now. This game has still not started.

6:37 p.m.: Sideline reporter Chris Myers gets the Patriots' Troy Brown before the game to offer this gem. "We want to go out and execute our game plan." Thanks, Troy.

6:37 p.m.: Sideline reporter Pam Oliver reports that Donovan McNabb and the Eagles were relaxed before the game, playing Rick James in the locker room. Dave Chappelle must be loving life.

First Quarter

6:38 p.m.: Kickoff. Finally

6:38 p.m.: For the Buck family time capsule, here's play-by-play announcer Joe Buck's first official sentence as a Super Bowl broadcaster: "That will be the matchup to start, and we play for the NFL Championship."

6:39 p.m.: Terrell Owens is starting. God better get a one heck of winner's share if the Eagles win.

6:40 p.m.: Owens catches his first pass on the second play of the Super Bowl. Analyst Cris Collinsworth says Owens "is getting a warm reception from this crowd or at least half of it." Really? AP reports that the Eagles fans at Alltel Stadium are visibly and vocally outnumbering Pats fans, and that Owens got a standing ovation in the pregame.

6:41 p.m.: McNabb fumbles on the following play. Fox misses the fumble on the initial shot but gives us nice replays of Willie McGinest knocking the ball away. I can live with that. The play is challenged.

6:42 p.m.: The first in-game commercial. A not-so-funny Bud Light commercial. Chris Ballard better be all over this.

6:43 p.m.: Everyone in the booth agrees that McNabb's knee was down. The challenge is overturned. Fox gets it right.

6:49 p.m.: Collinsworth says that the Pats are going to the molasses count (a.k.a. a slow count) to force the Eagles to show the blitz. A quick check of the Web shows that the history of molasses in America dates back to 1493 when Columbus introduced it to the West Indies.

6:51 p.m.: Nice job by Fox showing Belichick going to the wrong sideline coming out of the tunnel.

6:52 p.m.: First hyperbolic statement of the broadcast comes from (who else) Collinsworth: "I don't care if Terrell Owens can't barely walk out there, any time Donovan McNabb sees him one on one against a rookie like Randall Gay, he's just going to raise up and throw the ball." Uh, if Terrell Owens can barely walk, chances are he's not lining up.

6:58 p.m.: Fox tells us that Eagles cornerback Lito Sheppard is from Jacksonville. So is singer Pat Boone.

7:01 p.m.: Pam Oliver reports that it was a Herculean effort to get T.O. ready and that T.O. even slept in a hyperbaric chamber. "I think it was Austin Powers who made the hyberbaric chamber famous," says Buck.

7:04 p.m.: File this away: Collinsworth says that early in games McNabb tends to get jacked up and throw the ball high. Aikman adds that when McNabb makes a mistake, it's generally because of poorly thrown balls.

7:10 p.m.: Patriots cornerback Asante Samuel picks off McNabb, but an illegal-contact penalty on Roman Phifer gives the Eagles the ball back. This prompts an angry call from SI.com reader Steve Zaitz, who tells me that Fox is broadcasting this game for non-football fans. Why, I ask? Because, says Zaitz, there are no replays of the penalty and they'd rather show a $2.5 million commercial instead of appealing to the hard-core fan. Fox then comes back from break and shows the replay of the penalty. Zaitz hangs up.

7:15 p.m.: Fox shows us pylon cam. People in China ask, "Why?"

7:16 p.m.: The first shout out to Paul McCartney. I'll give you 3-to-1 it won't be the last one.

7:18 p.m.: Fox offers the following stat: The Eagles have had 920 players since winning the 1960 championship. How many of you remember fullback Booker Russell?

7:22 p.m.: Buck tells us that its the sixth scoreless first quarter in Super Bowl history and the second straight time it's happened. Solid stat.

First Quarter Grade: A

The skinny: Even the dash of hyperbole from Collinsworth doesn't bother me. An excellent start for Fox.

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