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Listening to the refugees from trash talk AM radio who stole Monday Night Football, I realized what was so irritating about their uninterruptable - even by events in the game - stream of opinions andnon-sequiturs. Watching the Charger/Denver game Christmas Eve, just before the half, there were four plays in a row where the "play by play" announcer interrupted the unrelated game commentary only long enough to tell us what had already happened. "Cromartie catches a pass". "Tomlinson brought down" Meanwhile, the game is moving on and, since we're watching we already knew what happened. Its like sitting next to a motor mouth who knows a lot of sports trivia and just...won't...shut...up.

These commentators sem little better than opinionated blow hards who like to listen to their own drivel rather than enhance the viewing audience's experience with the game.  Maybe they believe most people are sitting in noisy sports bars and can't hear them anyway.  

I will say that the quality of the voices of Madden and Michaels are more easily separated, while the voices of the AM jocks sort of blend together for me, none of them very distinct or something I would recognize were I to overhear them order dinner at a table near me. The same would not be true were I seated near Madden or Michaels.

I wish I could tell you which of the three Jaworski, Kornheiser or Tirico is at fault.  I think if Kornheiser were removed, Jaworksi and Tirico might have a shot, hard to tell. 

To be unreasonably fair, Al Michaels sometimes tells what just happened, but he always . . . always . . . adds something, gives a context for the play, gives the impact of the outcome. All the while John Madden is providing color commentary with some of the same subject materials brought up by the AM jocks, but he rarely interrupts the Michaels play calling. And, most of the time, as the play is forming up, both Michaels and Madden are talking about THAT PLAY. They give you what might be going through the minds of the coaches and the players, what the players are trying to do and what the play means. Engaging.

With the AM jocks, unless you're watching the game carefully, you can't tell - from the commentary - when a play even starts! It's like listening to your annoying friend who chatters unendingingly next to you in the seats about something unrelated to the game, insisting on responses from you, while the play is taking shape.

Are these guys even watching the game? Like a Toastmasters for sports broadcasters, we should all count the number of times these guys say "going back to ..." the few times they are interrupted as they insist picking up whatever it was they were saying when the game got in the way.

Something significant might be going on, a developing play, and the AM jocks are rattling on about some other team or time or WHATEVER!

I think it's time to find real radio broadcast, turn off the MNF sound and listen to commentators skilled at radio broadcasting while I watch.