"Everyone See Palmer Now"

And now for something completely different...

When I heard that ESPN was awarded the contract to carry Monday Night Football, I rejoiced. Madden is/was/always will be a Hall of Fame coach; and that's where he belongs.

I hope he wasn't watching Brett Farve tonight. If so, I sure hope the EMTs were on stand-by
to revive him after every down Farve played. Cincinnati's defense just obliterated Green Bay's offense.

And then there was Cincinnati's offence. The title of this post came from a banner I caught while watching the game. I can think of another acronym for ESPN other, having more to do with the commentator's profound oral fixation with Palmer's genitalia. It made me sick (excusing the fact that I am a huge fan of the Men of Steel and bleed Black 'n' Gold). Is it phenomenal that Palmer was able to recover in less than half the amount of time any normal human being would require. But was he just as good as ESPN seem to inflate his performance?

Nope. Nay. Um, I'm thinking no.

Why? Green Bay sucks. Farve should've retired while he was semi-ahead (even though last year was absolutely putrid). The have a rookie offensive line. Farve even said himself, paraphrased from the commentators they "are extremely talented...but with absolutely no real world experience". Did the Bengals tear apart their defense? Yeah, but the seam was frayed to begin with.

Now, to switch gears a bit, it wasn't just this game that I think the commentating was one sided. This past Friday (yes, the PIT @ PHI game), the commentators were more impressed with how the Eagles are managing without T.O., how great it must be to be without all those distractions, and how the team is gelling together. Did they look good? Sure. I'm sure it's nice to have all that behind you. But they didn't really do anything until the third quarter, and that was without McNabb. The first two quarters, Pittsburgh held the Eagles to three mile-long field goals. Sure, Akers has a leg and then some, but the wind was in his favor. Put him in Heinz Field and I'm sure he makes the first, but the last two I'm not so sure about.

So what's the point to all this? I am glad that we're out of the Michaels-Madden duo for Monday Night, but I think the only guy that had things together on both these games was the PTI guy - Tony Cornhiser (or something like that). Every body needs preseason. So let's hope that Monday Night Football on ESPN only gets better as the season goes on.