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Article Excerpt
[ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]
Lately, no longer willing to endure the blather of idiots, I've taken to watching NFL games with the sound turned off. I don't need some poorly informed ex-jock in a turtleneck and double-breasted blazer or some gussied-up chick on the sidelines in earmuffs and furry boots to belabor the obvious. The games explain themselves. Down and distance are plainly marked. And even plays hardly worth a first glance are replayed until the film to yellow and crack. When a runner leaves defenders clawing air--as, for example, Marcus Allen's electrifying run in Super Bowl XVIII--I don't require a stammering monologue describing his special magic. I just want to hear Pat Summerall reduce the action to its essence with his soothing baritone: "Touchdown, seventy-five yards!" [paragraph] For economy of presentation, for adherence to the cosmic truth that less is always more, for letting the viewer discover the game for himself, no one can match Summerall. He's the Walter Cronkite of sportscasters, the best of an old school that includes John Madden, Al Michaels, Howard Cosell, and Jack Buck (not to be confused with Joe Buck, his nitwit son). Though semiretired at 77, Summerall is still the best play-by-play guy in the business, a model that the self-important, neurotic motormouths who currently occupy the broadcast booths would do well to study. The New York Times once parodied Summerall doing a play-by-play of Hemingway's The Old Man and the Sea: "Old Cuban. Sea. Marlin. Harpoon. Sharks feast. Brave old guy. Broken knife. What a struggle. John?"
That would be the cue for Madden to jump in. For more than two decades, Summerall and Madden were the voices of the NFL, first on CBS and later on Fox, Summerall's low-key delivery a perfect counterpart to Madden's bombastic pow! bang! style. Summerall retired after the 2005...
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