Time to KO Kornheiser on ESPN Monday Night Football

When ESPN acquired the rights to broadcast Monday Night Football, the network that brought us "ESPN Hollywood" and "Bonds on Bonds" was trusted with perhaps the most prestigious sports program in American television history.

Eager to inject "ESPN attitude" into a program that was doing just fine without it, the network hired Washington Post columnist and ESPN's "Pardon the Interruption" co-host Tony Kornheiser to work with play-by-play man Mike Tirico and NFL analyst Joe Theismann. While Tirico has been reputable and Theismann has brought keen, if not sometimes obvious, analysis, Kornheiser's role has still yet to be defined.

Sometimes he tries to be funny, sometimes he tries to be serious, sometimes he's even a pitch man, but he's rarely entertaining and sparingly informative.

Kornheiser spends more time talking about the ramifications of the play on the field for his fantasy football team than he does for the teams actually participating in the game, and when he tries to contribute a point of analysis he is often corrected by the much more knowledgeable Theismann. Furthermore, Kornheiser often curbs his points of analysis as to not seem like an expert, but if that's the case one would wonder why he's in the booth in the first place.

He has also become the chief shill in ESPN's disruptive attempts to once again bombard the viewer with cross promotion, branding, and in-booth guests that only detract from the game at hand. In these instances, Kornheiser finds himself idolatrously gawking over a star from "Desperate Housewives," or an NBA legend such as Charles Barkley rather than talking about the game.

The booth dynamic is a difficult one because the traditional setup of the play-by-plan man delivering the action while the commentators, who are generally former players or coaches, providing the analysis is muddied by the presence of Kornheiser. The network would be best served to have Kornheiser fill a roll that is similar to Peter Gammons' work on ESPN's Sunday Night baseball telecasts, in which the writer serving as commentator provides different angles of insight that are not necessarily evident on the field, such as background information on players and news and rumors from around the league. However the network employs both Michelle Tafoya and Suzy Kolber as "sideline reporters," and adding Kornheiser as a third outside voice, compounded by the seemingly endless news breaks and programming notes, would only further take away from the flow of the broadcast.

ESPN's counterpart, NBC's new Sunday night package, "Football Night in America," does a much better job at presenting and NFL game. In this offering, the traditional formula is followed with MNF veterans Al Michaels and John Madden providing the best commentary in the game today.

Sports Illustrated writer Peter King is featured during the studio segment to give the viewer the insider insight that Kornheiser should be providing. However King is never in the booth, and he never interrupts the action on the field.

It's not all Kornheiser's fault, he is simply perpetuating the ESPN culture of a discourse overwhelmed with glib, tongue-in-cheek commentary high on sound bite fodder but low on substance (see ESPN's "Quite Frankly" with Stephen A. Smith for the classic example). However this style does not flow well within the parameters of a football telecast and the experiment should be put to rest immediately.

Perhaps ESPN will take our advice. Hey, maybe they could have him call in on an "ESPN Mobile" phone rather than weigh in from the booth.

"Pardon the Interruption Mike and Joe, but my desperate housewife and I were listening to your broadcast only on 'ESPN' and I was compelled to call in on my brand new 'ESPN Mobile' phone to tell you that Michael Vick, who is on the cover of 'ESPN the Magazine' this month, is absolutely killing my 'ESPN Fantasy Football' team!"

"I did not play all that money for fantasy football advice on 'ESPN Insider,' which can only be found on 'ESPN.com,' to have this happen!"

Certainly Kornheiser is no Dennis Miller, and that's a good thing, but he's no Howard Cossell either.