What Went Wrong With MNF

[Daniel Synder]

with NFL Sunday ticket, fans are all footballed out by the time MNF comes around. not to mention the games do not end until the crack of dawn if you live on the east coast.

 

[mperfection]

The problem with MNF is they aren't selling football anymore. I won't watch a monday night game unless dallas is on. It's not just with MNF, but with everything these day's. Look no farther than the intro. What are they selling us? Actors, musicians, and skanks who have nothing to do with football. It's become a joke. Then they cut to the "are you ready for some football" thing, and it's women with hardly anything on(I know cheerleaders have been around for a while) dancing around a guy singing and asking if were ready for some football.

TV has become trash, MNF has just evolved into something other than a football broadcast, imo. It's been probably 4 years since I've watched a monday night game that didn't involve the Cowboy's.

Football isn't what it was even 15 years ago. IT's supposed to be a hard nosed GAME. Not a prissy business, thats what it is. Thats were MNF went wrong, imo. I hope ABC gets another crack at it in the near future and gets back to the basics.

Classic opinion!

 

[CaptainAmerica]

People talk about ratings problems with MNF and wonder what happened. I would like to offer a few opinions.

1. Obviously there is more football on TV today than ever before. Back when MNF started, if a team was on Monday Night Football and you didn't live in their region, it might be the only time you had all season to catch them on TV, or one of a couple of times.

BUT, for me personally that is not the biggest factor.

2. They have never been able to replace the entertainment factor of the original broadcast team. I enjoyed Frank, Howard and Dandy Don. Even if the game wasn't the best, THEY made it interesting. It was an EVENT. I'm sorry, Al Michaels just doesn't do that for me, and neither does John Madden. Gifford, Cosell and Meredith were just a perfect combination. You had a classy, understated play by play man in Gifford. A bombastic, but entertaining and highly opinionated color man in Cosell, and a fun loving cut up, but very shrewd color man in Meredith. The chemistry was perfect, and the entertainment and event atmosphere undeniable. That hasn't been present for a LONG time, and I think that is the ultimate answer for what happened to MNF.

I agree with your points, rcaldw. That was classic TV that can never be duplicated. I loved Dandy Don giving it to Howard every Monday night during the season.

One more point you forgot to mention. When they changed the musical intro, the show was a goner. Who can ever forget as a kid hearing that musical intro when they counted it down and then the MNF producer's words, "take,take". Then the music. Best theme music for a show in TV history in my book. It sent chills down your spine, especially if the Boys were playing that night.

 

[Taz]

Thing is FOX and CBS are not going to want to give up a great matchup so that ABC (now ESPN) can get it. That is why they have to select the games before the season starts. Most of the teams who play on MNF do so because they were playoff teams last season or a team on the verge of playoffs

also teams that have a huge audiene even if they still suck a little
example DALLAS COWBOYS
we usually have 1-2 MNF games ever season one year we had done but keep in mind we totaly did suck the year before

 

[rcaldw]

I agree with your points, rcaldw. That was classic TV that can never be duplicated. I loved Dandy Don giving it to Howard every Monday night during the season.

One more point you forgot to mention. When they changed the musical intro, the show was a goner. Who can ever forget as a kid hearing that musical intro when they counted it down and then the MNF producer's words, "take,take". Then the music. Best theme music for a show in TV history in my book. It sent chills down your spine, especially if the Boys were playing that night.

ABSOLUTELY agree with you. Couldn't have said it better.

 

[mmurray21]

With all this said it was still a top 20 show on a weekly basis. Probably Top 5 if you take into account that a huge number of people are actually watching in bars and clubs which are never counted by nielson.

 

[FLcowboy]

People talk about ratings problems with MNF and wonder what happened. I would like to offer a few opinions.

2. They have never been able to replace the entertainment factor of the original broadcast team. I enjoyed Frank, Howard and Dandy Don. Even if the game wasn't the best, THEY made it interesting. It was an EVENT. I'm sorry, Al Michaels just doesn't do that for me, and neither does John Madden. Gifford, Cosell and Meredith were just a perfect combination. You had a classy, understated play by play man in Gifford. A bombastic, but entertaining and highly opinionated color man in Cosell, and a fun loving cut up, but very shrewd color man in Meredith. The chemistry was perfect, and the entertainment and event atmosphere undeniable. That hasn't been present for a LONG time, and I think that is the ultimate answer for what happened to MNF.

I couldn't agree more. Back in the late 60s, (yes, I'm that old) when the rumors were flying that Howard Cosell was going to be replaced, I wrote a letter to Roone Arledge protesting that move, claiming as you did above, that MNF was entertainment, not sports, and those three guys made every game fun to watch, just because they were likely to start off on a tangent, and it would be entertainment. Pure and simple.

Al Michaels may have learned at the knee of Frank Gifford, be he sure can't be favorably compared to Frank.

 

[lockster]

Al michels is a biased buttkissing a$$hole. That's why!

 

[Sitting Bull]

MNF is not the novely is used to be thanks to ESPN Sunday Night games, Saturday games, etc. But mostly, I think the sheer amount of 24-hour, all-sports coverage, combined with the increased number sports overlapping the NFL season have combined to dilute the core viewership. A solution is to give MNF scheduling flexibility to "redo" it's matchups midseason with 4-weeks notice. But the business/politics of sports apparently makes that very problematic.

 

[jimmy40]

People talk about ratings problems with MNF and wonder what happened. I would like to offer a few opinions.

1. Obviously there is more football on TV today than ever before. Back when MNF started, if a team was on Monday Night Football and you didn't live in their region, it might be the only time you had all season to catch them on TV, or one of a couple of times.

BUT, for me personally that is not the biggest factor.

2. They have never been able to replace the entertainment factor of the original broadcast team. I enjoyed Frank, Howard and Dandy Don. Even if the game wasn't the best, THEY made it interesting. It was an EVENT. I'm sorry, Al Michaels just doesn't do that for me, and neither does John Madden. Gifford, Cosell and Meredith were just a perfect combination. You had a classy, understated play by play man in Gifford. A bombastic, but entertaining and highly opinionated color man in Cosell, and a fun loving cut up, but very shrewd color man in Meredith. The chemistry was perfect, and the entertainment and event atmosphere undeniable. That hasn't been present for a LONG time, and I think that is the ultimate answer for what happened to MNF.

Cable TV and other choices of what to watch, that's what happened.

 

[CM Duck]

everybody had good opinions on this for the most part. i believe it's because there hasn't been the controversial figure in the booth like Mr Cossell. alot of people tuned in just to hear what he had to say. even if they didnt like him, people wanted to listen to him. now i think espn is tryin to recapture that with theisman(what a joke!!!). but i think they are missing the boat with that choice, if that was their reasoning behind putting him in the booth.


i think, if they want a controversial guy who honestly isn't afraid to speak his mind there were others they could have hired.

they are: Stephen A Smith(I know he's a basketball guy from philly, but he says whats on his mind all the time)

Charles Barkley(again I know he's a basketball guy, but come on i can listen to him all nite!)

Jim Rome(I can't stand this dude, but he has a big mouth that could work)

WHAT DO YOU GUYS THINK?

 

[yentl911]

The ratings are down because the games that have been scheduled have sucked...........

 

[Kangaroo]

I think it is more than the booth I never cared about who was in the booth. What has changed is the American culture not who is in the booth.

Here is the issue in the 60' all the way up into the late 80's a lot of people had 9-5 steady jobs a lot of blue collar type jobs in the use. The standard 9-5 job no longer the case and think about this how many times did people eat out at restaurants or go to the movies during the weekday not many growing up but that is all normal now.

We have more white collar jobs we have a shift in the American culture weeknight we have computers; internet and 300 channels of nothing on TV to distract us. Throw in longer commute times to and from work etc etc.

We have a fundamental shift in the American lifestyle funny how Sunday night football ratings have shot through the roof yet Monday has been flat hum it is not who or what is in the booth that has caused it.

This is not the full extent of it but I stick by the the premise the overall culture in the US has changed and Football has adapted like they should.