Professional Football Researchers Association Forum

On their "Craziest What ifs" Top 10 show, The NFL Network has "What if MNF never happened" as it's #9 "what if".

They could have done that better. It should be "What if MNF never happened on ABC?".

If people like Roone Arledge, Howard Cosell, and Don Meredith never had anything to do with it, MNF may have been a flop.

7DnBrnc53 wrote:On their "Craziest What ifs" Top 10 show, The NFL Network has "What if MNF never happened" as it's #9 "what if".

They could have done that better. It should be "What if MNF never happened on ABC?".

If people like Roone Arledge, Howard Cosell, and Don Meredith never had anything to do with it, MNF may have been a flop.

Cosell was a polarizing figure, to be sure, and I think a lot of people watched him just to get irritated by him. I am reminded of the scene in the Howard Stern movie "Private Parts" where the radio consultant studied Stern's audience and explains his success, and he says (and I'm paraphrasing) that fans of his listen for an average of two hours a day, and the most common reason they listen is they want to hear what he'll say next, and people who don't like him listen for an average of three hours a day, and the most common reason they listen is they want to hear what he'll say next.

That being said, Cosell was a great broadcaster despite his unusual speaking voice, and his analysis was spot-on. Gifford's delivery was so smooth he was a perfect play-by-play guy, and was the perfect straight guy between Cosell and Meredith. When the three of them were in the booth together, Monday Night Football was event television.

I still think MNF would have been successful on NBC or CBS. By 1970, the public was ready for it, and I think either of the other networks would have put together a prime crew to announce the games. I think Don Meredith might have figured into it, maybe Summerall and Meredith at CBS, or Gowdy and Meredith at NBC, perhaps Sam Huff instead, or perhaps a three man booth with an PBP guy with Meredith and Huff, or Meredith and Jerry Kramer, or Hornung, or some combination thereof. I think NBC or CBS would have tested out different combinations and come across the right mix and went with it and it would have succeeded.

I still think MNF would have been successful on NBC or CBS. By 1970, the public was ready for it, and I think either of the other networks would have put together a prime crew to announce the games. I think Don Meredith might have figured into it, maybe Summerall and Meredith at CBS, or Gowdy and Meredith at NBC, perhaps Sam Huff instead, or perhaps a three man booth with an PBP guy with Meredith and Huff, or Meredith and Jerry Kramer, or Hornung, or some combination thereof. I think NBC or CBS would have tested out different combinations and come across the right mix and went with it and it would have succeeded.

You may be right, but after watching the Monday Night Mayhem movie (from the early-00's), the impression that I got was that NBC and CBS didn't want anything to do with it because of their normal lineup on Monday Night. In addition, the movie had the person who portrayed Carl Lindemann (NBC's Vice President for Sports) act like an unhinged psycho. One of Carl's lines was "Arledge is going to sink ABC with this thing".

Also, another thing I got from that movie was the idea of a fourth TV network (Howard Hughes network) that would have televised MNF if ABC also turned it down.

7DnBrnc53 wrote:

I still think MNF would have been successful on NBC or CBS. By 1970, the public was ready for it, and I think either of the other networks would have put together a prime crew to announce the games. I think Don Meredith might have figured into it, maybe Summerall and Meredith at CBS, or Gowdy and Meredith at NBC, perhaps Sam Huff instead, or perhaps a three man booth with an PBP guy with Meredith and Huff, or Meredith and Jerry Kramer, or Hornung, or some combination thereof. I think NBC or CBS would have tested out different combinations and come across the right mix and went with it and it would have succeeded.

You may be right, but after watching the Monday Night Mayhem movie (from the early-00's), the impression that I got was that NBC and CBS didn't want anything to do with it because of their normal lineup on Monday Night. In addition, the movie had the person who portrayed Carl Lindemann (NBC's Vice President for Sports) act like an unhinged psycho. One of Carl's lines was "Arledge is going to sink ABC with this thing".

Also, another thing I got from that movie was the idea of a fourth TV network (Howard Hughes network) that would have televised MNF if ABC also turned it down.

The Monday Night Mayhem movie was pretty good, especially John Turturro who was perfectly cast as Cosell. I haven't seen it since it first aired and don't remember the Hughes Network angle, but I doubt it would have worked if it had been syndicated like the WFL games were. I don't think Hughes would have been able to put a network together with a football package first, without local affiliates. In 1970 there weren't that many local UHF/VHF stations that weren't tied into one of the big three networks or public broadcasting. Such a Hughes Network would not have been able to cover much of the US.

By the mid-80's this had changed, as independent TV stations cropped up in all TV markets. I remember how the Fox TV network came together in the late 80's, and it started airing one night a week, Sunday nights. However, Fox already had a motion picture division so setting up the structure for a TV division wasn't difficult as they already had studios and a pool of actors/directors etc. As the Fox Network slowly became successful, it added a second and third night or broadcasting, and I think it was when they added The Simpsons in 1990 when it was clear Fox was here to stay. It just took 5-6 years to put enough shows together to fill out a seven night schedule and in the meantime setting up local affiliates in every TV market. After Fox had everything in place were they able to take on the NFL.

CBS had tried a few Monday Night games in the late 60's but they didn't get high ratings, and they didn't think it would succeed. It was clear after about the first 3-4 weeks that MNF was going to be a huge hit as the ratings were much better than expected and in the second season when Keith Jackson was replaced by Gifford and Meredith joined them in the booth, it was a match made in Heaven for ABC.

Rupert Patrick wrote:

7DnBrnc53 wrote:

I still think MNF would have been successful on NBC or CBS. By 1970, the public was ready for it, and I think either of the other networks would have put together a prime crew to announce the games. I think Don Meredith might have figured into it, maybe Summerall and Meredith at CBS, or Gowdy and Meredith at NBC, perhaps Sam Huff instead, or perhaps a three man booth with an PBP guy with Meredith and Huff, or Meredith and Jerry Kramer, or Hornung, or some combination thereof. I think NBC or CBS would have tested out different combinations and come across the right mix and went with it and it would have succeeded.

CBS had tried a few Monday Night games in the late 60's but they didn't get high ratings, and they didn't think it would succeed. It was clear after about the first 3-4 weeks that MNF was going to be a huge hit as the ratings were much better than expected and in the second season when Keith Jackson was replaced by Gifford and Meredith joined them in the booth, it was a match made in Heaven for ABC.

That's rather ironic, since Gifford was one of the worst play-by-play announcers it has ever been my misfortune to hear.

I wouldn't go that far, but his nickname was "Faultless Frank" for a reason.

rhickok1109 wrote:That's rather ironic, since Gifford was one of the worst play-by-play announcers it has ever been my misfortune to hear.

Gifford used to do the 60-90 second "intro" for MNF, explaining the key players and the matchup for that night. I remember reading that the production crew would always complain, because it would take literally hours for them to get Gifford to say his lines correctly. Gifford must have been a big name, because it seems weird that his incompetence would be tolerated.

To me, Cosell was a big reason why MNF was an event. He was unique for his time in that he was opinionated and would be critical of players/coaches. You also didn't have as many NFL games on TV, and you didn't have highlight shows either. MNF was usually matched two strong teams, and halftime would have Cosell giving you the highlight package of that Sunday's games. I think if the original MNF didn't have Cosell, it wouldn't have been a "thing"...instead, it would have been like how MNF is now.

7DnBrnc53 wrote:
You may be right, but after watching the Monday Night Mayhem movie (from the early-00's), the impression that I got was that NBC and CBS didn't want anything to do with it because of their normal lineup on Monday Night. In addition, the movie had the person who portrayed Carl Lindemann (NBC's Vice President for Sports) act like an unhinged psycho. One of Carl's lines was "Arledge is going to sink ABC with this thing".

Also, another thing I got from that movie was the idea of a fourth TV network (Howard Hughes network) that would have televised MNF if ABC also turned it down.

I'd say that's accurate. I was wondering what CBS and NBC had on during after 9:00 pm time slots in the fall of 1970, and it was a carry over from their 1969 programming, which had actually been pretty successful. NBC had had Monday Night at the Movies for years, and CBS had three Top 20 programs (Mayberry RFD, The Doris Day Show and The Carol Burnett Show. The ratings on all of those shows dropped that year as viewers tuned in to the NFL. Incidentally, MNF proved to be much more popular than ABC's previous Monday night offering, Love, American Style .

Bryan wrote:

rhickok1109 wrote:That's rather ironic, since Gifford was one of the worst play-by-play announcers it has ever been my misfortune to hear.

Gifford used to do the 60-90 second "intro" for MNF, explaining the key players and the matchup for that night. I remember reading that the production crew would always complain, because it would take literally hours for them to get Gifford to say his lines correctly. Gifford must have been a big name, because it seems weird that his incompetence would be tolerated.

To me, Cosell was a big reason why MNF was an event. He was unique for his time in that he was opinionated and would be critical of players/coaches. You also didn't have as many NFL games on TV, and you didn't have highlight shows either. MNF was usually matched two strong teams, and halftime would have Cosell giving you the highlight package of that Sunday's games. I think if the original MNF didn't have Cosell, it wouldn't have been a "thing"...instead, it would have been like how MNF is now.

I remember a documentary about Cosell where they showed him doing the halftime segments on MNF. All day Monday, NFL Films would be putting the highlights together and would get them to ABC a couple hours before the game started, as Howard was getting ready to call the game. He didn't have time to write a script for the halftime highlights, so he would narrate do those halftime highlights without a script, just watching the video, and would hit the end of the video right on cue and do it all in one take and back to getting ready for the game. He never took a broadcasting class in his life; for one thing, he would have been booted out just for his speaking voice. I think it was because Cosell was such a brilliant man that as soon as he got into broadcasting and television he quickly figured it all out on his own.