Cheesiness aside ...

The Kickoff

Whatever else you say about ESPN's first Monday night telecast of the regular season, it was obvious how much better a rapport Tony Kornheiser has with Ron Jaworski than he did with Joe Theismann. Yes, they yukked it up, but it didn't get in the way of Jaworski's points about the game, which he made without going on and on like the fellow in that chair last year.

Earlier in the weekend:

Dan Marino greeted the newest member of The NFL Today cast, Bill Cowher, by putting on a "spit shield" to protect him should the former coach launch into the kind of intense monologue that typified his sideline style.

Yeah, it was cheesy, but I still chuckled at NBC's Bob Costas showing up on Fox to slug impressionist extraordinaire Frank Caliendo, who has taken his share of shots at Costas. In fact, just before the punch, he got in one last one tweaking Costas for his supposedly pretentious use of language. Caliendo, as John Madden, tried to distract Costas by saying, "Look, Bob, a thesaurus!"

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