Nfl Today

Cleveland-based businessman Alfred Lerner is expected to file an application today to own an NFL expansion team in Baltimore, becoming the third owner vying for a local team.His emergence, with the encouragement of Gov. William Donald Schaefer, is at least a vote of no confidence for the two other potential owners who have been involved in the effort for more than a year: Florida-based corporate investor Malcolm Glazer and Baltimore-born retail executive Leonard "Boogie" Weinglass.Although officials would not confirm that Schaefer would endorse Lerner, Weinglass said he was told otherwise during a 50-minute meeting yesterday morning.

CBS is putting it this way -- it already had former players and a general manager, now it has a coach. The network announced yesterday it added former Pittsburgh Steelers coach Bill Cowher to The NFL Today cast. Cowher joins host James Brown as a new analyst with Boomer Esiason, Dan Marino and Shannon Sharpe. (The former general manager is Charley Casserly, who has his own segment rather than talking with the crew at the big desk.) Cowher left the Steelers after the 2006 season, his 15th as their coach, and has moved to North Carolina to spend more time with his family.

It's difficult, if not impossible, to run away from your past, and CBS didn't even try yesterday as it returned to the NFL after a four-year absence.At the top of the new "NFL Today" pre-game show, the network aired a montage of its storied football history with footage of Pat Summerall, John Madden, Jack Buck, Vin Scully, Brent Musburger, Phyllis George and Jimmy "The Greek" Snyder, all parts -- good or bad -- of CBS' four decades of NFL telecasts.The...

AS WE APPROACH the first pro football Sunday of the season, perhaps some statistics class can come up with the formula that measures the NFL's popularity. Something like this: Amount of time spent discussing the sport divided by number of games equals popularity quotient. Part of the NFL's appeal may be that it gives us the sport in easily digestible, one-game-per-team-a-week bites. (Another part of the appeal may have to do with those little cards with numbers on them that I swear I've never seen anywhere before and somebody else must have dropped on my desk, honest.

Admittedly, being grateful for having a network NFL telecast to work on doesn't quite stack up to the more profound currents that run through most of our lives, like home, health and family, but Jim Nantz is nonetheless thankful today to be back in the NFL game."

Larry Cavolina and Mark Wolff heard the news that CBS had regained the rights to telecast the NFL just as everyone else did last winter.But it wasn't until Wolff, the lead producer on CBS' telecasts, and Cavolina, the director, walked through the New York Giants' training camp in Albany, N.Y., with former Giants quarterback Phil Simms last month that the concept became reality.CBS would be doing football again."We're walking on the field and Larry says to me, 'Man, isn't it great to be doing football again?

CBS is putting it this way -- it already had former players and a general manager, now it has a coach. The network announced yesterday it added former Pittsburgh Steelers coach Bill Cowher to The NFL Today cast. Cowher joins host James Brown as a new analyst with Boomer Esiason, Dan Marino and Shannon Sharpe. (The former general manager is Charley Casserly, who has his own segment rather than talking with the crew at the big desk.) Cowher left the Steelers after the 2006 season, his 15th as their coach, and has moved to North Carolina to spend more time with his family.

AS WE APPROACH the first pro football Sunday of the season, perhaps some statistics class can come up with the formula that measures the NFL's popularity. Something like this: Amount of time spent discussing the sport divided by number of games equals popularity quotient. Part of the NFL's appeal may be that it gives us the sport in easily digestible, one-game-per-team-a-week bites. (Another part of the appeal may have to do with those little cards with numbers on them that I swear I've never seen anywhere before and somebody else must have dropped on my desk, honest.

Something new, not different, for LampleyJim Lampley continued his circuit around the sportscasting industry yesterday, when NBC announced that he will take over Bob Costas' host slot on "NFL Live" this fall.Costas previously had said he wasn't returning to "NFL Live."Lampley, beloved for his role as proprietor of NBC's Club Barcelona -- where everybody knows your name, but pronounces it with a Spanish accent -- during the 1992 Summer Olympics, has done just about everything in network sportscasting, beginning with his debut as one of ABC's college football sideline kids in 1974.

During the halftime show of the "NFL Today" on CBS yesterday, there was a short piece detailing how the five cities vying for two expansion franchises will be in Chicago tomorrow and Wednesday bearing gold, frankincense and myrrh for the league.An unofficial count is that this will constitute the 147th time the Final Five of Baltimore, Charlotte, Jacksonville, Memphis and St. Louis (listed alphabetically) is being commanded to prostrate themselves in total subjugation to the NFL.No one will ever be able to accuse the league of a "rush to judgment" when it comes to expansion, it being 20 years since the NFL decided to pass out secret de-coder rings to its last pair of members, Seattle and Tampa Bay.There's a reason why proposed expansion proceeds at glacier-like speed and it has nothing to do with the men calling the shots, the owners, wanting to make the right decisions.

Amid all the humdrum games in the middle of the NFL schedule is a gem like this Sunday's Ravens-Redskins tilt, and CBS analyst Dan Dierdorf, who will call the game with Dick Enberg, is feeling lucky to get a piece of something so good. "This is one of the better games of the year," Dierdorf said by phone this week. "You've got the old-time NFL in [Ravens owner] Art Modell and the new breed in [Redskins owner] Dan Snyder. The excitement level is there. This is the kind of game where, right after the national anthem, as a former player, I have to resist the urge to smack Dick."

Admittedly, being grateful for having a network NFL telecast to work on doesn't quite stack up to the more profound currents that run through most of our lives, like home, health and family, but Jim Nantz is nonetheless thankful today to be back in the NFL game."

It's difficult, if not impossible, to run away from your past, and CBS didn't even try yesterday as it returned to the NFL after a four-year absence.At the top of the new "NFL Today" pre-game show, the network aired a montage of its storied football history with footage of Pat Summerall, John Madden, Jack Buck, Vin Scully, Brent Musburger, Phyllis George and Jimmy "The Greek" Snyder, all parts -- good or bad -- of CBS' four decades of NFL telecasts.The...

Larry Cavolina and Mark Wolff heard the news that CBS had regained the rights to telecast the NFL just as everyone else did last winter.But it wasn't until Wolff, the lead producer on CBS' telecasts, and Cavolina, the director, walked through the New York Giants' training camp in Albany, N.Y., with former Giants quarterback Phil Simms last month that the concept became reality.CBS would be doing football again."We're walking on the field and Larry says to me, 'Man, isn't it great to be doing football again?

It's symbolic of the state of the NFL today that players will not be allowed to take their helmets off on the field to celebrate this year.In our star-driven society, the NFL is an anomaly these days because its players remain obscured under their helmets. The NFL has no players with the charisma -- or the marketing deals -- of a Michael Jordan or a Tiger Woods.The NFL, though, doesn't appear to need stars. As it proved when it put on the replacement games in 1987, it sells the uniforms. The players in them are almost superfluous.

The big guy's hair is white now and so is his beard. When he walks, he looks like the ex-pro football player he is.He limps. He'll get a hip replacement Dec. 12.This is Joe Ehrmann, a defensive tackle for the Baltimore Colts two decades ago.I see Joe Ehrmann at high school games. I like high school football. So does he."I like high school ball more than pro or college," Ehrmann says. "These kids play football because they enjoy it. But the NFL today . . . it's all money."It's ironic that Joe Ehrmann would be disenchanted because of the money in football.

Amid all the humdrum games in the middle of the NFL schedule is a gem like this Sunday's Ravens-Redskins tilt, and CBS analyst Dan Dierdorf, who will call the game with Dick Enberg, is feeling lucky to get a piece of something so good. "This is one of the better games of the year," Dierdorf said by phone this week. "You've got the old-time NFL in [Ravens owner] Art Modell and the new breed in [Redskins owner] Dan Snyder. The excitement level is there. This is the kind of game where, right after the national anthem, as a former player, I have to resist the urge to smack Dick."

Hand-wringing and teeth-gnashing fill the land. One of America's favorite sports is switching networks.What will this upstart do to our beloved game? These people don't know the sport. Oh, woe is us.Such is the concern in some corners with the Fox Network's entrance into NFL television and CBS's exit. But these alarms are something of an echo from a few years back. Remember when CBS was awarded the major-league baseball contract that ran from 1990 to 1993?We all got through that OK, didn't we?

Hand-wringing and teeth-gnashing fill the land. One of America's favorite sports is switching networks.What will this upstart do to our beloved game? These people don't know the sport. Oh, woe is us.Such is the concern in some corners with the Fox Network's entrance into NFL television and CBS's exit. But these alarms are something of an echo from a few years back. Remember when CBS was awarded the major-league baseball contract that ran from 1990 to 1993?We all got through that OK, didn't we?

Cleveland-based businessman Alfred Lerner is expected to file an application today to own an NFL expansion team in Baltimore, becoming the third owner vying for a local team.His emergence, with the encouragement of Gov. William Donald Schaefer, is at least a vote of no confidence for the two other potential owners who have been involved in the effort for more than a year: Florida-based corporate investor Malcolm Glazer and Baltimore-born retail executive Leonard "Boogie" Weinglass.Although officials would not confirm that Schaefer would endorse Lerner, Weinglass said he was told otherwise during a 50-minute meeting yesterday morning.