HBO's Inside the NFL: canceled

[RichK]

This is likely old news to some, but I just caught up on my Tivo'ed programs...and ended up watching the last episode EVER of Inside the NFL on HBO. 31 years ended with little explanation! Bob Costas, Dan Marino, Cris Collinsworth and Cris Carter seemed stunned that they were announcing the end of the show.

Even during the past few years, when I wasn't much of a football fan, I watched this show. I watched years ago when it was Len Dawson and Nick Buoniconti hosting. The show used NFL Films footage and with the classic NFL voice-overs and slow-mo replays - quality stuff that showed the true grace of the game.

I did a bit of Googling, and there is some speculation that the NFL network may take over the show, or that the NFL network didn't want NFL Films to be used on HBO. Hopefully something good comes from this.

Bah!

[Gnam]

Didn't know. Liked the game recaps. Can't stand Bob F'n Costas.

As for the NFL being a bunch of beaches, they have been trying to purge 'The Clutch' ;) from Youtube. Greatest play in 20 years and they're trying NOT to show it. :shakehead

[nrc]

I did a bit of Googling, and there is some speculation that the NFL network may take over the show, or that the NFL network didn't want NFL Films to be used on HBO. Hopefully something good comes from this.

Bah!

I was disappointed to find this on my TiVo, also. The stories I dug up seemed to indicate that it was HBO pulling the plug. The feeling seemed to be that they weren't offering enough different from all the other highlight shows on the air now.

I hate to see it go because I do like Costas and the jocks on the show could at least speak mostly in full sentences.

"Bob smells like a chili dog. And his hair is huge. Could he be using Chambraigne? Now with weiner scent?"

[Gnam]

The feeling seemed to be that they weren't offering enough different from all the other highlight shows on the air now.
More room for the topical humor of the The Chris Rock Show. The newest episode is only seven years old. :shakehead

[Don Quixote]

In other football broadcast news, I hear that ABC is dropping Dan Fouts, the worst, most biased, and most annoying play by play man in history going back to Roman sports in the first century. :thumbup: :thumbup:

[nrc]

In other football broadcast news, I hear that ABC is dropping Dan Fouts, the worst, most biased, and most annoying play by play man in history going back to Roman sports in the first century. :thumbup: :thumbup:

Yeah, but he's a Hall of Famer and Ken Anderson isn't. :mad:

[Insomniac]

I was disappointed to find this on my TiVo, also. The stories I dug up seemed to indicate that it was HBO pulling the plug. The feeling seemed to be that they weren't offering enough different from all the other highlight shows on the air now.

I hate to see it go because I do like Costas and the jocks on the show could at least speak mostly in full sentences.

"Bob smells like a chili dog. And his hair is huge. Could he be using Chambraigne? Now with weiner scent?"

I heard part of it was the increasing cost of the NFL Films footage. Peter King said:


I think the demise of Inside the NFL, to the best of my knowledge, was not so much about money as it was about not being different enough anymore. That's what we, as a staff, were told by HBO Sports president Ross Greenburg and executive producer Rick Bernstein.

The 27 minutes of NFL Films highlights and feature footage we aired each week, plus the often hard-hitting features we did on the show, were unique to NFL studio shows. For example, even though the Cardinals hosted the Super Bowl this year, our Super Bowl week piece by producer Christine Wilt about how the 1925 NFL title was stolen from the rightful winners, the Pottsville Maroons, and now resides with the Cardinals had to be embarrassing to the Cardinals franchise. That's not a story most studio shows would have done, ever, and certainly not during Super Bowl week.

Though the show was different, it's hard to call any NFL studio show "unique.''

I've gained so much respect for people I didn't know very well entering the experience. There's not a more salt-of-the-earth guy in the game than Dan Marino; once you're on his team, you're family. Not satisfied with just being on the show, Cris Carter worked to become a better broadcaster. I assume the same way he worked to become a better receiver. Bob Costas worked as hard trying to make everyone else on the show look good, setting us up with the right questions he knew we could bat out of the ballpark, as he did in excelling himself.

I learned a lot from Cris Collinsworth, about former players who became great in this line of work, not just because they were polished, but because they're not afraid to speak the truth. The truth he spoke this year about the shame of Spygate and how Bill Belichick should have been suspended for it ought to be required viewing -- whether you agree with him or not -- for ex-jocks trying to make a TV go of it. (I know my family will never forget Collinsworth, on Christmas Eve 2006, excusing himself from a dinner we were hosting for the out-of-town NBC studio team members at our home. Cris went into the kitchen and washed the dishes. Not just for laughs, either. He did every last plate.)

It was great working with everyone there -- segment producers like Bentley Weiner, Bruce Cornblatt, Jason Hehir, Rahul Rohatgi and Wilt included -- and I hope the show isn't dead forever. But if someone picks up the show, it wouldn't be the same if Brian Hyland, a superb and fearless storyteller in a land of TV puffery, weren't producing it. I'm not encouraging Hyland to take a hike from HBO. I'm simply stating a fact. Thanks for the experience, HBO.
http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2008/writers/peter_king/02/10/tyree/4.html

[TravelGal]

Didn't know. Liked the game recaps. Can't stand Bob F'n Costas.

As for the NFL being a bunch of beaches, they have been trying to purge 'The Clutch' ;) from Youtube. Greatest play in 20 years and they're trying NOT to show it. :shakehead

:D Thanks Gnam. Anyone know what they actually decided to call it? I've been wondering about that these last few days when I was not anguishing over CCWS.