Monday Night Football's Brian Griese made no sense during Bears-Steelers game
1. Every single broadcaster in every single sport makes mistakes. It’s part of the gig and can’t be helped.
The issue is the level of the mistake. On a scale from 1 to 10, a 1 is misidentifying a player or mispronouncing a name while a 10 is just not having a clue what’s going on. Brian Griese gave us a 15 during last night’s Bears-Steelers Monday Night Football game on ESPN.
After the Bears scored a touchdown to tie the game at 26 with 1:46 remaining in regulation, they lined up to kick the extra point. The Steelers went offsides on the play, which led Griese to somehow say about Chicago, “Now you have options. Do you want to go for 2 here and potentially … well you’re gonna kick this field goal either way. It’s a higher percentage to win the game.”
Listen, I’ve always said the only coach in the entire league who knows what they are doing when it comes to timeouts and clock management is Bill Belichick. So it’s not a shock that an announcer would struggle to grasp these things as well.
But why on earth Griese would think going for two in a tied game made any sense is impossible to figure out. I think he probably realized his gaffe as he was speaking and then that caused him to then mess up again by saying the Bears were kicking a field goal instead of an extra point, which made the whole thing even worse.
The point of all this is not to embarrass Griese. Like I said, every announcer is going to screw up. But NFL broadcasters need to be extra careful when it comes to throwing out strategy at the end of the game. That is not the time you want your audience to hear you sound like you don’t know what you’re talking about.
And when you’re calling a standalone game, the scrutiny is going to be even more intense. You wouldn’t get away with something that bad during a Sunday 1 p.m. regional game that goes to 11% of the country. So when you make that mistake on Monday Night Football, you’re going to get hammered, as Griese did on social media.
It wasn’t a good night overall for the ESPN crew.
“Even when he got to Alabama on a full ride, got the fancy dorm room, he spent the first few months in Alabama sleeping on the floor,” play-by-play man Steve Levy said of Steelers rookie running back Najee Harris during the game. “He said he’s just more comfortable, more used to that.”
After the game, Harris clearly heard about Levy’s story and responded on Twitter.
Levy addressed the error early Tuesday afternoon with a classy tweet and gesture.
2. Speaking of Najee Harris, you absolutely must watch his postgame interview with ESPN Deportes.
3. The funniest thing you will see on the Internet today is the Daily Mail claiming this is Aaron Rodgers out and about in California yesterday.
4. Even without Aaron Rodgers and inept offense by both teams, Sunday's Packers-Chiefs game was the most-watched Sunday afternoon game of the NFL season so far with 24.4 million viewers tuning in.
5. Most of you have seen the shocking cheap shot Nikola Jokić delivered to Markieff Morris last night. While the incident was ugly, we need to appreciate the great call by Nuggets play-by-play man Chris Marlowe, who screamed out "OH NO. No. Keep the players on the bench. No."
6. The latest episode of the Sports Illustrated Media Podcast features an interview with Al Michaels.
The voice of NBC's Sunday Night Football addresses reports that he's headed to Amazon to call Thursday Night Football next season. Michaels also talks about how he views certain games on the Sunday night schedule, the wildest games he's called, his old feud with Boomer Esiason, the good and bad from the Dennis Miller years on Monday Night Football and his thoughts on the success of the ManningCast.
Michaels also talks about steakhouses, his favorite sides and why he puts ketchup on his steaks.
The podcast closes with the weekly "Traina Thoughts" segment. This week, Jimmy and Sal Licata from WFAN and SNY talk about the Aaron Rodgers COVID-19 saga, whether Von Miller was traded because of a Halloween party, highlights of the last ManningCast, Episode 2 of Curb Your Enthusiasm, and the revelation that Tony died in the final episode of The Sopranos.
You can listen to the podcast below or download it on Apple, Spotify and Stitcher.
You can also watch the SI Media Podcast on YouTube.
7. RANDOM VIDEO OF THE DAY: Happy 51st birthday to Chris Jericho, who still has the greatest debut in WWE history.
Be sure to catch up on past editions of Traina Thoughts and check out the Sports Illustrated Media Podcast hosted by Jimmy Traina on Apple, Spotify or Stitcher. You can also follow Jimmy on Twitter and Instagram.