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djnemo65 · 04-18-2009, 02:31 AM

While Madden was revolutionary in his time, his style of announcing had grown anachronistic in my opinion, his oversimplified analyses incongruent with the sophistication of your average NFL fan today. His was an approach born in an era in which ESPN and 24 hour sports shows and detailed football simulations didn't exist; in which the average fan didn't have access to the amount and quality of information that is available today. Thus he broke the arcane minutiae of professional football down into terms that your grandmother and mailman could understand, and this made him the biggest show in town in the 80's.

The problem is, members of my generation have been playing video games and obsessing over ESPN and internet statistics all of our lives, and as a result have a level of understanding of the game that would have been impossible for anyone not working in it 25 years ago. So we don't need to be spoken to as if we are 6 years old watching our first game with pops, who is trying to teach us the rules. That's why I think younger people were often so annoyed by Madden, who seemed to assume that they knew jack about the game.

In many ways Collinsworth is the antithesis of this. He assumes that his audience knows almost as much about football as he does, and usually he's right. Don't get the hate for him in this thread at all, I'm really looking forward to hearing him with Michaels next year.

04-18-2009, 02:31 AM	#43
djnemo65 Playmaker Join Date: May 2004 Posts: 2,836	Re: John Madden retires While Madden was revolutionary in his time, his style of announcing had grown anachronistic in my opinion, his oversimplified analyses incongruent with the sophistication of your average NFL fan today. His was an approach born in an era in which ESPN and 24 hour sports shows and detailed football simulations didn't exist; in which the average fan didn't have access to the amount and quality of information that is available today. Thus he broke the arcane minutiae of professional football down into terms that your grandmother and mailman could understand, and this made him the biggest show in town in the 80's. The problem is, members of my generation have been playing video games and obsessing over ESPN and internet statistics all of our lives, and as a result have a level of understanding of the game that would have been impossible for anyone not working in it 25 years ago. So we don't need to be spoken to as if we are 6 years old watching our first game with pops, who is trying to teach us the rules. That's why I think younger people were often so annoyed by Madden, who seemed to assume that they knew jack about the game. In many ways Collinsworth is the antithesis of this. He assumes that his audience knows almost as much about football as he does, and usually he's right. Don't get the hate for him in this thread at all, I'm really looking forward to hearing him with Michaels next year.