Sunday, November 7, 2010

Wherefor art thou, Highlights?

It seems I praised NFL films a bit too much in my post to open the season.  I think they've started to take me for granted.

First, they haven't produced "Game of the Week" since the end of the 2008-2009 season.  The last "Game of the Week" was the Super Bowl between the Steelers and Cardinals.  Its now been a season and a half with no new features.  My only guess at the reason is the death of narrator Harry Kalas in April 2009.  Harry's death was a loss for all of us, but surely the show must go on, right?

Another thing which is bad may not be related to NFL Films directly, but is related to the NFL and how it handles its video content.  For some reason the NFL has ceased to create self contained highlight videos during this season.  These are videos of a game which show only highlights coupled with the radio calls of the given team making the highlight, which no studio input or outside narration.  They would always be listed simply, with a title like "Chargers 21, Raiders 14". Now for some reason this practice has stopped, which is really a pain because the only way to try and get a full video of highlights is through a recap show.  That can be fine sometimes, but its far from perfect. I've seen them do highlights for a game where 40+ points were scored, and the whole reel consisted of one play and lasted less than 30 seconds.  That's hardly what I'd call full coverage.

So what's the deal?  Where are our highlights?

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