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Two-Man Show By George Stahl NEW YORK (AQB)--Boomer Esiason said being the lone analyst on ABC's Monday Night Football, which begins its 30th season this week with the Super Bowl champion Denver Broncos hosting the Miami Dolphins, makes his job easier and harder. "A two-man booth is much easier for me. It allows me to analyze the game and gives the fan an opportunity to find out what these players are thinking about and how they're feeling," the former All-Pro quarterback said in a conference call this week. However, "there's a greater burden on me to understand the X's and O's of what each team is trying to do." Nonetheless, Esiason sounds happy sharing the booth with only play-by-play man Al Michaels, who is starting his 14th straight season on Monday Night Football. "I just can't tell you how much more relaxed I am this year, because I know I'm not looking for a spot to fit in. I know where I fit in. I know what my job is, and it's so much easier when you have a clearer job description." Michaels, not surprisingly, also says he likes the arrangement. "I'm looking forward to this probably more than any other season because it's different, and I think a two-man situation is going to be better and easier. It just feels right - that's the only way that I could put it." "In a two-man booth, we have the opportunity to begin a story and to weave it without having an obstacle placed in our way," he said, explaining that it is easier to control a conversation between two people, rather than between three. "That, I think, is going to be the benefit of this." Michaels, who worked in the only other two-man booth in Monday Night Football history, with Frank Gifford in 1996, said the missing analyst also will put some air in the telecast. "I think we can allow the telecast to breathe. You don't have to keep up a constant patter during the course of game. These days, the way sports are being done on television, that might be disconcerting to an audience. I think they're use to just hearing constant chatter, but we don't have to give them a constant chatter." Producer Ken Wolfe agrees. "Although I think there are some dynamics to a three-man booth, I think one of the huge advantages of a two-man booth is that you can make it a relaxing, informative telecast," the 14-year MNF veteran said. "I don't think there is anything to wrong with letting something breathe." ABC Sports vice president of production John Filippelli said the network "briefly" considered adding a person but that "it wasn't a concept that either [ABC Sports President] Howard Katz or myself was sold on." Of course, Monday Night Football is down a man in the booth because it did not renew the contract Dan Dierdorf, who has since moved to CBS' second team with Verne Lundquist. Michaels said that's the unfortunate side of the business. "On a personal level, it's one thing. On a professional level, it's a whole other thing. I know at a certain point, a ship has sailed. Dan and I are still very, very close, and we'll always be, but at a certain point you have to move on because it's out of your hands. And that was out of our hands, none of us could do anything about it. "At a certain point, you just have to say, 'OK, that's over and done. Let's move on.'" "Last year, with Dan in the last year of his deal with none of us knowing whether he was coming back, that was more difficult. That had an effect on all of us, because we didn't know what was going to happen. "Could it have been handled differently? I'm sure it could have, but again, that's the type of thing that's always open to a second guess. And there is no good way to ever handle something like that. Esiason was upset with how his relationship with Dierdorf was perceived. "The most disturbing thing that came out of last year was that Dan Dierdorf and I were terrific friends. We were friends off the camera, and we were friends on the camera. I don't know why but there was this feeling that he and I were trying to snipe at each other, or he was sniping at me. And I never, ever felt that way. "I guess it's all in the ear of the beholder, if you will. But I don't know where that came from. I was saddened that that actually was there," the two-year MNF veteran said. "Dan gave me more room than probably most people would have, and that was the most disappointing aspect of it." After three preseason games, the men are pleased with their performance so far; however, Michaels said it's a work in progress. "It's an evolving process. Boomer and I have only had three games together in a two-man situation, and you want to assume it's going to get better and better, but we're going to work at it. Instead of making a tremendous change, you tweak it. That's all you need every week. "That's going to be the key to this whole process."
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