ESPN Classic has been showing a lot of old NFL team highlight videos lately; if they keep it up, I may not leave my apartment the rest of the summer. What's great about it is that they aren't so much showing champions, but teams that did pretty well--playoff teams, but not championship teams. For instance, I just finished watching the 1981 Giants. I know about the '81 49ers, I know about the '86 Giants, but learning about this level of team is exactly what I like. The running of Scott Carpenter, the passing of Scott Brunner, etc. Add in the fact that it's just at the point where you get the classic NFL Films music, while also mixing in a little bit of '80s synth cheese. "Broncomania" (from 1986), and the 1980 Browns and Falcons, were great for exactly the same reason (replacing Carpenter and Brunner with William Andrews and Brian Sipe, of course).

If I could take over ESPN Classic, the lineup would be simple--old NFL Films, um, films; old games in their almost entirety (and by old, I mean that I would include stuff from before, say, 1998); maybe keep the Sunday night movie; and of course, Cheap Seats. That's it, that's the list. Never again would the network be besmirched with SportsCentury features, and certainly not of athletes who have retired in the last 5 years, or worse still, haven't even retired yet. People it's simple--it's about the games, and when it's not about the games, it's about old NFL Films. I don't even understand how someone could argue with me on this.