Artie Lange, Paul Rudd, and Jason Sudeikis were on the premiere episode of Joe Buck Live last night, and let's just say that Lange took control of the show with a dirty put down to Buck after the host brought up TMZ.com. (The after-the-show webcast can be seen at HBO's site, but it seems to be down right now.). Sports Illustrated has more, including comments from HBO and Buck.

Oh, Brett Favre was on the show too.



[via Awful Announcing]

As anyone who follows sports on TV knows, Bob Costas is a baseball guy. He loves, loves, loves the National Pastime. Therefore, since NBC has not had major league baseball for years, it's been rough on Bob. He's managed to keep his love for the game alive with books and speeches and as part of his work for HBO. Well, now he's going to be doing a lot more baseball.

Bob Costas is upping his commitment to the MLB Network, and leaving HBO. When the new baseball channel launched on January 1, 2009, included in the charter line up All Time Games, the rebroadcasting of vintage baseball games with Costas as the host.

(S07E13) NBC is broadcasting the Super Bowl on Sunday in case you didn't already know that, although I can't imagine how unless you've been living in a cave for the past couple of weeks. The promotion has been across the entire NBC Universal network.

There have been little football reminders in most of its programming, like the NFL-themed cuisine on Bravo's Top Chef. This Sunday there'll be an all-day USA Network Super Bowl Promotion including the characters from Psych, Law and Order: CI, Burn Notice, In Plain Sight, The Starter Wife, and Monk. Yeah, Monk.

And yet, probably because of some "rights" thing, this episode of Monk had to build the mystery at a playoff game around a fictional football team and that made this whole show pretty flimsy.

NBC is airing the Super Bowl this year. Sunday's all-day telecast (several hours of pre-game and probably another four or so for the game itself) will feature a wide variety of guests. Which of these guests are not going to be seen during the broadcast?

Keith Olbermann
Sarah Palin
Tina Fey
Top Chef's Tom Colicchio
Matt Lauer
Al Roker
Bruce Springsteen
Bob Costas
Jay Leno
Conan O'Brien

For nearly 20 years, NFL football fans could feast on Sunday games and then flip on ESPN for a complete wrap up on NFL Prime Time hosted primarily by Chris "Boomer" Berman and Tom Jackson. It was a staple. Then in 2005, ESPN dropped the show.

Now, it's coming back (sort of) and in addition to Boomer and Jackson, John Saunders will be rejoining them, re-creating the original troika from 1987. The essence of NFL Prime Time will be found in the 7 p.m. ET edition of SportsCenter each Sunday during football season. Essentially, they'll be doing what they did on NFL Prime Time, and in doing so, they'll be taking aim at NBC's Football Night in America, that network's lead in show for the Sunday Night Football game.

This should be really interesting because the NBC pre-game show is like Thanksgiving dinner -- loaded with stuffing. They have stars galore, including the recently added, former ESPN stalwart, Dan Patrick.

Over the past few days it has once again become quite apparent that they have yet to invent an Olympic sport that I won't watch. Really. Fencing, Women's Air Rifle, Badminton... I'll watch it all. I spent my weekend traveling between the various channels, internet streams, and the occasional visit to my Slingbox in Boston. As far as the games go, they're as good as they've ever been. The coverage from NBC though, unfortunately, is still not nearly what it should be.

I'll admit, they got me. When I read about the plans for more live coverage, and how they were going to make use of all the other NBC/Universal properties, I thought this would be the year, the Olympic nirvana that always could have been. It's really not panning out that way. More than anything else, the word that keeps coming to mind for the NBC coverage is annoying. After the jump, some notes for NBC.

I feel bad about not watching the Olympics. It feels almost un-American. Not only am I not cheering on the US athletes, I'm also not watching 2000 hours of TV programming, which is even more against the ideals of this country. But I just can't get into any of the games or events. Why?

1. I'm not that interested in sports, actually. There are two sports that I truly love: tennis and baseball (in that order). So if I were to watch the Olympics, I would suddenly have to become a fan of swimming or volleyball or track and field or weightlifting, and if I don't watch those shows the rest of the year why would I suddenly get an intense interest in them every few years? I have a general "I hope the USA does well" feeling, of course, and I'm glad to hear that Michael Phelps and Dara Torres are doing well, and I hope the U.S. tennis team does well. But I think you really have to be into sports (or the human drama/stories aspect) to watch the Olympics at length.

Today was the very last day of the press tour here in Beverly Hills. It was "TCA Day," with members of the association (including me) going to the Warner Brothers lot to visit the sets of ER, Pushing Daisies, and Chuck, where we spoke to cast members and producers (Oh, we went to the set of America's Best Dance Crew, but let's just forget I mentioned that one). Then we bused it over to the Fox lot, where Joss Whedon showed us around the set of Dollhouse, and the entire cast of King of the Hill gave a table read of their 250th episode. All this fun will be in upcoming posts later this summer.

Despite some of the griping you may have seen from me, it's been lots of fun. It's just a very tiring experience. Case in point: On Monday, NBC decided to close out the press conference portion of the tour by having us sit through ten panels, five of them after lunch. Here's a wrap-up post that goes over some of what went on yesterday that I haven't already covered.

NBC's Football Night in America is something like too much of a good thing. The network seems intent on stuffing the Sunday night broadcast with everything but the kitchen sink.

When Tiki Barber retired from the New York Giants, he joined their broadcast. Same thing with Jerome Bettis of the Pittsburgh Steelers. Then Keith Olbermann, a sports guy before becoming the host of MSNBC's Countdown, was inserted into the show. And that was on top of the three mainstays Bob Costas, Cris Collinsworth and Peter King.

Now, you can add one more star to the constellation. Dan Patrick is joining Football Night in America. Patrick, formerly the main man at ESPN -- and Keith's longtime partner on Sports Center as well as Dan's radio show -- will be paired up with Olbermann again and will be slotted in as pre-game show's co-host.

There's no question that Patrick will be an asset. His 18 years at ESPN proved that, and I admired his maverick spirit when he bolted the comforts of Bristol, Connecticut and set up a new deal with his radio show.

Long before ESPN was the worldwide leader in sports, ABC sportscaster and newsman Jim McKay was the voice of American sports. ABC sports legend Jim McKay died today at the age of 86; the cause of death was not revealed. In the annals of television history, Jim McKay is among the giants in sports broadcasting: a twelve-time Emmy winner, an iconic presence on The Wide World of Sports, the man who said the words, "the thrill of victory, the agony of defeat." He was the moderator of twelve Olympics and a broadcaster who gave the best he had in every television show in which he was involved, be it the Kentucky Derby, the British Open, or any of the other hundreds of events he covered.

If Jim McKay had just done that, he'd have a great legacy. However, when he was confronted with the task of anchoring the events that unfolded at the 1972 Munich Olympics, when the Israeli athletes were taken hostage by terrorist and killed in a commando raid, Jim McKay rose to the occasion.

As Bob Sassone wrote in his report about Inside the NFL ending its HBO run last February, the NFL was reporting that the show would find a home on another network. It has. And I can tell you now that Inside the NFL will be appearing weekly on Showtime. It'll be a collaboration with CBS Sports and NFL Films. That said, I think we can expect to see CBS talent on the show.

In its most recent edition on HBO, Inside the NFL was hosted by Bob Costas, with expert input by former players and current broadcast analysts Dan Marino, Cris Collinsworth and Cris Carter. Costas and Collinsworth are NBC employees, and Carter is part of ESPN. That leaves Danny Boy. And yes, he is a CBS guy, a regular commentator on The NFL Today every Sunday during football season. I'll bet you right now that Dan will be on the show.

Inside the NFL is a unique weekly highlight show -- one of the best ever -- because shows the games up close from the viewpoint of NFL Films. Those cameras get inside of the game more than TV cameras. They're films, not TV and the production values are like a documentary film. As a longtime football fan, I'm really glad that Inside the NFL will go on. This year will be its 32nd on the air.

Anyone catch the live broadcast of Costas NOW last night? I was lucky enough to get a few tickets and went to the live taping in Manhattan with my girlfriend. And I really do mean lucky. Not only did we get seated in the front row, but we were seated right in front of all the panelists. Everyone. Joe Buck, Cris Carter, Mitch Albom, Mike Tirico, Michael Wilbon, John McEnroe... the list goes on. And of course, Bob Costas was only a few feet in front of us on stage. For a sports and TV fanatic, it was very impressive. So why am I writing about it? The town hall format of the show covered a lot of hot topics in sports, but there were a couple segments that really stood out because they directly relate to what we're doing here at TV Squad -- blogging and athletes' (or in our case TV celebs, writers, and producers) reactions to the media.

• TNT has NBA Playoffs all night.
• At 8, ABC has a new According To Jim.
• CBS has a new NCIS at 8, followed by a new Shark.
• FOX has new episodes of American Idol and Hell's Kitchen.
• There's a new Beauty and the Geek on The CW at 8, then a new Reaper.
• At 9, ABC has a new Dancing with the Stars, then a new Women's Murder Club.
• PBS has a new installment of Carrier at 9.
• Discovery has a new Deadliest Catch at 9.
• Hallmark has the new movie The Good Witch at 9.
• BBC America has a new Last Restaurant Standing at 9.
• At 10, NBC has a new Law and Order: SVU.
• FX has a new episode of The Riches at 10.
• Sci-Fi has a new ECW at 10.
• HBO has a new Costas Now at 10.
• Also at 10: MTV has a new A Shot At Love with Tila Tequila.

Check your local TV listings for more.

There are probably two reactions to that headline:

1. No big deal, I didn't really watch that show anyway.

2. There's a show called Inside the NFL?

Actually, there's a third reaction possible, when you realize that the show has been on for 31 years! I had no idea the show was on for that long, nor did I know that HBO has existed for that long. I wonder how many people had cable in 1977?

• At 7, USA has coverage of The U.S. Open.
• At 8, CBS has a new Power of 10.
• NBC has a new Most Outrageous Moments at 8, then new episodes of Last Comic Standing and Dateline.
• At 9, Fox News has a Republican debate from New Hampshire.
• TBS has two new episodes of House of Payne at 9.
• There's a new Mythbusters on Discovery at 9.
• The History Channel has a new Lost Worlds at 9.
• HBO has a new Costas NOW at 9.
• At 9:30, HGTV has a new Design on a Dime.
• At 10, FX has a new Rescue Me.
• Food Network has a new Dinner: Impossible at 10.
• Fox Movie Channel has Revenge of the Nerds at 10.
• Also at 10: Bravo has a new Top Chef.

Check your local TV listings for more.