ESPN Goes Gaga on Draft Day

With apologies to Mickey, Minnie and Jiggy, the happiest place on Earth on Saturday was another Disney subsidiary, ESPN, home of the longest, peppiest infomercial on record, sometimes also known as the NFL draft.

In another place and time, many of the players passing through this trumpet-blaring 10-hour red-carpet parade will disappoint their fans, their coaches and their teammates, or suffer career-gutting injuries, or wind up on police blotters, or make strange commercials for a video game manufacturer.

But on Saturday, Day One of the NFL draft -- presented by Coors, gift-wrapped by ESPN -- everyone given a minute’s air time, with the possible exception of the Minnesota Vikings, is given the benefit of the doubt, reputations inflated like the footballs many of these can’t-miss rookies will soon be bobbling.

Steve Mariucci had just traded down in a serious way, pulling out of San Francisco, where he couldn’t win a big game, and moving over to Detroit, where the Lions don’t win much of anything. In NFL terms, Detroit is Cincinnati with more freeways, but on draft day, Mariucci and ESPN’s Chris Berman are all grins, Berman congratulating the coach on his first-round pick: “Good job up top, Mooch.”

That pick, Michigan State receiver Charles Rogers, goes into the league amid questions about a “diluted” urine sample, which could indicate the presence of a masking agent, although Rogers claims he simply drank a lot of water before delivering the sample. Uncomfortable with this sort of controversy, ESPN’s Chris Fowler told viewers he recently had lunch with Rogers and then mentioned to Rogers, “You told me yesterday you never used drugs, right?” “Never,” Rogers declared.

“Never means never,” Fowler assured everyone listening, and with that, it was over to Boomer to back-slap Mooch on the good job he did with that Rogers pick.

No image is too unsightly to defy sprucing up on draft day. Even Ray Lewis got the image overhaul in a bizarre series of video-game ads that cast Lewis as a mischievous veteran hazing rookies with such playful pranks as pelting Carson Palmer with crackers while the new Bengal quarterback cranks out a set of push-ups.

On NFL/ESPN draft day, every faulty resume has an upside, every underachiever has a chance to make it in the big league if someone can (draft-day catch-phrase alert!) “coach him up,” every coach or general manager appearing on the “Coors Light Videoconferencing Call” is anointed with a post-pick way-to-go by Berman.

And then came the Vikings, who, for the second consecutive draft, readied to take their place in the first round, had their name called, hemmed and hawed and elected to punt.

In 2002, the Vikings failed to make a move during their allotted 15 minutes, bumping them down a notch in the draft order.

In 2003, the Vikings outdid that precedent, dawdling so long that Jacksonville and Carolina jumped past them to make the seventh and eighth selections of the first round. Minnesota slid from seventh to ninth, where the Vikings stopped backpedaling and grabbed Oklahoma State defensive tackle Kevin Williams, like a stray tree branch saving them from a free fall into the second round.

Clearly, this was not a good-job-up-top kind of moment. Clearly, the Viking brain trust was not thinking altogether clearly.

How was ESPN going to play this one? Especially with former Viking coach Dennis Green sitting next to Mel Kiper and Chris Mortensen on the first-string analysts’ set?

Green had warned his old team, with seven minutes still on the clock, to “get those names ready, say it loud, say it clear and get it right.” When it got down to the final seconds, and then to 0:00, Berman turned incredulous, noting that this was the second year in a row the clock had run out on Minnesota. Then, when Commissioner Paul Tagliabue finally headed toward the podium, Berman deadpanned, “A card is turned in, but whose card is it? The suspense is killing us.” The card belonged to Jacksonville, which was putting in its claim on Marshall quarterback Byron Leftwich.

Another card quickly followed. Carolina had selected Utah offensive tackle Jordan Gross.

Meanwhile, in Eden Prairie, Minn., the life seemed to be sucked out of the “Vikings Draft Party.” Dozens of big-boned, purple-clad Minnesota fans first appeared to be stunned, then appeared to be cursing.

With Baltimore next in line to out-leg them, the Vikings at last delivered a card with Williams’ name on it.

“Well, they got their guy, that’s the important thing,” Kiper said.

Berman: “I guess. That’s an interesting way to get him.” Green took the all’s-well-that-doesn’t-end-in-catastrophe approach.

“Everybody has their own philosophy,” he said, “but Carolina and Jacksonvile and Baltimore are all happy because they got their player and didn’t have to give up anything. [The Vikings] got their player.”

“You’re telling me everybody’s happy,” Berman quipped. Then, with a touch of sarcasm, he added: “It’s a happy day.” Mortensen: “You know, there is still the appearance....”

“The Rams,” Berman interjected, cutting off Mortensen. “The Rams, when we come back.” Cut to commercial, reach for antiperspirant.

It’s a happy day. And ESPN was determined to keep it that way.