That’s Entertainment, ABC Style

The Tampa Bay Buccaneers, losers of the first 26 games in their history, longtime laughing stocks of the NFL, 3 1/2-point underdogs in their first Super Bowl, had just defeated the Oakland Raiders by 27 points after intercepting league most valuable player Rich Gannon five times.

We’d seen all the incredible television images.

We couldn’t wait for some postgame reaction to one of the most improbable Super Bowl results ever.

Oh, yes, we could.

Already, ABC had reduced the greatest one-day sporting spectacle on the planet to a four-hour warmup act for Jimmy Kimmel’s new talk show. Diminishment being the theme in San Diego on Sunday, the NFL thought nothing of turning its newly crowned champions into roadies for Bon Jovi.

After a few quick breathless comments from a still gasping Warren Sapp, the NFL turned its biggest stage over to Bon Jovi, who plodded through their corporate schlock rock while ABC broadcast canned interviews from Buccaneer players recorded long before kickoff.

Thankfully, Bon Jovi was silenced after one number and we were finally able to hear from Buccaneer owner Malcolm Glazer, who was so discombobulated he called his team the “Tampa Buccaneers.” Then, Tampa Bay Coach Jon Gruden, kind of an important figure in this game, got three questions and 63 seconds before the NFL turned it back over to Bon Jovi.

Where were Simeon Rice and Derrick Brooks when we really needed them?

Short of sacking Jon Bon Jovi in front of the drum kit, or Dexter Jackson pulling the plug and really earning his player-of-the-game trophy, the Buccaneers were stranded again. ABC did viewers one big favor -- the network broke away for commercials -- before coming back for brief interviews with a half-dozen Tampa Bay players and Oakland Coach Bill Callahan ... and then a plug by Chris Berman for a Super Bowl commercial Web site (in case you didn’t see enough commercials during the game, you could see them again on the Internet) and a camera cut to Times Square, where comic magicians Penn & Teller were about to take a sledgehammer to a sealed pickle jar to reveal their pre-Super Bowl predictions.

(Note to future socio-cultural historians: We kid you not.)

The game got away from ABC the same way it got away from the Raiders. After four hours of pregame talk, most of it superfluous, ABC and the NFL conspired to cut back on the words football fans most wanted to hear. According to Fred Gaudelli, producer of the game telecast, the network and the league made a joint decision to “make the postgame ceremony more entertainment-driven.”

ABC has consented to let Kimmel host a late-night talk show and try to hold his own against David Letterman and Jay Leno, but it couldn’t trust Gruden, Sapp and Keyshawn Johnson to carry a postgame show? Where had ABC been the last week, and the last five years?

Oh, for the record, Keyshawn did talk after the game, breaking his vow of media silence three days after swearing he’d never talk to another reporter for the rest of his career.

In case there was any doubt it had been a put-on from the start -- Johnson, after all, announced his media boycott in a column he wrote for ESPN.com -- it was dismissed within seconds of the final gun.

KNX radio listeners heard him first, with Johnson regaling a reporter about how “nobody wanted to see us get here, nobody wanted to see me win a championship. But we did it!”

A few minutes later, Keyshawn joined Tampa Bay quarterback Brad Johnson and ABC’s Lynn Swann for a television conversation. Swann didn’t even have to ask a question to get Keyshawn rambling.

Swann: “This is the first time you’ve had the same quarterback for two consecutive years. This is a whole new beginning for you!”

Keyshawn: “Oh, yeah, it is! You know what, I plan on having him for a third consecutive year. You can’t say enough about Brad. Brad didn’t get credit from anybody all year long. Later, our fans, with all the big support, came through for Brad and he led us to victory.”

Actually, Keyshawn was wrong. Apparently, you could say enough about Brad. Penn & Teller were standing by. Interviews had to be short.

Similarly, Al Michaels and John Madden were hamstrung by an unexpected blowout. Tampa Bay had a 20-3 halftime lead, building it to 34-3 with 20 minutes to play.

Finally, they caught a break when Gannon found Jerry Porter open in the back of the end zone for a juggling reception initially ruled incomplete.

After watching a replay, Madden decided Porter had possessed the ball and dragged both feet in the end zone. He suggested the Raiders ought to challenge the call.

The Raiders did. As more replays flashed on the screen, Michaels said he thought Porter did not have control of the ball as he went out of bounds. “I don’t think [referee Bill] Carollo overturns it.”

Madden disagreed. “Just to be contrary,” he said, “I think he does.”

This didn’t displease Michaels.

“John, anything to hold an audience,” he quipped.

A year after being wrong about New England needing to run out the clock instead of driving for the field goal that beat the St. Louis Rams, Madden was validated when Carollo reversed the call and signaled touchdown.

Michaels: “There you go. You see. So much from Tom Brady trying to sit on the ball last year.”

Madden: “Sometimes, contrary is good.”

Madden was also righteously indignant as he watched the Raiders sleepwalk through the first 40 minutes of the Super Bowl.

“This is the Super Bowl!” he cried. “This is the world championship! This is it!”

Buccaneer fans hoping to hear a few postgame words from their heroes were thinking exactly the same as they waited and waded through Bon Jovi and Penn & Teller.