Channeling Some Football

Here’s where to watch NFL games this season:

CBS

This is the network’s 48th season of televising the NFL. It has the rights to Sunday day games involving visiting teams from the AFC.

Jim Nantz and Phil Simms make up the lead announcing team. Others include Greg Gumbel-Dan Dierdorf, Dick Enberg-Randy Cross and Kevin Harlan-Rich Gannon. Ian Eagle this season will team with Solomon Wilcots, Gus Johnson will join Steve Tasker, Don Criqui will work with Steve Beuerlein, and Bill Macatee will work with a still-to-be-named partner.

The pregame show cast again includes host James Brown and analysts Dan Marino, Boomer Esiason and Shannon Sharpe, plus newcomer Bill Cowher. Charley Casserly returns as the CBS insider.

Fox

Sunday day games involving visiting teams from the NFC will be shown on Fox, which has been televising the NFL since 1994.

The lead announcing team will again be Joe Buck and Troy Aikman, with Pam Oliver reporting from the sidelines. Kenny Albert has a new partner, Daryl Johnston, and Johnston’s former partner, Dick Stockton, will be paired with Brian Baldinger. Tony Siragusa will be the sideline reporter for the Albert-Johnston team. The other teams will be Sam Rosen-Tim Ryan, Matt Vasgersian-JC Pearson, and Ron Pitts-Tony Boselli.

Curt Menefee is now the permanent host of the pregame show, which traveled to game sites most of last season but this season will stay in its Los Angeles studio. Joining the cast of Terry Bradshaw, Howie Long and Jimmy Johnson will be Barry Switzer. Also, Fox insider Jay Glazer will now report from the L.A. studio.

NBC

The network gets the Thursday night season opener, New Orleans at Indianapolis on Sept. 6, then, three days later, begins its second season of “Sunday Night Football” with the New York Giants at Dallas. Al Michaels and John Madden, along with sideline reporter Andrea Kremer, return as the announcing team.

Bob Costas returns as the host of the “Football Night in America” studio show. He will be joined by new co-host Keith Olbermann. Newcomer Tiki Barber will join analysts Cris Collinsworth and Jerome Bettis.

ESPN

The network’s second season of “Monday Night Football” will begin the same as its first, with a doubleheader. On Sept. 10, Baltimore will play at Cincinnati at 4 p.m. PT, followed by Arizona at San Francisco at around 7:15 p.m.

Mike Tirico returns as the play-by-play announcer. He and holdover Tony Kornheiser will be joined by Ron Jaworski, who is replacing Joe Theismann.

NFL Network

When the NFL starts offering games on what early in the season typically are off days, they can be found on this network, starting with a Thanksgiving night telecast of Indianapolis at Atlanta (which will go up against USC-Arizona State on ESPN).

The network will televise a total of eight late-season games -- five on Thursdays and three on Saturdays.

Bryant Gumbel and Cris Collinsworth return as the announcers. The network will also replay five of the best games from the weekend -- one on Monday night and two each on Tuesday and Wednesday nights. In the L.A. market, NFL network is not available to Time Warner and Charter cable subscribers.

DirecTV

The “NFL Sunday Ticket” pay package offers games not televised in the L.A. market. The base cost is $269 for the season, with a premium “Super Fan” package available for an additional $99. Among the pluses Super Fan customers get is a channel that takes them from game to game, following the most significant action.

Also, Super Fan customers can watch web-streamed games on their personal computer or laptop, a first for the NFL in the U.S.

DirecTV acquired live-game broadband rights as part of its five-year, $3.5-billion deal with the league in 2005.

The Postseason

In the postseason, the television lineup will look like this:

* Saturday, Jan. 5: NBC televises AFC and NFC wild-card games.

* Sunday, Jan. 6: CBS and Fox televise AFC and NFL wild-card games.

* Saturday, Jan. 12 and Sunday, Jan. 13: CBS and Fox televise divisional playoff games.

* Sunday, Jan. 30: CBS and Fox televise conference championship games.

* Sunday, Feb. 3: Fox televises Super Bowl XLII at Glendale, Ariz.

* Sunday, Feb. 10: Fox televises Pro Bowl at Honolulu.

-- Larry Stewart