The 2nd Annual Fang's Bites NFL TV Awards

Following the format of last year's successful 1st Annual Fang's Bites NFL TV Awards, it's time to give you the 2nd Annual edition. Again, no quirky nicknames for the awards, just the Best and Worst, and again, no betting, this is not a competition.

Best Play-by-Play: He won it last year and I see no reason to give it to anyone else this year. Al Michaels of NBC's Sunday Night Football manages to rise to the occasion again and again. With some excellent late season games, Al stepped up to the plate and hit home runs especially during Week 16's Carolina-Giants game. Always seeing trends, Al can sometimes take over a broadcast and do both play-by-play and color, stepping over his partner, but late this season, he seemed to allow John Madden to be John Madden.

Best Game Analyst: Earlier this season, he showed a lot of slippage and it was noticeable. However, in December, John Madden showed signs of why he was the best analyst in the NFL during the 1980's and early 1990's. In his last two games of the 2008 regular season, Carolina-Giants and Denver-San Diego, the old Madden surfaced. The one that was on top of trends, the one that showed humor. Even a "BOOM!" came out. It seemed as if Al Michaels decided to give Madden a chance to show what he was made of. It has made Sunday Night Football a much more enjoyable broadcast.

Best Studio Show: NFL Gameday Final, NFL Network. It's mainly a highlight show that airs late Sunday night and is repeated throughout Monday morning, but it has become quite good. While it won't make us forget the legacy of the original NFL Primetime on ESPN, Rich Eisen, Deion Sanders and Steve Mariucci have jelled rather well and with the NFL Network allowed to use extended highlights, one can get a good sense of what happened in each game. Mariucci's "Coach It Up" segments are fun to watch. And Deion's "Going Primetime" at the end of each program has become a must-see segment.

Best Studio Host: James Brown, NFL Today. He is one of the best traffic cops on TV today. Having to deal with four studio analysts, James makes sure his co-horts, Dan Marino, Bill Cowher, Shannon Sharpe and Boomer Esiason all get chances to shine. It's why he helped to make Fox NFL Sunday number one during his tenure as host of that show. It's why his no nonsense hosting allows the NFL Today to be a fun show to watch. However, it still will not beat Fox in the ratings due to the bigger NFC markets. But J.B. remains the best studio host of the five that are out there.

Best Studio Analyst: Bill Cowher, CBS. I would have given this to Howie Long of Fox, but Cowher did a really good job this season breaking down the Cowboys. He was outspoken at times and he was not afraid to speak out, especially on Dallas as Barry Horn noted a few times in his blog. In his second year, Cowher has become a very decent analyst. However, the one fault and not of his own, was CBS failing to ask him his plans for 2009 on the final Sunday of the regular season.

Most Valuable Network: Fox. It rose to the top of the ratings heap this season even beating out the primetime package for the second year in a row. Fox also had some big games this season and rode the Cowboys to the ratings win.

Rookie of the Year: Michael Strahan, Fox. It was the worst kept secret in the offseason, that Strahan would join Fox and when Osi Umenyiora went down with an injury leading to speculation that the Giants would come a calling, Strahan turned it down. It led to him joining the established Fox NFL Sunday and he injected some energy into the show that was already high octane. He made a nice fit into the show, although he made a strange prediction early on saying the Cowboys were the best team in the NFC.

Best NFL Insider: Jay Glazer, Fox. Again. If you thought last season with the Patriots Spygate tape wasn't enough, Jay was once again the man with the know. He was on top of the Brett Favre-to-the Jets story. He constantly had inside information and often was breaking news during his segment on Fox NFL Sunday. Jay is a repeat winner in this category.

Best Announcing Team: You would think I would say Al Michaels and John Madden and normally you would be right, but I'm going with Kenny Albert, Daryl Johnston and Tony Siragusa of Fox. At first, I didn't like Siragusa because I thought he was depending too much on schtick, but in the last couple of seasons, he's actually been pretty good noting the blocking schemes while stationed on the field. His chemistry with Johnston is good and Kenny Albert is showing that he's quite good at play-by-play. I've found that I have been entertained with this team and also learned a few things about offensive line play thanks to Goose. Definitely a surprise pick.

Best Sideline Reporter: I'm giving this to Charissa Thompson of Fox. While you can say I'm awarding Charissa the award because I've been touting her since last season, she's quite good especially when she has to pull double duty working Saturday's for the Big Ten Network and then again the following day on the NFL.

Best Feature: Red Zone Channel, DirecTV. I raved about it last season, I raved about it this season, it's the best way to watch the NFL as long as you subscribe to DirecTV's Sunday NFL Ticket's Superfan feature. Host Andrew Siciliano is able to see all of the games and will bring to all of the action as it happens. And scoring updates come as soon as they happen. During one particular week, Red Zone Channel was able to cut back and forth as games were ending and caught every single significant scoring play. To me, it's the way the NFL is supposed to be covered.

Best Game Coverage: Fox. Last year, it was NBC, this year, Fox's look was clean and especially with the top production team assigned to Joe Buck and Troy Aikman, the camera work was sharp and the replays were mostly spot on. And the crew with the "B" team of Albert, Johnston and Siragusa is also very good. Because I watched a lot of NFC games this season, I thought Fox did an excellent job this season.

Worst Play-by-Play: Ron Pitts, Fox. Again. One more year and he can retire this award. Charissa Thompson is assigned to Ron's team and she does a very good job. Ron is sometimes confused. He doesn't give down and distance. He's not good at all.

Worst Game Analyst: John Lynch, Fox. He's a rookie. I only saw him do two games, but those were enough. Very shaky on his analysis.

Worst Studio Host: Stuart Scott, ESPN. He's the second host on Monday Night Countdown. He's not necessary. I know ESPN likes a presence at its games, but to be honest, having Stuart partnered with Steve Young and Emmit Smith is like being stopped by a second police car two miles after you were already ticketed for speeding. There's no need for two studio crews or studio hosts on Monday Night Countdown that runs for 90 minutes. Too many cooks for the soup.

Worst Studio Analyst: Emmit Smith, ESPN. Awful. Terrible. Horrible. Should be scrapped.

Least Valuable Network: NFL Network. For the third consecutive season, Big Cable refused to get on board to show 8 Thursday and Saturday night games. While NFL Network had two big games this season, Jets at Patriots and the final game at Texas Stadium, the viewers were hard to come by for the channel thanks to its bickering with Bright House, Cablevision, Charter, Comcast, Time Warner, etc., etc., etc. Just end the fighting, give the Big Cable providers an ownership stake or give the Thursday night games to ESPN or Versus. The fighting is now boring.

Worst Game Coverage: NFL Network. While ESPN's camera work and production is pretty bad, NFL Network at times this season has looked amateurish. It should be much better considering it has hired some major league talent in Bob Papa and Cris Collinsworth to do games. You would think the NFL would know better. Graphics sometimes were late, coming out of commercial breaks were late and the replays were not clear. The National Football League deserves a better production than this.

Those are the awards for this season. Let me know if you agree or disagree.