Courtesy Baltimore Sun

(July 18, 2008) The hiring of Bob Papa as the NFL Network's play-by-play voice - a long-anticipated move announced this week - means a switch in outlook on the games from the perspective offered by Bryant Gumbel. That's according to the man sitting behind the analyst microphone for the Thursday night package, Cris Collinsworth.

"With Bryant, I was always interested in his take on the games because Bryant has a way of seeing a very broad picture of the NFL and big picture of where the NFL fits in the world, obviously with all his news background and such," Collinsworth said, according to highlights of a conference call.

"So that was an interesting dynamic for me all the way through. But I think with Bob, he lives the minutiae the way that I do, if that makes sense. ... So I think it will be a different dynamic."

Collinsworth, an analyst on NBC's Football Night in America and Showtime's Inside the NFL studio shows, said he looks forward to working games for the chance to approach talking football differently.

"We will get into discussions of the details of what's going on in the league. And, for me, that's probably what I enjoy most about doing the games themselves. When you do studio work, you're always talking about the Brett Favre situations of the world; you're always talking about the same four or five topics that sort of are the headlines in the newspapers. But when you're doing the games, you get to talk about the left guard and the running backs coach."

•Papa, the New York Giants' radio voice, would be more than willing to talk about the running backs coach. Also from the conference call, he said: "All eyes of the NFL are on these games. To have a chance to work with Cris and be a part of this is tremendous. I mean, I've been a subscriber and a fan of NFL Network since its inception. It's always on in my house."

I'm sure he doesn't literally mean "always." After all, how many times can you watch the Making the Squad episodes about the 2006 San Diego Chargers cheerleader tryouts?