7 DAYS UNTIL NFL AM DEBUTS!
NFL Network’s ‘NFL AM’ Premieres Monday, July 30 at 6:00 AM ET
Meet Analyst Mark Kriegel
Seven days and counting until the premiere of NFL AM – a new, live weekday morning show on NFL Network!
Beginning Monday, July 30 at 6:00 AM ET, fans can start their day with the NFL like never before with a four-hour morning show featuring seasoned and opinionated talent who will report and debate news, and examine the personalities that play the game.
Veteran sports columnist Mark Kriegel joins NFL Network after spending the previous five years as a national columnist for FOXSports.com and 10 years as a sports columnist for the New York Daily Newsand New York Post. Kriegel is also the author of two New York Times best-sellers: Namath: A Biography and Pistol: The Life of Pete Maravich. Additionally, Kriegel has served as a contributing editorEsquire magazine. In September, Kriegel’s book on boxer Ray “Boom Boom” Mancini titled The Good Son will be released.
Learn more about Kriegel with this brief Q&A:
On how he became a sports columnist:
“I was at the New York Daily News and I was basically covering mafia trials…Whenever there was a felonious basketball story, they would say, ‘Let Kriegel do it.’ The Daily News was about to go on strike and the [New York] Post was also in financial trouble; it had bought out a good number of its sports writers. So we were sitting at the bar and the consensus at the bar was, ‘Why don’t you let Kriegel write the sports column over there?’ That’s how it came about four months into the strike. A guy called me after three or four months out of work and said, ‘Do you still want that columnist job?’ I said, ‘Yeah…what do you want me to write a sports column for?’ He said, ‘I just want people to pick up the paper and say I hate that kid.’ I was young, I was 28 years old.”
On how he got started in journalism:
“It’s another misdirection play. I wanted to be a novelist and obviously it was something I couldn’t make a living at so I went into journalism. Also, I walked out of the LSATs. I took the written part of the test and I said, ‘I just can’t go through with this, I’m going to be a newspaper man.’”
On the greatest sporting event he covered:
“The first [Riddick] Bowe-[Evander] Holyfield fight in Las Vegas was to me an extraordinary spectacle because it was one of those things that actually lived up to the hype. People say you have to cover a heavyweight title fight in Vegas, and they were right. It came through so intensely.”
On covering the Denver Broncos’ victory over the Pittsburgh Steelers in the AFC Wild Card Game last year:
“[It] was something I was totally unprepared for…When [Tim] Tebow made that pass – which was perfect, I don’t care what anyone says – and Demaryius Thomas got to the end zone, a hush fell over that stadium that was unlike any event I’ve ever been to. People were stunned that it ended as it did. For those few moments, there was something that truly approximated awe…It was unlike anything I’ve ever seen or experienced in a stadium: that many people being absolutely still.”
The thing about waking up for a show that airs at 6:00 AM ET (3:00 AM PT) is…
“…Is that when they ask you that question at 8:30 AM PT, you have no answer. I’m going to start having a relationship with sunlight that is like a vampire.”
What would surprise me this NFL season is…
“…If there is not a New York Jets quarterback controversy. That would surprise me; that would stun me – that would shock me.”
What is your must-have technology?
“I’m not really a technological sort. I’ve never downloaded a song…I guess a cell phone.”
NFL AM’s talent roster also features 13-year NFL veteran Eric Davis, Brian Webber, Nicole Zaloumisand Steve Wyche. The show will be based at NFL Network’s Culver City, Calif. studios. No other sport is the sole focus of a show of this length each and every weekday morning.
NFL Network airs seven days a week, 24 hours a day on a year-round basis and is the only television network fully dedicated to the NFL and the sport of football. For more information, log on towww.nfl.com/nflnetwork. NFL.com is the exclusive internet home of NFL Network.
– NFL MEDIA –