By Leonard Shapiro
Washington Post Columnist
Friday, January 29, 1999; Page D8

MIAMI – Any notion that Pat Summerall and John Madden won't be announcing football on Fox much longer was quashed the other day when Summerall said he plans to keep working for at least four years. David Hill, president of Fox Sports, said he would like to have Summerall, 68, announce NFL football in perpetuity, if that could be arranged.

"He's the best, they're the best," Hill said. "I would like both of them to stay as long as possible."

Summerall and Madden, a pairing for 18 years, will work their seventh Super Bowl as a team on Sunday, more games than any other twosome in the history of the game. Summerall, once an end and kicker for the New York Giants, has been doing football on network TV since 1962 and has worked 14 Super Bowls at the network level, including the first in 1967 as an analyst and sideline reporter assigned to the Green Bay Packers' bench.

That first Super Bowl was carried simultaneously by CBS and NBC, and Summerall recalled the other day that NBC was interviewing Bob Hope at halftime and missed the second-half kickoff. "A producer wanted me to ask Vince Lombardi if he would mind kicking off again," he said. "He was serious. I told him I didn't think that was such a good idea."

Summerall also had a rather startling admission this week. He is known for a low-key, less-is-more, mostly unemotional approach to play-by-play. But he said he found himself pulling for the underdog Atlanta Falcons over the Minnesota Vikings in the overtime session of the NFC title game after the Falcons improbably tied the game.

"I don't think I've ever said anything like that before," Summerall said. "I'll probably never be able to go back to Minnesota, but it's the truth."

Millen Misses Wins, Losses
Matt Millen, a man Hill described as "the second best analyst in all of football," will handle that chore for CBS Radio, working with play-by-play broadcaster Howard David. Millen, also a Fox analyst, also apparently will be around for the long haul, though he was tempted to cross over to the other side of the street last month when he was in serious negotiations with the Detroit Lions about becoming team president.

"I love what I'm doing," said Millen, the only player to win Super Bowl rings with three franchises (the Raiders, 49ers and Redskins). "But the one thing I've always missed is the feeling you had after a game, whether you won or you lost. Here, they don't put up a W or an L. It's more like 'good broadcast' or 'nice job.' The chance to get back in that arena where you know exactly where you stand every Sunday was very intriguing to me."

In the end, it didn't work out for a variety of reasons. The Lions have said that there were philosophical differences that couldn't be worked out. Millen said there were only a few unresolved issues over authority, and he had family concerns.

Several of his Fox colleagues have said that Millen had serious reservations about Bobby Ross's ability to turn the franchise around but was told the head coach was untouchable, at least for this coming year. Millen also wasn't expecting the deluge of phone calls from old friends, former teammates and coaches all eager to find employment if he were the man in charge.

"Matt's not a guy who likes to say no to people," said one friend. "Being the boss is a lot different than what he's doing now."

Almost as Good as a Couch
A select group of fans attending Sunday's game at Pro Player Stadium will find themselves on the cutting edge of interactive technology when they plop down in their $325 seats.

About 600 of those seats, and all the stadium skyboxes, have been outfitted with "ChoiceSeat," what amounts to a personal computer/television set mounted on an arm rest that will access the live game broadcast, and also provide 18 live camera angles and eight replay channels, highlights and programming from NFL Films and real-time and historic statistical information, all available at a fingertip touch of the screen.

The technology has been installed at the Tampa Bay Buccaneers' new stadium, and has been used on an experimental basis in other venues. Williams Communications, the company that developed the product, believes it won't be long before most new stadiums are outfitted with their product, which has an advertising component, the better to increase the profit margin.

It's all very impressive, but also leads to several questions. If you're in a stadium, why would you stare at a television screen you could be watching at home instead of focusing on the field? What happens when the beer man sloshes suds in the wrong direction? Are mustard stains easy to clean off the screen?