FanHouse Nbc Sunday Night Footbal

NBC will add former Indianapolis Colts coach Tony Dungy and former Patriots safety Rodney Harrison to its Sunday night football broadcast team, the network announced today.

"Both of these guys will have no problem talking about the game in both positive and critical ways," NBC chairman Dick Ebersol said on a conference call.

The NBC executives on the call said they hadn't finalized their broadcast crew for the 2009 season, but they did say they were planning more changes, that they would be moving at least part of their pregame show to the venues where the Sunday night games will be played and that they'll be "clearing out" more time for their analysts to analyze the specific game they're broadcasting that night.

New England's Rodney Harrison this morning announced his retirement from the NFL after 15 seasons. A two-time Super Bowl winner with the Patriots, Harrison is the only player in NFL history with more than 30 sacks and 30 interceptions.

"I had to contemplate a lot of different feelings, a lot of different emotions," Harrison said in a conference call. "But I feel like I've done everything I could possibly do on the field and have nothing left to prove."

Harrison didn't immediately announce his future plans, but it's pretty clear he will begin a career as a broadcaster with NBC. He worked for NBC during the network's Super Bowl coverage this year, and NBC is holding its own conference call today at noon.

This Sunday's game against the San Diego Chargers has a lot of storylines going for it as it contends for a spot among the week's top games. For one, it's an intense divisional rivalry between two good teams currently tied for the AFC West lead. It could also have a lot of bearing on next week's power rankings, with the Broncos currently ranked third and the Chargers fourth in most polls. But for the Broncos, a win on Sunday would almost cement another AFC West title if they can keep winning. Why?

If the Broncos win, they'll not only be one game ahead of the Chargers in overall record, but they'll be dominating every tiebreaking category. Right now, the Broncos are 3-0 in the division. A win against the Chargers would push Denver to 4-0, and San Diego to 1-2, guaranteeing at the very least a tie in that first tiebreaking category (after head-to-head wins, which would also be tied at the very least). The teams' respective conference records (second tiebreaker) fall much the same way. San Diego stands to drop to 5-3 in the AFC if they lose this Sunday, whereas Denver would rise to 8-1 - after playing the Colts and the Patriots. With only divisional opponents and Cincinatti left to play in the AFC, the Broncos would be in a strong position if they could eek out a victory.

Of course, this all assumes that Denver will finish with the same (or better) record as San Diego. But that's exactly why this game is a critical one for the Broncos. They have (and will) faced a much tougher schedule than the Chargers by far (which will become an instant cop-out if the Broncos can't win the division), which means that grabbing this opportunity to gain significant advantages in the tiebreaker categories, and also taking the overall win lead, is going to be crucial. San Diego may not lose more than four games this year, which means that the Broncos - who could easily be 11-5 with the schedule they still have remaining - have to take advantage of every opportunity to beat the Chargers head to head, especially when so much in those crucial tiebreaking categories is on the line.