While most of the sports world will be focused on a particular field reporter in Raleigh, there’s another woman who habitually patrols the football sidelines making more significant news tonight. ↵
Lesley Visser Will Be Color Analyst for Tonight’s Saint-Dolphins Game
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↵↵CBS Sports’ Lesley Visser will serve as the color commentator for the fourth quarter of the Miami Dolphins-New Orleans Saints preseason game tonight. The game, which will air on WFOR-TV (the Miami CBS affiliate), marks the first time a woman is doing color analysis for television coverage of an NFL game. Visser, who works the Miami preseason games with Bob Griese, Nat Moore and Craig Bolerjack, seems pretty excited about the opportunity. ↵
↵↵⇥“Having had many challenges in my career, I am especially excited about this one. I am grateful to CBS for giving me this opportunity.”↵↵↵Visser is no stranger to breaking new media ground, having been the first woman to serve as an NFL beat writer back in 1976, covering the Patriots for the Boston Globe. She was also the first woman to do NFL color on radio, working a few MNF games in the booth for Westwood One back in 2002. ↵
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↵Here's the thing about this story: it shouldn't be a story. Visser is calling one quarter of a preseason game in the booth. I bet kids from Make a Wish have gotten more air time than that in the past. But it's the fact that it's the first time this is happening that's so newsworthy, and unbelievable.↵
↵↵Visser, and other women in the business, have been working football games for more than 30 years, yet this is the first time a woman will be doing color analysis in the booth. The NFL ‘color guy’ fraternity is the oldest of the good ol’ boy networks – a circle of former players who vociferously opposed the MNF signings of Dennis Miller and Tony Kornheiser in the past, seemingly because they hadn’t been in the trenches – so this is quite a feat for Visser. Even if it’s only for the least important 15 minutes of the entire preseason. ↵
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This post originally appeared on the Sporting Blog. For more, see The Sporting Blog Archives.
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