The ghost of Kerry Packer still looms large over the Channel Nine commentary team, and this is what he has to say …
"Stop asking questions of other commentators and excluding the viewer; stop telling us about s..t weather; cut out the in-jokes - we're not interested in your tennis and golf games or your fish and chips; keep women, kids and blokes who don't play the game in the loop by keeping it simple and explaining it for dummies; call the f..king game, not the peripherals; tell us about the game but don't analyse everything - it's not science, it's a game, and all that analysis is boring; call the game; know the players, know the figures, know the conditions and take us inside the game. Don't lecture. Call the bloody game."
This Packer quote comes from Mark Nicholas's recently released autobiography - a cricket autobiography is the new black, apparently, everyone is doing it - and the spray came in 2005 as the plum-mouthed Englishman was finding his feet at Nine.
If Packer were alive today and still owned Nine, you can imagine him barking the same instructions down the line to his commentary team ahead of this summer's Test series against South Africa and Pakistan.
For years, Nine's cricket coverage has needed an enema. This summer, under new head of sport Tom Malone, it's starting to happen.
James Brayshaw, Brett Lee and Mike Hussey are gone - thankfully - with Michael Clarke, Kevin Pietersen and possibly Waqar Younis to come in.
Instead of having three commentators holding the mikes at one time, it will revert to two.
Will this be enough for the audience to warm to them? An audience that has fallen out of love with the Nine team that was once so revered in the days of Richie, Bill, Tony and Chappelli that it almost outshone the actual Australian team in popularity?
Indeed, the most irritating trend for the last few years has been the in-jokes that Packer lamented more than a decade ago.
Hopefully, Clarke and Warne will not share the commentary box at any stage.
When an injured Clarke tried his hand at the job a couple of years ago, he and his old mate Warnie sounded like they were sitting around the blackjack table at Crown.
Last summer, you could barely listen to Warne as he gibbered away about everything from KFC and pizza to how much weight he'd put on during the Christmas period. The West Indies were hard enough to watch let alone cut against a backdrop of this rubbish.
When he first started, Warnie talked about the cricket. It was superb. A real insight from the one of the greatest of all-time. Now, he mainly talks about himself.
Clarke won't be the new face of the team, as many have reported this week. But he showed in his description of the Matador Cup final that he can bring a breath of fresh air to the coverage.
As we understand it, the directive to the commentary team is to focus more on what's happening on the field.
Every viewer has a very subjective view of who they like to listen to. I think Michael Slater is a superb caller. I like Mark Taylor. Ian Healy goes good. I'll turn on ABC Radio when Nicholas is calling.
This is an interesting summer for Nine.
The broadcast rights deal ends at the end of 2018, and chief executive Hugh Marks does not share the same view as those before him - David Gyngell, Sam Chisholm, David Leckie - about cricket being on Nine no matter the cost.
You can expect it will want to snatch the Big Bash League off Network Ten but don't expect it to fall into a bidding war when negotiations ramp up next year.
And if it doesn't happen? Could you imagine cricket being not being on Nine? What would KP say?
To use his immortal line to the Australian Cricket Board in the 1970s when he was trying to secure the exclusive rights to first-class cricket: "Come on, we're all harlots - what's your price?"
At odds: Simon Katich and Michael Clarke. Photo: Getty Images
The truth will out
The Australian cricket team or Sweet Valley High?
Given the continued bitching since Clarke's autobiography was released last week, it's difficult to tell.
For years, we were all told about player disharmony in that team. For years, players denied and scoffed and said it was merely media fabrication.
And now, with baggy greens hung on the hook and lucrative book deals secured, the truth is being set free.
Then fast bowler Mitchell Johnson, to coincide with the launch of his own weighty tome, sat in the SCG dressing-rooms and told Fox Sports he thought Simon Katich "did the right thing" in grabbing Clarke by the throat in the very sanctified room in which he was sitting.
"I wouldn't say I had a personal relationship," he said. Asked if they kept in contact, Johnson said bluntly: "No".
Benny keeps 'em guessing
The old fox that is Wayne Bennett is at it again, appearing to play mind games ahead of the Four Nations tournament that starts this weekend.
Or maybe the newly appointed England coach is just being selfish. We can never tell.
In London on Thursday, a Four Nations celebration was held - no less - at the Houses of Parliament on Westminster, right on the Thames.
The four competing teams - Australia, New Zealand, Scotland and host nation England - were in attendance.
Three teams sent players to the function. Australia sent Darius Boyd and Matt Gillett. New Zealand sent players from Leeds, in the north, where they are based.
England, though, decided to send a couple of members of their coaching staff.
According to those in attendance, it didn't go down well.
When Bennett was appointed coach, he was flown out to England but refused to do any press with local reporters.
We contacted England team management for comment but it did not return emails.
Danny Green and Anthony Mundine in action in 2006. Photo: Getty Images
One last payday
So you reckon Anthony Mundine's left hook wouldn't bruise a grape these days?
The black eye his father and trainer, Tony, sported at the announcement of the rematch between Mundine and Danny Green set down for Adelaide Oval suggests there's still some life in his 41-year-old bones.
Mundine accidentally hit his father while doing pad work in preparation for the bout with 43-year-old Green on February 3.
For an indication of just how far Mundine is into his sporting career, consider this: he played rugby league for St George against Western Suburbs at Adelaide Oval in 1994.
The likes of Jeff Fenech say the fight should not be allowed to go ahead because of a fear Green will knock out Mundine, but you can understand why the aging pugs are dragging themselves into the ring.
They won't be getting anywhere near the $10 million payday for each boxer that's been speculated. It's more likely to be about $3 million each, but that's more than many league players make during an entire career.
I stand corrected
What an idiot.
On Monday, in a column about Winx, your humble correspondent wrote the New Zealand champion Rising Fast (1954) was the only horse to win the Cox Plate and Melbourne Cup in the one year.
This was incorrect. Nightmarch (1929), Phar Lap (1930), Saintly (1996) and Makybe Diva (2005) have also done it. Might and Power won the Cup in 1997 and then claimed the Cox Plate the following year.
Unbelievably, I backed and won much-needed money on Saintly and Makybe Diva when they completed these rare doubles.
What. An. Idiot.
Q&A: Marc Stein
With the NBA season underway this week, we speak to ESPN's leading analyst.
There are eight Australians playing in the NBA this season. I mean, are we really that good?!
You're asking the guy who, during group play in the Olympics, proclaimed Australia to be the biggest threat in Rio to Team USA. It obviously didn't turn out exactly that way in the medal round but, yes, I think Australia is that good. I'm a big fan of this group of players.
A lot of hype around Ben Simmons, obviously. Is it justified and can we expect him to play at all this season?
Ben's performance in summer league was such that the hype is unstoppable. Everyone wants to see him on the floor in NBA. An official timetable for his return hasn't been established yet, but there also haven't been any official suggestions to date that we won't see him at some point. We're just going to have to be patient. If you were running the Sixers, you'd be preaching caution, too. Simmons has a LONG road ahead of him. There's nothing to be gained by rushing.
Andrew Bogut is very outspoken for an Australian sports star. He was a quote machine at the Olympics for Australian reporters. What is his reputation like as personality of the NBA - and how will he fit in at Dallas?
He's a quote machine in our world as well. He's definitely on Team Tell It Like It Is and has always been a pleasure to cover for that very reason. As for the fit in Dallas, from everything I hear his new team loves him. A big man who can protect the basket always fits well next to Dirk Nowitzki and that, of course, is a Bogut specialty.
The Golden State Warriors are stacked with some of the best players on the planet. Are they unstoppable?
As we just saw on Opening Night, Golden State won't be starting 24-0 this time. The Warriors are mortal. No one in the NBA is untradeable or unstoppable. But as bad as they looked in their debut against San Antonio, there are still at least 28 teams in this league - Cleveland is probably the only exception - that would trade their problems for Golden State's problems.
LeBron proved his greatness last year. Is there any way he can get any better?
The three games he strung together in the last three games in the finals last June are as good as it gets. So I'm not sure he can get "better" per se, since everyone's athleticism inevitably recedes by some measure with each passing year, but LeBron also gets wiser with every passing season, too. And that wisdom helps him stay dominant. In most situations he's several steps ahead of everybody.
There is double the coverage of live NBA on ESPN this season.
Starting out: Ben Simmons. Photo: Getty Images
THE WEEK
THE QUOTE
"Trump? Trump? No, no Trump, no Trump calls. We are using something very similar. But there is not a Trump. Nothing there, nothing there." – New York Giants quarterback Eli Manning wants to make it very clear that his side hasn't been using a call named after Donald Trump.
THUMBS UP
Super League's John Ribot famously once said he'd take rugby league to China. Two decades later and the AFL has beaten everyone to the punch, scheduling a game between Port Adelaide and Gold Coast in Shanghai in May next year. That, friends, will do me.
THUMBS DOWN
Regardless of whether Michael Cheika was trying to inspire his own side or get up the nose of his opponents, using the post-match media conference following an All Blacks thumping to whinge about a newspaper cartoon depicting him as a clown was poorly timed.
It's a big weekend for … Sacred Elixir, the New Zealander who lines up as firming favourite in the Victoria Derby (2500m) at Flemington on Saturday. Other trainers say it's his to lose, which often means he will.
It's an even bigger weekend for … the Chicago Cubs and Cleveland Indians as they chase history in the World Series. Cubs haven't won it since 1908, Indians since 1948. And Parramatta fans complain about their premiership drought …
