All Blog Posts from Horserace

Two years ago, as speculation grew around his potential presidential candidacy, Illinois Senator Barack Obama made a faux-announcement at the beginning of a Monday Night Football game featuring his hometown Chicago Bears. Tonight, both presidential candidates appear in taped interviews to be aired at halftime.

ESPN’s Chris Berman spoke with both Obama and John McCain via satellite on the eve of the presidential election and the AP has a preview of what they had to say when asked to name the one thing they would change in sports.

"I think it is about time that we had playoffs in college football,” Obama says. “I'm fed up with these computer rankings and this and that and the other. Get eight teams - the top eight teams right at the end. You got a playoff. Decide on a National Champion,"

McCain said he would like to see the end of performance-enhancing drugs, saying he would "take significant action to prevent the spread and use of performance-enhancing substances. I think it's a game we're going to be in for a long time. What I mean by that is there is somebody in a laboratory right now trying to develop some type of substance that can't be detected and we've got to stay ahead of it. It's not good for the athletes. It's not good for the sports. It's very bad for those who don't do it, and I think it can attack the very integrity of all sports going all the way down to high school."

Barack Obama and John McCain will participate in one-on-one interviews during halftime of next week's installment of ESPN's "Monday Night Football," the Associated Press reports.

The interviews, set to be taped via satellite during the day on Monday, will air during halftime, ESPN says. Voters (who have not voted early or absentee) go to the polls the following day.

"I am ready," Obama said, a reference to speculation that he would run for president. He then put on a Bears cap and added, "for the Bears to go all the way, baby!"

Barack Obama and John McCain will participate in one-on-one interviews during halftime of next week's installment of ESPN's "Monday Night Football," the Associated Press reports.

The interviews, set to be taped via satellite at some point earlier on Monday, will air during halftime, ESPN says. Voters who have not voted early or absentee go to the polls the following day.

The interviews will be conducted by ESPN's Chris Berman.

"Monday Night Football" has averaged 12.2 million viewers this season, the AP notes. Obama appeared on the program in December of 2006, when his hometown team, the Chicago Bears, was playing.

"I am ready," Obama said then, a reference to speculation that he would run for president. He then put on a Bears cap and added, "for the Bears to go all the way, baby!"

From CBS News' Scott Conroy, on the trail with the Mitt Romney campaign:

Tom Brady he is not, but Mitt Romney can throw a pretty decent spiral.

The former Massachusetts governor took a break from preparing for tonight’s GOP presidential debate in St. Petersburg, Florida, to play a game of flag football this morning. The teams were composed of Romney’s sons, campaign staffers, political supporters and media (I played on the governor’s team).

This was not the kind of touch football game in which wide receivers casually jog out into the end zone to wait for the quarterback to lob a Hail Mary on every play. No, this was the kind of competitive battle one would expect from a family with five sons, featuring a real referee, freshly painted yard markers and a whole lot of rough and tumble play.

Over the years, the Romney brothers have taken to teasing their father for his lack of athletic prowess, but they showed the old man no mercy on the gridiron today. On one play, Governor Romney seemed to have a clear path to the end zone until his son Matt came from nowhere and yanked off a flag attached to his father’s waist.

Although Romney briefly showed off his passing skills during warm-ups, he did not take any snaps at QB during the game. Instead, he rotated between the center and wide receiver positions on the offensive end.

But the governor proved to be more of a defensive specialist, and he was not afraid to engage in some mind games with the opposing team to get the job done.

“I’m going to rush the passer, but I’m not going to set up like I am,” Romney whispered to his teammates before one play.

Governor Romney substituted himself out of the game before the end of the first half of the low scoring contest, sweat dripping from his face. It was time to hit the showers and run through the playbook for tonight.

The clock is running down, the game is on the line: It's time to...donate some cash?

So says an email from team McCain, one signed by former Dallas Cowboys quarterback Roger Staubach. He is urging McCain supporters to "get in the game now," before the third-quarter fundraising deadline. "We can't do our job in the fourth quarter unless we play hard in the third," he writes.

Many of the lines in the email, in fact, contain a football metaphor: "The clock is ticking and we're getting ready to make a final push to victory," "Football requires a team effort. So does a campaign," "the last chance we have as a team of McCain supporters to huddle up," and so on.

In that spirit, then, let's say this: While the struggling McCain campaign may not be throwing a Hail Mary pass just yet, they certainly have the hurry-up offense on the field seeking one more big score this quarter.