•
HOLLYWOOD, Sept. 5, 2000 -- He's been tinkering with his gameplan for the past several weeks, but the skepticism surrounding comedian Dennis Miller's schtick in the "Monday Night Football" broadcast booth might begin to fade now. After three so-so preseason games, Miller made his regular-season "MNF" debut Monday night, and today many TV critics are taking a different view of the would-be, latter-day Howard Cosell.
The consensus: He was funny, and not nearly as annoying as we thought.
"Miller refrained from too much over-the-top esoterica, picking his spots to go for laughs," writes Howard Fendrich of The Associated Press.
Miller, as everyone knows, was hired during the summer to fill a void and stir up interest in ABC's long-running sports program. But during the three exhibition games, Miller took a lot of heat for his freewheeling use of arcane jokes during th