Nothing Says Christmas Like John Madden

TV networks tend to be pretty particular when choosing their Christmas entertainment, whether it's a re-airing of It's a Wonderful Life or 24 hours of A Christmas Story. Which is why it's notable that FOX is premiering their highly anticipated new documentary All-Madden, about the famed NFL coach and broadcaster John Madden, on Christmas Day -- right before the network broadcast of the Green Bay Packers versus Cleveland Browns. But while live sports on major national holidays is a tradition that spans decades, the question must be posed: why the John Madden documentary on Christmas? What exactly about the man who led the Raiders to a Super Bowl title in 1977 screams Christmas?

I'm here to tell you that John Madden is everything we love about Christmas and more.

All-Madden comes at an interesting time in sports culture. It's been well over a decade since Madden called his last game for NBC Sports. And while the video game that famously bears his name is still being produced, it's easy to imagine a generation or more to whom "Madden" is just a brand name like "Kellogg" or "Kleenex" (little-known fact: Bob Kleenex won seven Stanley Cups with the Boston Bruins). This doc can remind a new generation of sports fans why Madden ended up being such a visible and lovable figure in the sport. Again, though, why Christmas Day? A quick look at John Madden legacy, and the answers become quite apparent.

Football, Duh

This is the easy one. John Madden earned his fame as the head coach of the NFL's Oakland Raiders, taking the team to seven AFC Championship Games, and a Super Bowl XI championship over the Minnesota Vikings. Madden was the youngest head coach to reach 100 victories, and he's still the winningest coach in Raiders history. Football, of course, is a huge part of American culture, and is often a staple of holiday gatherings. Traditionally the NFL is more tied to Thanksgiving, with games played every year in Dallas and Detroit (and, more recently, a third game, sometimes won by the Buffalo Bills). But Christmas Day football happens sometimes too, especially if the holiday falls on a Saturday or Sunday. Odds are, some family out there has precious holiday memories of opening presents while John Madden was heard in the background explaining what downfield blocking is.

Turducken

Madden often worked in the broadcast booth for CBS, FOX, and later NBC on their Thanksgiving Day games, and he was the one who started the tradition of awarding turkey drumsticks to the MVPs of the games. At one point, Madden became enamored with the food preparation known as a turducken: a chicken cooked inside a duck cooked inside a turkey and served for holiday meal. This meat tornado of a meal fit Madden's smash-mouth, hard-grinding attitude (his annual "All-Madden" teams, selected from the season's best players, were often the toughest, mlst grind-it-out players in the league). All meat! No frills! When the turducken enjoyed a brief moment in the cultural sun as a trendy food choice, Madden was its most prominent celebrity endorser. If your family ever decided to get crazy and make turducken for Christmas, you have Madden to thank/blame.

Video Games

After his football career and parallel to his broadcasting career, John Madden became one of the great celebrity pitchmen. He filmed advertisements for everything from Ace Hardware stores, Miller Light beer, and of course the famous treatment for athlete's foot, "Tough Actin'" Tinactin. But Madden's greatest claim to fame in the celebrity endorsement realm was the video game series that bore his name. Madden NFL Football from EA Sports was the biggest game ever for sports nerds and casual gamers alike.

The game became so popular that Madden tournaments would become major events, sometimes televised on ESPN. The cultural phenomenon of the Madden NFL game crossed into and out of the sporting world. The currency and prestige that came with whichever athlete was chosen to grace the cover of the new year's Madden game was significant, although there was also talk of a "curse" that befell Madden cover athletes, who would often face a significant injury or career setback in the subsequent season. Video games are, and have been since the earliest Nintendo days, a staple of any kid's Christmas wish list to Santa. Certainly Madden NFL Football has appeared under the tree or in the stocking of countless kids (and, let's face it, adults) all over America.

Inconvenient Travel

As much of a Christmas staple as anything is the concept of inconvenient travel. Even before COVID times, airports and train stations in the week leading up to Christmas have always been nightmares full of crowded and stressed travelers just trying to get home for the holidays. This is why there are movies like Planes, Trains, and Automobiles and Home Alone about holiday travel nightmares. John Madden feels the frustration of inconvenient travel options better than you may know. Madden was famously averse to air travel, and so for his entire broadcasting career, he took trains and later busses to wherever the game of the week was. He ended up getting sponsored by greyhound and would traverse the great continental United States in his massive Madden Cruiser coach bus. Maybe it took longer than a flight, and surely Madden must have been inconvenienced by his dedication to bus travel through the years, but much like how we put up with travel nightmares to get home for the holidays, for Madden, the hassle was worth it.

Well … the Obvious

Look, there's no point in dancing around it: throughout his professional career, one of the things that Madden was best known for was his largesse. Physically. John Madden was a big guy, but he was also a gregarious guy who brought a great mood and vibe to the broadcast booth. And you know who else is a jolly fat man who brings joy to millions around the holidays? Yes, we're comparing John Madden to Santa Claus right now, in all the ways that matter. Slap a beard on Madden, and you'd have a positively Claus-ian figure who likes turkey legs, commerce, and taking the long way to get where he's going. John Madden IS Christmas, America. Show him the respect he deserves and watch his documentary.

All Madden premieres on FOX at 2:00 PM ET Christmas Day.

Joe Reid is the senior writer at Primetimer and co-host of the This Had Oscar Buzz podcast. His work has appeared in Decider, NPR, HuffPost, The Atlantic, Slate, Polygon, Vanity Fair, Vulture, The A.V. Club and more.