Steve Sabol, who revolutionized the way sports are covered in America as the president of NFL Films, died on Tuesday from brain cancer, according to NFL.com. He was 69.

In the early ’60s, Sabol joined his father Ed Sabol in creating a new style of looking at the sport of football — it was intimate, passionate, and brought fans used to watching from the stands, or their living-room La-Z-Boys, closer to the field than they had ever been. It was one thing to watch a game on TV on Sunday, it was quite another to relive it the following week thanks to the Sabols, who brought an almost-mythic level of drama to the gladiatorial combat on the gridiron. Sabol worked as a cameraman, editor, writer, director, and producer for NFL Films, sharing a passion for the game that developed while playing football at Colorado College.

Over the next decade, the Sabols’ NFL Films segments became an institution. They were instantly recognizable to fans, not only for their on-the-field view of the plays and the players (who they often put tiny microphones on), but also for the stentorian narration of John Facenda — a man whose voice seemed to rumble down from the fog-shrouded peak of Mt. Olympus. READ FULL STORY »