Analysis of analysis: All things Madden in today's Salon. This covers it well. But in the discussion about whether people are tuning into Monday Night Football for Madden or for the game, what about the fact that a huge chunk of MNF watchers are at sports bars, where the sound may be off or drowned out? (These folks aren't counted by Nielsen, by the way, last I checked, which is never mentioned in stories about MNF's ratings.) It seems that should be part of the Madden and MNF speculation.
http://www.salon.com/news/sports/col/kaufman/2002/08/06/madden/index.html