Showing posts with label New Prospect. Show all posts
Showing posts with label New Prospect. Show all posts

Wednesday, October 1, 2025

New Prospect (Higher Quality!)

Song - New Prospect
Artist(s) - Zack Laurence
Released - 1984
Primetime Usage - 1987-88
Featured Highlight - Dolphins @ Eagles, 1987


I'm not done writing about new NFL Primetime songs, but pretty much everything left to post that's new or unidentified is from New Primetime (i.e., the 2019-present ESPN+ edition of the show).  Unfortunately, my YouTube posts of New Primetime stuff don't get a lot of views.  The videos with highlights from the '80s and '90s—the classic era of NFL Primetime—definitely seem to get more action.  Some of those clips, however, were not the best quality (especially the ones from 1988).  GodzFire's acquisition of that huge lot of early NFL Primetime episodes last spring created an opportunity to post better quality videos with some of the songs from that era.  I was originally planning on posting those after posting (most) everything from New Primetime, but I kinda feel a need to try and rejuice my channel first—getting closer to the views I was getting last spring-to-summer at least.  As an experiment, I'm going to post a few "Higher Quality" clips of older tracks before getting back to New Primetime stuff.  I plan on going back-and-forth between the two post types (or something like that) afterward.  I hope you enjoy it!

The first-HQ-post belong to Zack Laurence's "New Prospect." New Prospect was one of the staples of the first two years of NFL Primetime.  It was used seemingly every regular-season week from Week 5 of 1987 (or Week 6 if you count the cancelled Week 3) up through the end of 1988.  This time, the included game highlight is the Dolphins' visit to Veterans Stadium to play the Eagles in '87.  The contest featured two star quarterbacks, Dan Marino & Randall Cunningham, albeit playing for middling teams that would not make the playoffs that year.  There's also a nice production blooper at the beginning of the video.  Have fun watching!

Original New Prospect Link

 


 

Monday, April 11, 2016

Lots of Prospects

Song - New Prospect
Artist(s) - Zack Laurence
Released - 1984
Primetime Usage - 1987-88
Contained on - Bruton BRN 13 (New Prospects), Bruton BVA005 (The Zack Laurence Anthology)
Featured Highlight - Chiefs @ Oilers, 1988


If you like heavy brass with a driving bass line, then this track is for you.  Zack Laurence's "New Prospect" is straightforward, loud, in your face, and it gets the job done.  As a result, it's not surprising ESPN featured it prominently during the first two years of NFL Primetime.  New Prospect is one of many songs with the word "Prospect" in the title from Laurence's appropriately titled, variations-on-a-theme album New Prospects.  This LP was never officially converted to digital as far as I know (though amateur uploads are easy to find through the magic of Google & YouTube), but about half of it is contained on Bruton's The Zack Laurence Anthology linked above.  I haven't discovered a whole lot of info about Laurence, but I've found him to be one of the more prolific & talented production music composers of the 1970s & '80s.

Week 6 of 1988 was not kind to quarterbacks.  A disproportionate number of signal callers suffered injuries during that week, and the Houston Oilers were not immune.  With Warren Moon not even dressed, backup "Commander" Cody Carlson dislocated his thumb early in their game against Kansas City.  Former replacement QB (and ex-Montana QB) Brent Pease then came in and "led" his team to a 7-6 victory despite terrible numbers.  Here's the highlight: