• by Wayne Friedman , Staff Writer, February 8, 2005

Just when you thought everything was safe in the Super Bowl broadcast, the NFL and Fox called an advertising audible at the line of scrimmage.

During the game, Fox made a rare decision to withdraw a spot from GoDaddy.com, an Internet name domain company, which was scheduled to run in the fourth quarter. Strangely, the spot had already aired in the first quarter.

Fox said the spot "was very much out of step with the tenor set by the other ads," the network said. And it decided, after a discussion with NFL executives, to rerun Diet Pepsi instead, a spot that also appeared in the first quarter.

What the press hasn't asked so far is this: Why did Fox's standards and practices people approve the spot before the game aired only to realize mid-game that the spot wasn't appropriate for a second airing?

The NFL is so paranoid that the 'tenor' of the country is watching its every move that it decided to censor itself just in case the Federal Communications Commission woke up the next morning with a case of the runs.

The NFL doesn't have approval of Fox's TV commercials. That's Fox's area of expertise. But you don't have to be genius to figure out it was the NFL who told Fox to pull the plug.

The GoDaddy spot was filmed to look like a televised coverage of the testimony of a buxom young actress before the censorship committee. Then her strap on her top breaks. An older woman says in disgust, "Can't you wear a turtleneck?"

Of course, the ad was a knock on the actual FCC hearings last year as a consequence of Janet Jackson's halftime clothes "malfunction."

Remember this is the same NFL who needed to review every word and sentence of four Paul McCartney songs performed during half-time - some of which are 40 years old and have played on U.S. radio stations for decades without any trouble from the FCC.

The NFL should stand for the New Family League. One would suppose next year's Super Bowl will be a tag football contest to eliminate any gratuitous violence. Why? This is the still the highest rated TV program of the year - and the NFL owns and controls it.

The GoDaddy incident signifies that the NFL will now always ask a major rhetorical question of its scared TV advertisers looking to appease an angry parent: Who's your daddy?