The NFL Network’s season opener, Bears-Niners, last night, began with an unanticipated but not unanimously unappreciated start when the audio from the booth went unheard to much of America that has access to the channel. That loss of commentary, provided by play-by-player Bob Papa and analyst Matt Millen, ended halfway through the first quarter, roughly 20 minutes into the game telecast.

Everything else — crowd noise, the referees’ calls on the field microphone, advertisements — came in crisply and clearly. The transmission failure apparently was experienced just by DirecTV and Verizion FIOS subscribers.