Harrison Butker’s Miss at Super Bowl Led to Creation of ‘Doink’ Cameras
Harrison Butker has made all 14 of his kicks this postseason, cementing his reputation as one of NFL’s great kickers. Despite his consistency, last year’s Super Bowl miss prompted an epiphany for Jason Cohen, a CBS Sports vice president.
With just over two minutes left in the opening quarter of Super Bowl LVII between the Kansas City Chiefs and Philadelphia Eagles, Butker’s 42-yard field goal attempt bounced off the top of the left upright at State Farm Stadium, leading Cohen to request a camera in the uprights for this year’s Super Bowl broadcast.
Cohen and CBS Sports’ vice president of engineering, Mike Francis, were sitting in the end zone where the kick was missed. The sound of the miss led Cohen to text the NFL’s senior director of broadcasting, Blake Jones, expressing his desire to place a camera in the uprights for this year’s Super Bowl.
Months of planning produced a set of “doink” cameras for Sunday’s game. The CBS broadcast will feature six total 4K cameras inserted into the Allegiant Stadium goalposts. The cameras will provide multiple angles and high-resolution zoom and super-slow-motion replay capabilities.
Cohen found a company, Sportsfield Specialities, which designed and manufactured the camera inserts. The doink cameras made their debut in a preseason game in August, and the technology is now ready for its big moment at the Super Bowl.
Ryan Galvin, the lead replay producer for the Super Bowl, will oversee the operation of the doink cameras and determine which replays to use. Broadcast innovation is often dictated by networks, and it remains to be seen how the doink cameras will be received by viewers.
Cohen said testing revealed that the cameras provide not only the image of the football, but also a frame of reference to see if the ball went through or not. Sportsfield Specialities was able to custom fit the cameras to the specifications provided by the CBS team, and the technology is set for its debut this weekend.