The league managed to get a handful of late-season and playoff games televised – on ESPN’s networks in 2014, on Fox’s networks the other three years. A confidant of three commissioners, he played a major role in negotiations with the players’ union and in league expansion in 1976 to Seattle and Tampa. He made the Pro Bowl after the 2002 and 2003 seasons and was a second-team All-Pro in 2003. An eagle-eyed TV viewer called in to complain that Thompson had placed her golf ball, after marking it, about half a centimetre from its original place on the 17th green.