The 1979 NFL Draft was the procedure by which National Football League teams selected amateur college football players. It is officially known as the NFL Annual Player Selection Meeting. The draft was held May 3–4, 1979. The league also held a supplemental draft after the regular draft and before the regular season.

The National Football League Draft is an annual event in which the National Football League (NFL) teams select eligible college football players and it is their most common source of player recruitment. The basic design of the draft is that each team is given a position in the drafting order in reverse order relative its record in the previous year—the last place gets positioned first. With this position, the team can either select a player or trade their position to another team for other positions, a player, or players, or any combination thereof. After each team had utilized its position in the drafting order, whether by trading it or selecting a player, a round would be complete. Certain aspects of the draft, including team positioning and the number of rounds in the draft, have seen revisions since its first creation in 1936, but the fundamental methodology has remained the same. The original rationale in creating the draft was to increase the competitive parity between the teams as the worst team would, idealistically, have chosen the best player available.

Phillip Martin "Phil" Simms (born November 3, 1954) is a former American football quarterback, and currently a television sportscaster for the CBS network. After a standout career at Morehead State University, Simms was drafted in the first round by the New York Giants of the National Football League (NFL) with the number seven selection overall in the 1979 NFL Draft. Simms played his entire professional career with the Giants and was named Most Valuable Player (MVP) of Super Bowl XXI, after he led the Giants to a 39–20 victory over the Denver Broncos and set the record for highest completion percentage in a super bowl, going 22 for 25. He also was named to the Pro Bowl for his performances in the 1985 and 1993 seasons.

He finished his career with 33,462 passing yards and has since gone on to a career broadcaster of NFL games—first as an analyst for ESPN, then as a in-game color commentator with NBC, and currently with CBS. He is the father of former NFL quarterback and current New England Patriots assistant coach Chris Simms and New York Jets quarterback Matt Simms.

Eric Reid is the television play-by-play announcer for the Miami Heat and college football on Sun Sports.

Reid has been with the Heat since the team's inaugural season. He was the Heat's color analyst for three seasons before taking over play-by-play duties in 1991, and has been their play-by-play announcer ever since. He has shared the broadcast booth with analysts including Dr. Jack Ramsay, Dave Wohl, Ed Pinckney, Mike Fratello, and Tony Fiorentino.

Reid's broadcast career began at WHCU radio in Ithaca, New York where he was the station's sports director and the radio play-by-play voice for Cornell University football, basketball, and lacrosse.

Prior to joining the Heat, Reid was the radio voice of Providence College from 1982 to 1988. He has also called basketball games for ESPN Plus and the University of South Florida, and football games for ESPN Plus, New England Sports Network, Brown University, the University of Miami, and the University of South Florida.

While at NESN, Reid also hosted the pre- and post-game shows for the Boston Red Sox, did play-by-play for the Pawtucket Red Sox, and was also the host and writer for the syndicated weekly television show, "This Week in the Big East."

Ivan Reitman, OC (born October 27, 1946) is a Canadian film producer and director, best known for his comedy work, especially in the 1980s and 1990s.

He is the owner of The Montecito Picture Company, founded in 2000.

Reitman was born in Komárno, Czechoslovakia (now Slovakia), the son of Clara and Leslie Reitman. Reitman's parents were Jewish; his mother survived the Auschwitz concentration camp and his father was an underground resistance fighter. His family came to Canada as refugees in 1950. Reitman attended Oakwood Collegiate in Toronto and was a member of the Twintone Four singing group.^{[citation needed]} He is the father of film director Jason Reitman.

Reitman's first producing job was with the then-new station CITY-TV in Toronto. CITY was also the home of the first announcing job of his later friend and collaborator Dan Aykroyd. However, Reitman's tenure at CITY was short and he was fired during his first year by station owner Moses Znaimer.^{[citation needed]}

Spellbound (1972), directed by Ivan Reitman, with music by Howard Shore, magic by Doug Henning and co-starring actress Jennifer Dale, a musical that combined an intense storyline and Henning's magic tricks. The show opened in Toronto and broke box office ticket records in that city.