Washington, Denver Media Pack Rosters

The competition between the Redskins and the Broncos will be fierce Sunday, but it may pale in comparison to the battle already being waged by the newspapers, radio and television stations in Washington and Denver.

They’ve hunkered down in San Diego with a media army the NFL puts at 344 as the two towns slug it out to meet the ravenous Super Bowl appetites in their respective football-crazy cities.

There are 159 from Denver and 185 from Washington, including reporters, news anchors, talk show hosts, photographers, producers, cameramen, technicians and even weathermen.

Whether the media outlets are reacting to Broncomania or Redskins Fever, the formula seems to be the same: Saturation coverage, the more the better.

Covering Every Angle

For television stations, that means bringing out waves of anchor people and having them do live shows as early as 6 a.m., lasting throughout the afternoon and finally ending with the 11 o’clock news. To give it all a slightly exotic touch, the shows are employing outdoor studios at various hotels and using sunny and warm San Diego as an enticing backdrop for cold-weary fans back home.

Or, as weatherman Larry Green, of television station KCNC in Denver, did, show the local fauna, such as the San Diego Zoo boa constrictor he held Tuesday during his live 4:30 p.m. report.

Apparently nothing is safe, including empty rooms. Television station WRC of Washington, for example, had one of its reporters--searching for the sights and sounds of Super Bowl hoopla--file a report showing the Hyatt Islandia hotel rooms where Redskins quarterback Doug Williams and Coach Joe Gibbs are staying.

For newspapers, the pressure is equally intense, with some mention of Super Bowl on the front page nearly every day. Special sections describing the teams are almost mandatory.

“What’s the appetite here for the Redskins? It’s enormous. This town is just Redskins-crazy. It’s a big deal,” said Mary Jo Meisner, city editor of the Washington Post, which has assigned 17 people, including news and sports reporters and photographers. Of the Post’s readers’ interest in the Redskins, Meisner said, “They’ll read everything we give them.”

Underlying the coverage in both cities, especially in the case of television, is the competition factor.

“That’s the key point,” said Fidel (Butch) Montoya, news director of station KUSA in Denver, which is locked in a virtual dead heat for ratings with KCNC.

“It’s the only game in town . . . You need to take a chance and do all that you can. This is one you have to do in order to survive in the market,” he said. His station has brought 30 people to San Diego, seven more than it assigned last year when the Broncos played in the Super Bowl.

Montoya, though, declined to say how much this week’s Super Bowl coverage is costing his station--a common reticence among his television brethren. “I can tell you it’s very expensive . . . we’ll not spend this much in a week again this year,” he said.

Across town at KCNC, news director Marv Rockford put his station’s squad at 38 people. “What we’re trying to do,” he said, “is re-create for our audience . . . what the experience of Super Bowl will be like . . . of what San Diego is like.”

While his reporters will do stories on serious subjects comparing San Diego and Denver, such as progress on the respective cities’ convention centers and problems with downtown airports, he also expects plenty of lighter fare, such as the piece with the snake.

It’s all part of responding to the thirst his viewers have for anything doing with the Broncos.

“It’s virtually insatiable,” Rockford said. “This community has an enormous emotional investment in the Broncos . . . a love affair with the Broncos. The town really does have a consuming interest in them and that cuts across all demographic lines.”

If that means “toe to toe slugging it out with” his station’s competitors, bring on the boxing gloves, he said. “If you are going to be successful” in the Denver media market, “you have to satisfy the demand for Broncos information.”

Denver’s two newspapers, the Post and the Rocky Mountain News, are locked in a circulation war. And even though the state’s economic downturn has caused both papers to penny pinch and thus spend fewer people to the game this year, they nonetheless have sent sizeable contingents to San Diego.

The Rocky Mountain News has 16 people in San Diego, said Gale Baldwin, the paper’s city editor. They will cover everything from Tijuana’s interest in the Super Bowl to the Bronco fanatics who hang out at Rocky Balboa’s, the Pacific Beach sports bar.

Over at the Denver Post, city editor Todd Engdahl said his paper is sending about a dozen people to San Diego to cover the game and its attendant activities.

He downplays the competitive pressure, saying that even if either paper clearly dominated the city, interest in the Broncos is so high that “we’d do as much as we’re doing now.”

Even in the nation’s capital, where big stories are routine, Redskins Fever raises everything another notch. The score card of the four major television stations reads like this: WUSA, 26 people in San Diego; WJLA, 25; WRC, 20, and independent station WTTG, 10.

“It’s competition . . . you know who is doing what and it’s like keeping up with the Joneses,” said Kelly Williams, manager of publicity for WRC. “While obviously elections are very, very big and we dedicate a lot to them, this is a very large event for us.”

Views of the Marina

WRC’s anchors are broadcasting from the Redskins team hotel, the Hyatt Islandia, and making sure to take in views of the marina there, which contrasts with the several inches of snow now covering Washington.

At WJLA, Teri Everett, the station’s public relations manager, said that not only did the station send two of its news anchors but it displaced its entire eight-person sports department. “I think everyone is keeping up with what everyone else is doing . . . everyone is making a major commitment to the Super Bowl.”

Some would say there is no comparison between the Washington Post and the upstart Washington Times. The Post dominates its market, in advertising and circulation. But when it comes to the Redskins, the Times is staying close.

Assistant managing editor Pat Innerst says anything connected “with the Redskins plays very, very well.” So much so that the paper has sent 12 reporters, columnists and photographers to San Diego.

“We have something on Page 1 every day,” he said, noting that the paper will also distribute a special 20-page Super Bowl supplement on Friday.

“I know we have fewer people” than the Post, he said, “but we’re doing everything we can” to stay in the race.