Remaking ‘NBC Nightly News’ : Television: The network is putting its faith in new executive producer Steve Friedman, whose winning touch made the ‘Today’ show No. 1 for five years.

They used to throw baseballs as well as ideas around Steve Friedman’s office during his heyday on the “Today” show. Friedman, a rotund, funny pooh-bah of an executive producer, would use a baseball bat as a gavel, banging it against a heating vent above his head to make a point or to call a meeting to disorder.

“I think Steve wanted to mark the territory, saying, ‘My manners are going to be terrible, my appearance is going to be slovenly, and I’m not going to bow at the altar of journalism--I do television,’ ” explains Jane Pauley, whom Friedman paired with Bryant Gumbel on the morning broadcast in 1981. “In fact, Steve is the one who returned ‘Today’ to being a news program in the early 1980s. Steve’s Barnum & Bailey routine brought us resources, and it made Bryant and me look like coming attractions at a time when we weren’t exactly overnight sensations in the ratings.”

During Friedman’s seven-year tenure on “Today,” the show rose in the ratings from third place to first and stayed there for five years.

A regular observer of Friedman’s office follies was Tom Brokaw, whom Friedman dubbed “The Prince of News.” The two have been friends since they met in 1969 at KNBC Channel 4 in Los Angeles, Friedman a news writer and Brokaw a handsome young anchor. They worked together then, again at the “Today” show and now find themselves paired once more. Friedman began work three weeks ago as executive producer of “NBC Nightly News With Tom Brokaw.”

“I remember Steve as a smart-mouth right off the streets of Chicago,” Brokaw recalls. “He was good company, and he knew what he was doing.”

Brokaw and Friedman joined forces at KNBC to sell their local spots to “Today” for $25 apiece.

“Tom was all over the place at KNBC,” Friedman recalls. “He became Mr. California Politics for the network because he told people that Reagan was going to win the presidency. Tom would fly to Sacramento to do a piece for the network, then come back that day to anchor the news. Other times, he’d walk into the station at 10:30 at night after going to a party at Warren Beatty’s! He was smooth.”

Two years after he left NBC to produce a syndicated version of “USA Today” that proved to be a $50-million failure, Friedman is back at the network, 71 pounds lighter than a year ago, more modest but unbowed. NBC executives are hoping that he can do for the third-place “Nightly News” what he did for “Today.”

Introduced to the owners of NBC stations at the network’s recent annual affiliates convention, Friedman said that he could imagine what the audience was thinking: “Which Steve Friedman have you got--the genius who helped put ‘Today’ back on top, or the bozo who produced ‘USA Today’?”

Highly touted as the first venture between “USA Today” founder Al Neuharth and former NBC chairman Grant Tinker, “USA Today” was panned by critics as all flash and no substance. “I think Steve realizes that he caused a nine-car wreck with ‘USA Today,’ ” observes Brokaw.

“I’ve learned from my mistake on ‘USA Today,’ ” Friedman says. “I had thought that form mattered more than content. People may think that I’ve been brought in to soften ‘Nightly News.’ In fact, I’m going to harden it up.”

A key element in the plans for “Nightly News” is to have Brokaw travel more to news events around the world, anchoring from there while Jane Pauley serves as “sub-anchor,” reading the rest of the newscast from New York. For instance, Brokaw anchored the newscast from San Francisco during Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev’s visit there, while Pauley was in New York. On July 2-4, Brokaw will anchor from the Soviet Party Congress in the U.S.S.R. and then travel to London, the site of the NATO summit, on July 5 and 6. Pauley will be the sub-anchor July 5-6; Faith Daniels will be sub-anchor when Pauley is not available on July 2-4.

Pauley, who has been the principal substitute for Brokaw since she left “Today” at the beginning of the year, also will continue in that role when he is on vacation or away for other reasons.

Pauley’s expanded role, plus her increased popularity post-”Today,” has led to speculation that NBC is planning to put her on “Nightly News” alongside Brokaw as a full-fledged co-anchor. Not so, say Brokaw, Friedman and Pauley.

“There are no plans for Jane to co-anchor,” says Friedman. “If there were, I’d be the guy doing it. The show is being redesigned around Tom’s strengths. He’s our best reporter, and people like to see him out on the story when there’s a big news event. Having Jane there will allow us to take a chance on letting Tom go to places where we think news will be breaking and to stories such as the recent trip to Mt. St. Helens, where we define the story as news.”

“I’m pleased to have Jane on board,” says Brokaw, who is a good friend of Pauley’s and introduced her to her future husband, cartoonist Garry Trudeau. “I’ve told her exactly how I feel. In 22 minutes, whether it’s me or Jane or Willard Scott anchoring the news, I just don’t think there’s enough time to divide up the news with a co-anchor.”

“Being co-anchor of ‘NBC Nightly News’ is not an option for me whether my own magazine program succeeds or not,” says Pauley, who is doing five prime-time specials this summer as part of her projected prime-time series, to begin in January. “I haven’t been asked to be co-anchor, but I feel the need to be so emphatic because the speculation implies that Tom needs a co-anchor and implies that my own program isn’t to be taken seriously. Tom’s role on ‘Nightly’ is not my best skill. Although I’m happy to help the organization cover the news in the way it does best, the magazine show is my job. And, besides that, having made the decision to have three children, the deal I’ve made with them is that I’m not going to get home so late at night that I only see them in their pajamas.”

Friedman has other changes in mind for “Nightly News,” however. With all three evening newscasts facing declining shares of the TV audience, he notes, the networks can’t afford to open the program with the anchor saying, “Good evening. Unemployment is down” because viewers will already have heard that on their local stations or on Cable News Network. To differentiate the NBC newscast, Brokaw will conduct more live, “Nightline”-style interviews from the studio. The program will showcase the work of such specialists as investigative reporter Brian Ross.

And there will be regularly scheduled features. In September, Friedman plans to introduce what he calls “the daily difference,” daily segments on such topics as health and medicine, and the “Friday follow,” updating news stories. Similar to ABC’s “American Agenda” features, the lengthier segments will air on regular days except when there is a major news event.

Some signs of Friedman’s humor already are evident in the program’s graphics. After a recent end-piece on the new popularity of animated cartoons, the “Nightly News” logo that night had lettering like an old Warner Bros. cartoon. Purists may complain, but, says Brokaw, “I don’t think it’s bad to have a little humor on occasion.” On a recent afternoon in Friedman’s “Nightly News” office, Brokaw met quietly with Friedman and other producers on the program to discuss a multipart series on the new Germany and other upcoming stories. The atmosphere was convivial, but there were no projectiles. “This is no picnic,” Friedman explained later. “The baseballs came after ‘Today’ was functioning smoothly.”

But don’t think he’s subdued. Friedman just bought a new bat.