The Bigger They Come. . .the Harder They Fall.

Less than two months into the 1997-98 season, television’s champagne-sipping set appears more inclined to gulp Maalox straight from the bottle.

Such anxiety stems from a fall chill in the form of wilted ratings, with the major networks waking up some mornings to downright scary results compared to those generated even a few years ago.

With the exception of ratings leader NBC (which televised the World Series) and the fledgling WB, the networks are each down from their prime-time averages at this point last year, and three dozen new series haven’t provided the instant cure that stressed-out executives sought--indeed, roughly a third have already been canceled or temporarily pulled.

While few clear patterns have emerged, some early lessons can be drawn from the current season. They include:

* Deals do not a series make, nor big names a hit. A half-dozen shows created last spring came armed with major commitments from the network, meaning the producer or star would be paid a substantial fee if the concept didn’t become a series.

Of those shows, “The Visitor” (from the producers of “Independence Day”), “Timecop” (based on the movie) and last summer’s “Braveheart”-like “Roar” have been canceled, while Steven Bochco’s police drama “Brooklyn South” has so far fallen short of ratings expectations.

As for stars, NBC’s “The Tony Danza Show” was temporarily shelved due to low ratings (but returns for another try next month); “Jenny,” featuring MTV poster girl Jenny McCarthy, has struggled ratings-wise Sundays; and David Caruso’s TV comeback “Michael Hayes” hasn’t proven terribly arresting either.

Even NBC’s high-rated “Veronica’s Closet,” with Kirstie Alley, has cooled a bit, gradually losing more of the audience that watches “Seinfeld” Thursdays.

A new program that hasn’t disappointed, meanwhile, is ABC’s “Dharma & Greg,” whose stars, Jenna Elfman and Thomas Gibson, aren’t household names--sort of like the “ER” and “Friends” folk once upon a time. New UPN President Dean Valentine has said his network wants to work with writers to develop the best ideas and then cast them, as opposed to seeking out recognizable stars and creating shows around them.

* “Bad” can quickly get worse, or Change = Risk. To some executives the most disquieting trend this season is that ratings can quickly slide to shockingly low levels.

With the average home receiving more than 40 channels, replacing marginal series provides no assurance a network will gain viewers and actually risks alienating more of them. New programs introduced this fall on ratings-challenged nights--NBC on Wednesdays, ABC on Thursdays and Saturdays, Fox on Thursdays and CBS on Mondays--have all fared worse than shows that occupied the same slots last season.

“The mind-set from even five years ago [when faced with low ratings] is, ‘We can do better,’ ” said Warner Bros. Television President Tony Jonas. “Sometimes, to do better you have to stay right where you are.”

* Know when to hold ‘em. Several series renewed despite marginal ratings last year have begun to blossom this season, such as NBC’s “Just Shoot Me” and, to a lesser degree, ABC’s “The Practice,” WB’s “7th Heaven” and CBS’ “Promised Land,” “JAG” (which premiered two years ago on NBC) and “Everybody Loves Raymond.”

In similar fashion, some of today’s prime-time stalwarts started slowly, including “Seinfeld,” “The X-Files,” “The Drew Carey Show” and “Touched by an Angel.”

“Seventy percent of the true hit shows take time to build and did not look like hits at all initially,” said Universal Television President Ken Solomon.

Greater competition has lowered expectations, allowing networks to hang on to shows whose ratings once would have earned almost immediate cancellation. The challenge executives face involves identifying marginal shows with the potential to expand their audience.

“TV is so much about patience, and it’s an impatient world,” Jonas said. “It can take 13 or 22 episodes [to work the kinks out of a series]. No one’s got the time.”

* Hits are harder to come by. The cost of renewing existing hits such as “Seinfeld,” “Home Improvement” and “ER” keeps climbing, meaning the networks find themselves paying more to retain a diminishing share of the overall viewing pie.

There seems little choice but to do so, however, since such shows are more crucial than ever as it becomes increasingly difficult to attract an audience.

“One of the things that’s becoming apparent is that the anchor shows are more and more valuable,” said Perry Simon, president of Viacom Productions and a former NBC executive.

* When in doubt, rerun for cover. Having ordered surprisingly few backup series this year, the networks are seemingly using chewing gum and wire to hold their schedules together--filling the void left by canceled programs with repeats of their hit shows.

Though some view the practice as shortsighted, network sources say rerunning “Home Improvement” or “Frasier” can offer a better short-term solution than squandering a new series in a time period where it’s destined to fail. The networks have also turned to news programs as a low-cost means of plugging holes until reinforcements arrive.

* Fiddle with old formats. Another effective place-holder has been specials, ranging from Fox’s critically derided “World’s Scariest Car Chases” and its ilk to softer concepts such as NBC’s blooper shows and CBS’ revivals of “Kids Say the Darndest Things” and “Candid Camera.”

“I think we’re seeing the return of the one-hour comedy-variety form in a big way,” noted Viacom’s Simon.

* Be consistent . . . just not too consistent. ABC has been criticized for having no clear, over-arching programming strategy or philosophy--courting disparate audiences from one night to the next, or even one time period to the next. CBS may have made a similar error by trying to launch a Friday lineup that appeals strongly to kids (anchored by one-time ABC sitcom “Family Matters”) on the network with the oldest audience profile.

Some feel that NBC, by contrast, has suffered from being too homogenous, beginning the season with 18 comedies--many of which look strikingly similar--and four editions of “Dateline NBC.”

“Don’t make every comedy the exact same comedy,” said one executive at a rival network.

* Everyone has problems . . . and opportunities. Even top-rated NBC discovered how low the limbo bar can go, at one point finishing sixth in the ratings--behind UPN and WB--with one of its new sitcoms. With cable pecking away at the available audience, there’s renewed doubt whether all the broadcast networks can survive.

On the plus side, “Rodgers & Hammerstein’s Cinderella” delivered a massive audience on ABC’s “Wonderful World of Disney,” underscoring network TV’s unique ability to create such mass-appeal events. Even the second-lowest-rated World Series on record demonstrated the medium’s enduring power, with nearly 38 million people tuning in for the deciding game--the biggest audience to watch baseball since 1991.

“It used to be that people didn’t have any other choice [but to watch the networks], and now they do,” Solomon noted. “But I also believe the converse: With the right show, you can wipe everybody out.”