Perry’s on the Ball

Quarterbacks Roman Gabriel and Bill Munson played for the same pro team in 1965. Sure, they both were on the Rams, but they also played for the Wildcats, which was a pro team for about an hour on a “Perry Mason” episode (Friday at 4 a.m. on KTTV Channel 11).

Also on the team in “The 12th Wildcat” are other fresh-faced and thick-necked Rams: guards Joe Scibelli and Don Chuy, tight end Marlin McKeever and linebacker Cliff Livingston.

They have a sweetie of an owner, Ellen Payne, who says such things as, “You could talk Notre Dame into kicking on first down” just so we’ll know she’s a football fan.

The athlete-actors don’t get those kinds of lines. They mostly just try to muster slow burns while Ellen’s husband, Burt, berates them (he calls them “pussycats”). Burt also is nasty to Ellen and the coach and anyone else connected with the team.

When it looks as though Burt has been murdered, it’s Ellen who’s blamed. Good thing she has a pal named Perry Mason. But even Perry has to get rough with her when she won’t tell all. “This isn’t a football game, Ellen,” he snaps. “You lose this one, you lose for keeps.” (Dramatic music.)

The usually sitting-or-standing Raymond Burr actually gets some exercise here: There’s a chase outside the L.A. Coliseum, where he helps right-hand man Paul Drake (William Hopper) take down the bad guy.

Perry gets the case dismissed (hope we didn’t ruin the ending for you), which is why he’s dubbed by Ellen “the 12th Wildcat.”

DETAILS, DETAILS: What San Francisco-set series did Raymond Burr go on to after “Ironside”?

Answer to last week’s quiz (What did the “Isn’t It Romantic” episode of “The Golden Girls” win an Emmy for?): Directing (Terry Hughes).

Set Your VCR

Richard Dreyfuss plays a neurotic warlock, Rodney, who’s smitten with Samantha and wants to break up her marriage so he can have her, on “Bewitched” (Monday at 11:30 p.m. on Nickelodeon). It’s part of Nick at Nite’s “Darrin vs. Darrin” marathon, which runs nightly from Monday through March 13 from 8:30 p.m. to 12:30 a.m.

A not-so-typical judge comes to preside over “Night Court” (today at 1 p.m. on Lifetime) in the series pilot.

Burgess Meredith is the victim of “The Twilight Zone’s” irony for the first time, in the classic “Time Enough at Last” (Wednesday at 9 a.m. on Sci-Fi). He’s a bookworm who, tragically, gets what he wants. Meredith would appear on three more episodes, but this is the one that’s best remembered.

During a “My Three Sons” marathon (5 p.m. Saturday to 2:30 a.m. Sunday on TV Land), Mike leaves the show, but Ernie’s adoption keeps the title accurate. Some milestones: Mike (Tim Considine) gets married (5 p.m.); the family moves from the Midwest to Southern California (8 p.m.); Robbie and Katie get married (9 p.m.); Ernie has dates with two girls at the same time (one of them is pre-”Brady Bunch” Maureen McCormick)--and he doesn’t even like girls (9:30 p.m.); Katie has triplets (11 p.m.); Steve and Barbara get married (1 a.m.); and Chip and Polly decide to elope (2:30 a.m.).

Robby the Robot, from the science-fiction film classic “Forbidden Planet” (1956), goes slumming on “Lost in Space” (today at noon on Sci-Fi). He plays an evil robotoid trying to get chummy with the Robinsons.

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