World Series Has a Hard Act to Follow

What’s NBC going to do for an encore?

Its coverage of the highly dramatic National League championship series was a critical and ratings success, and now we have a World Series that has a lot of people, at least in this part of the country, saying, “Who cares?”

It’s the New York Yankees and Atlanta Braves, and haven’t we seen enough of these two teams in postseason play?

On the good-news side, though, producer David Neal promises a minimum number of Ted Turner-Jane Fonda close-ups.

“It is our philosophy not to do a lot of crowd shots,” producer David Neal said Thursday. “Dick Ebersol [the head of NBC Sports] always says people tune in to watch the games, not people watching games.”

A LOOK AT THE ANNOUNCERS

Maybe it was all the drama in the Brave-New York Met contest, but the announcing team of Bob Costas and Joe Morgan has won me over.

Costas seems to be in a comfort zone where his anecdotal story-telling skills, his lyrical style and his descriptive language rival the easy-listening style of Vin Scully.

Morgan didn’t score well in a recent Sport magazine poll of major league players, but his response to that on Thursday was: “I don’t broadcast games for players, I broadcast them for fans.”

Costas was asked about some of the criticism he and Morgan took when they did their last Series together, in 1998, and, in a rare show of humility, he said, “My own assessment was that I was rusty and I did not do as well as I have done in the past.”

One thing that helped this year, both say, is they worked two games together for ESPN during the season. “That helped us get our mechanics down, our rhythm down,” Costas said.

On criticism in general, Morgan said, “If you’re going to stand up and make comments, you’re going to have to take what goes along with it. Not everyone is going to like you.”

Said Costas: “If you’ve been around a long time and lucky enough to be treated well by the press and well-accepted by the fans, then at the sign that you may have fallen off that standard, even for a moment, people jump on it.

“I accept that, I understand that. Some of it is valid and some of it is the kind of potshot stuff that comes with the atmosphere of a whole society where there is a kind of mean-spiritedness out there.”

MORE ON SERIES

NBC offers two one-hour baseball specials on Saturday. At 11 a.m. will be a look at baseball’s 25 greatest moments, as selected by the Sporting News. At noon, Costas is the host when the all-century team, a list of the 100 greatest players, is announced.

The living players will be introduced during pregame ceremonies Sunday before Game 2, and Scully has been selected as the emcee.

On Saturday and Sunday, NBC will have a half-hour pregame show each day, beginning at 4:30 p.m., with the first pitch scheduled for 5:05. Weekday coverage for Games 3, 4, and 5 in New York will begin at 5 p.m.

Channel 4 will have its own Series half-hour postgame shows, “Instant Replay With Fred Roggin.” They will consist of game analysis, with studio guest Eric Karros, and a game show.

Viewers will be given a chance to win prizes via the station’s Web site, www.nbc4la.com., or by phone. And the prizes aren’t Roggin T-shirts, but such things as personal watercraft, resort vacations, and televisions. Also, two fans each night will have a shot at $1 million.

“There’s just so much game analysis everywhere these days, we’re trying to come up with something different to keep viewers interested,” said Roggin, the show’s host and also co-executive producer with Joe Candido. “But game analysis will still be the emphasis.”

SPORTS ON THE INTERNET

The Channel 4 postgame show is one example of the merging of television and the Internet, and this weekend’s live Web-cast of the Ironman Triathlon World Championship is another.

The 17-hour event that takes place over a 140.6-mile course is getting full coverage on the Internet at www.ironmanlive.com. thanks to Sportvision, a sports-media convergence company based in Mountain View, Calif. There has been race information on the Web site since Tuesday.

Dwight Stones will be the host of the race coverage, with Paula Newby-Fraser, Mark Allen, Julie Moss and Paul Huddle providing commentary.

“It’s impossible to cover a 17-hour event live on television,” said Lew Friedland, president of the World Triathlon Corp. “This way, fans can log on and stay there all day if they want.”

WHERE THEY ARE NOW?

Todd Donoho has been keeping a low profile since being let go by Channel 7 a year ago, but not by choice. He’s restricted because Channel 7 is still paying on his contract, which runs through the end of this year. Besides being involved with author Joe Garner in the production of “And the Crowd Goes Wild,” a book-CD project, Donoho has been coaching his sons in various youth sports in the Newhall area. . . . Former Fox Sports News anchor Leslie Gudel, now working for a regional network in Philadelphia, has been doing college football sideline reporting for ABC this season. . . . Lisa Guerrero, formerly of Channel 2, has been doing reporting for Rick Garcia at Channel 11, and she anchored the sports news on a busy day Sunday.

SHORT WAVES

Mike Tyson makes a rare non-pay-per-view appearance Saturday night on Showtime, fighting Orlin Norris. Coverage begins at 8 p.m., but promoters say the main event won’t start until after Game 1 of the World Series ends, unless the game goes past 9 p.m. . . . The announcers for ABC’s coverage of the Stanford-USC game Saturday at 12:30 p.m. will be Keith Jackson and Dan Fouts, who will work together the rest of the season. . . . ABC has set its other college football announcing teams--Brad Nessler and Bob Griese, Brent Musburger and Gary Danielson, and Tim Brant and Dean Blevins. . . . Saturday’s UCLA-Oregon State game is a Fox Sports Net syndicated Pacific 10 game of the week that will be televised at 3:30 p.m. by Channel 9. The announcers will be Barry Tompkins and David Norrie.

(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX / INFOGRAPHIC)

What Los Angeles Is Watching

A sampling of L.A. Nielsen ratings for Oct. 16-17.

SATURDAY

Over-the-air

*--*

Channel Rating Share Baseball playoffs: Atlanta at New York Mets 4 8.5 17 College football: USC at Notre Dame 7 7.1 20 Baseball playoffs: New York Yankees at Boston 11 6.9 18 College football: California at UCLA 7 3.1 8 Pro basketball: San Antonio vs. Vasco de Gama 4 3.1 8 College football: Arizona State at Washington 7 2.8 6 Hockey: Mighty Ducks at Florida 9 1.1 2 College football: Alabama at Mississippi 2 0.8 2

*--*

Cable

*--*

Network Rating Share College football: Florida at Auburn ESPN 1.1 2 College football: Indiana at Wisconsin ESPN 0.8 2 Golf: Las Vegas Invitational ESPN 0.7 2 Golf: LPGA AFLAC Championships LIF 0.5 2 Horse racing: Spinster Stakes ESPN 0.5 1 College football: Utah at Air Force ESPN2 0.5 1

*--*

SUNDAY

Over-the-air

*--*

Channel Rating Share Baseball playoffs: Atlanta at New York Mets 4 12.2 26 Pro football: Carolina at San Francisco 11 8.4 19 Baseball playoffs: New York Yankees at Boston 11 7.9 14 Pro football: Oakland at Buffalo 2 7.2 18 Pro football: St. Louis at Atlanta 11 5.6 14

*--*

Cable

*--*

Network Rating Share Pro football: Washington at Arizona ESPN 3.9 7 Auto racing: Winston 500 at Talladega, Ala. ESPN 1.6 4 Golf: Las Vegas Invitational ESPN 0.6 1 Soccer: MLS playoffs, Tampa Bay at Columbus ESPN2 0.6 1 Horse racing: Ancient Title Handicap FSW 0.4 1 Golf: LPGA AFLAC Championships LIF 0.3 1

*--*

WEEKDAY RATINGS:

MONDAY--Pro football, Dallas-New York Giants, Channel 7, 11.3/18; Baseball playoffs, New York Yankees-Boston, Channel 11, 9.5/16. TUESDAY--Baseball playoffs, New York Mets-Atlanta, Channel 4, 16.0/26.

Note: Each rating point represents 51,350 L.A. households. Cable ratings reflect the entire market, even though cable is in only 63% of L.A. households.