If You Want Games Live, Fly to Sydney

Today’s column, which was written, filed and edited more than 24 hours ago and has been sitting in the can ever since, is brought to you by NBC Sports, which is Australian for tape-delayed, mate.

Every word in this column, NBC Sports is proud to say, was once written live, although we make no pretenses that what you are reading now is actually live, or even “plausibly live.” No, to our credit, we will always be upfront with the American public about that.

Today’s column, which, truth be told, is really yesterday’s column, is filled with pathos, poignancy and heart-tugging human drama and we at NBC Sports really can’t wait to bring it to you, even though, truth be told, we have.

But first, the inspirational real-life story of how the author overcame a tragic lifelong bout with fallen arches and hours of noisy street construction outside his office window to make a bold attempt to bring this column in at world-record pace.

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Are you ready for the Baker’s Special Summer Olympics--day-old swimming and running and throwing events that will be kept on the shelf before NBC packages them in brightly colored wrapping for public consumption?

NBC announced this week that all 437 1/2 hours of planned coverage of the Summer Games in Sydney will be tape-delayed because of the 18-hour time difference between Sydney and Los Angeles. Televising live events starting in the evening in Australia would mean airing them in the United States early in the morning--not what NBC considers prime time.

So NBC will rely exclusively on the videotape machine, ignoring the hard lessons absorbed by CBS at the 1998 Winter Olympics in Nagano, where its notorious “Memorex Games” were skewered by critics and eventually abandoned by American television viewers. In Nagano, CBS aired most events on tape-delay--including Picabo Street’s gold-medal downhill run more than 24 hours after the fact--while creating an unthinkable, own-worst-nightmare scenario: Television getting scooped by newspapers.

Because of the delays, many Americans, especially those in the Pacific and Mountain time zones, had read about gold-medal performances in their morning newspapers before watching them on television. This did not sit particularly well with many Americans. Some actually wrote letters to their local newspapers, complaining about how the sports section was ruining the Olympics for them because they already knew who was going to win before settling in for that evening’s CBS bobsled drama.

Others simply tuned out, preferring to get their Olympic news on the Internet, while it was still fresh.

NBC is setting itself up for the same kind of backlash, especially from hard-core track and field fans, who subsist on split seconds and demand the same things from their Olympic coverage as they do their sprinters: fast and faster.

Tell a track aficionado that he’s going to have to wait 18 hours to catch that 100-meter final?

“We hate it,” says Los Angeles track promoter Don Franken. “We want everything live. You want to be part of it, right there when [400-meter hurdler] Kevin Young breaks 47 seconds and sets a new world record. Or watching a great duel like [Roger] Bannister-[John] Landy or Kip Keino and Jim Ryun. How exciting is that if you already know who won?”

Track fans also live for the world record. Scott Davis, meet promoter for the Mt. San Antonio College Relays, wonders how many will actually tune in to watch the tape of an event if they already know the race produced a run-of-the-mill time.

“If you already know Michael Johnson won the 400 in 44.2 [seconds], who gives a . . . ?” Davis says.

“My gut feeling, from the track perspective, is that it’s going to cost [NBC] ratings points. If Maurice Greene wins the gold medal but doesn’t set a world record, if he runs 9.9 [at 100 meters], if you already know that, are going to care to watch?”

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NBC counters such talk with numbers. Ordinarily, track fans would be able to relate, but these are not statistics they are going to want to see.

According to NBC track analyst Dwight Stones, research conducted by the network during the 1996 Atlanta Olympics determined that 48% of its audience was women, 36% men and 16% children.

At an Olympic planning meeting this week in Salt Lake City, Stones said NBC officials explained “about the makeup of the audience and why we have to do our coverage the way we do it--because of the heavy female component. They are just not interested in only actions and results.

“That’s a guy thing. I can hang in there and tolerate pretty much anything as long as you get the action and the results. Some women will not. And that’s been proven over and over and over.

“The Olympics are not about the hard-core fanatic viewer. . . . If you do not do programming that is going to keep the female demographic in the broadcast, you’re losing a huge, huge component [of the audience]. And that’s why we do the story telling, that’s why we personalize the athletes, that’s why we do the features.”

That might sound cynical, and more than a little patronizing toward American female sports fans, but NBC is convinced that strategy was a success in 1996. So expect more of the soft-feature, gauzy-focus formula this summer--”the up close and nausea” approach, as Davis derides it.

“I’m just simply not interested, and I don’t think most other people are interested, in what Hicham El Guerrouj eats for breakfast,” Davis says. “I want to watch him run.”

One proposed solution was to move the evening events to the late morning or early afternoon. But Stones points out that NBC tried that tactic in Seoul in 1988 and “it just didn’t work. They didn’t get the viewership they hoped for.”

And, he adds, competing in the heat of midday was not in the best interest of the athletes.

“This is one of those things where I’m proud to say that NBC has learned from [the Seoul Olympics] and realized that it’s about the athletes and they have not asked the organizing committee to change the schedule whatsoever,” Stones says.

“I think that the 100-meter final should probably be at 6 or 7 or 8 o’clock at night. It’s certainly going to be after 6 local time. And if that’s the case, it’s 3 a.m. in New York and midnight in L.A.”

Then there’s Davis’ solution.

“My friend Jim has a satellite dish and he can pull in the [Canadian Broadcasting Company] feed and get the whole thing live,” Davis said with a laugh. “For the big finals, I’m going to Jim’s house.”

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What Los Angeles Is Watching

A sampling of L.A. Nielsen ratings for May 6-7, including sports on cable networks:

SATURDAY

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Over-the-air Channel Rating Share Horse racing: Kentucky Derby 7 5.5 14 NBA playoffs: Philadelphia at Indiana 4 4.9 14 Baseball: Houston at Dodgers 5 3.3 6 Golf: PGA Compaq Classic 7 2.9 8 Baseball: Angels at Seattle 9 1.6 4 Golf: LPGA Philips Invitational 2 1.0 3

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Cable Network Rating Share Boxing: Johnny Tapia-Javier Torres Show 1.5 1 Boxing: Pal Spadafora-Mike Griffith HBO 1.4 3 Auto racing: NASCAR Winston Cup Pontiac 400 ESPN 0.9 2 Golf: Senior PGA Home Depot Invitational ESPN 0.7 2 Volleyball: NCAA championship match ESPN2 0.6 2 NHL playoffs: New Jersey at Toronto ESPN2 0.5 1 Track and field: U.S. Collegiate Team Invitational FSN2 0.3 1

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SUNDAY

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Over-the-air Channel Rating Share NBA playoffs: Phoenix at Lakers 4 15.0 35 NBA playoffs: Utah at Portland 4 9.8 26 NBA playoffs: New York at Miami 4 8.4 22 Golf: PGA Compaq Classic 7 1.6 4 Baseball: Angels at Seattle 9 1.6 4 NHL playoffs: Pittsburgh at Philadelphia 7 1.2 3 Golf: LPGA Philips Invitational 2 0.6 2 Tennis: ATP U.S. Clay Court Championships 2 0.4 1

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Cable Network Rating Share Baseball: Houston at Dodgers ESPN 2.3 4 Soccer: Women’s U.S. Cup ESPN2 0.4 1 NHL playoffs: San Jose at Dallas ESPN2 0.4 1 Golf: Senior PGA Home Depot Invitational ESPN 0.2 1

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