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A consumer’s guide to the best and worst of sports media and merchandise. Ground rules: If it can be read, heard, observed, viewed, dialed or downloaded, it’s in play here. One exception: No products will be endorsed.

What: “Showtime Dreams: The 2002-2003 Laker Girls”

Where: Fox Sports Net 2, tonight, 8.

Fox Sports Net, granted unprecedented access, provides a behind-the-scenes look at what it takes to become a Laker Girl in this one-hour special that first aired Sunday at 5 p.m.

Probably not too many people saw it, however, because Game 7 of the World Series was on big-brother Fox at the same time. But Fox Sports Net has a number of re-airings, including tonight’s.

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The first part of the show offers coverage of this year’s tryouts at the Laker offices and practice facility in El Segundo. Nearly 500 young women showed up.

Although the show doesn’t offer much substance, there is more to it than young women dancing. Jerry Buss, who created the Lakers Girls and started an NBA trend, is among those interviewed.

“I was always a big college basketball fan and I always thought cheerleaders and dance groups added of lot of excitement and entertainment value,” he says.

Devean George says he’ll sneak peaks at the Laker Girls during games, but Shaquille O’Neal and Kobe Bryant claim they don’t look. Bryant says the only time he looked was last season when, during a routine on roller skates, “one girl landed right on her butt.”

In the second part of the show, Lisa Estrada, longtime Laker Girl director, phones finalists to let them know if they made the squad. Estrada and the finalist she’s calling appear on camera. This works the first time, when Shannon, with her fingers crossed, is told she made it. But the producers run this bit into the ground. In all, eight finalists get an orchestrated call from Estrada. Six are told they made the squad and two are invited to try out again next year.

The producers might want to try making this special again next year as well. This one doesn’t quite cut it.

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