ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Saturday, June 22, 1996 TAG: 9606240129
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: B-3 EDITION: METRO
COLUMN: ON THE AIR
SOURCE: JACK BOGACZYK
With the NBA and NHL playoffs over and the Summer Olympics about a month away, this is supposed to be a slow time in the world of televised sports. Forget it. Just read on, before tuning in the World Bowl on Sunday (1 p.m., WJPR/WFXR Channels 21/27):
GENUINE DRAFT: The NBA draft airs live Wednesday from the New Jersey Meadowlands. As new Nets coach John Calipari will learn, the draft night collection of talent at Continental Airlines Arena will be mostly moving on to other clubs, including his former Massachusetts star Marcus Camby, expected to be the No.2 pick by Toronto.
Philadelphia plans to pick Georgetown guard Allen Iverson No.1. Then a TNT crew of Ernie Johnson, Hubie Brown, Craig Sager and Kentucky coach Rick Pitino will predict, announce and analyze the rest of the two-round process, which will be seen in its entirety, starting at 7:30 p.m.
TNT also has a draft preview show at 8 p.m. Tuesday
NO WORRY: Virginia Tech alumni have overloaded the Internet recently with a bad rumor about WUSA, the CBS affiliate in Washington, D.C. The Hokies were wringing their hands about WUSA not carrying the Big East Conference football telecasts from CBS in the fall.
It's not true. WUSA, as a CBS-owned station, will carry all CBS college football at 3:30 p.m., which includes Big East and Southeastern Conference games, including a few Tech appearances.
Chuck Cowdrey, WUSA's general manager, said the station has a decision to make in the noon time slot, between conference packages from the ACC and Big East. With two capital-region teams in Maryland and Virginia in the ACC, the station is likely to take that schedule.
RINGSIDE: Today's ``Wide World of Sports'' on ABC (4:30 p.m., WSET Channel 12) will be historic. It's the first heavyweight title fight on traditional network television in 11 years.
Michael Moorer and Axel Schulz will meet for the vacant IBF heavyweight crown in a scheduled 12-rounder at Dortmund, Germany. It's the first heavyweight title fight on a network since NBC aired a bout between Larry Holmes and Carl ``The Truth'' Williams in 1985.
The last heavyweight title bout on ABC was Holmes vs. Randall ``Tex'' Cobb in 1982. The last live heavyweight fight on ``Wide World,'' was ancient history in TV - Floyd Patterson-Jimmy Ellis in 1968.
Wide World also will show the first over-the-air network look at Mike Tyson's stopping of Frank Bruno this year.
THE BIG W: Home Box Office begins its first-week live coverage of the Wimbledon tennis championships Monday, with weekday shows from 9 a.m.-3 p.m. Billie Jean King, Mary Carillo and Martina Navratilova will call the matches on HBO.
NBC, which has a half-hour Wimbledon preview show Sunday (1:30 p.m., WSLS Channel 10), begins its All England match coverage June 29-30 on same-day tape.
HBO and NBC will have a combined 46 hours of coverage during Week 2, mostly on same-day tape, although the women's and men's finals will air live on NBC's traditional ``Breakfast at Wimbledon'' shows July 6-7.
WHAT ABOUT BOB: NBC has signed Bob Costas to a contract extension through 2002.
``I would have signed through 2004,'' Costas said, ``but NBC couldn't guarantee that the '04 Olympics would be held in my hometown, St.Louis.''
Costas' deal, worth in excess of $2 million annually, has him serving as host for two more Olympics after this summer's Atlanta Games, calling World Series and other baseball postseason games, as well as remaining host of the network's NBA pregame show.
He also will return to the NFL pregame show, stretching to one hour starting this season, although just as a contributor, not as studio host. Costas also will join MSNBC, the 24-hour cable network from NBC and Microsoft making its debut in July, as one of five rotating hosts for the prime-time talk and news program, ``Internight.''
Costas, 44, is a 10-time Emmy winner.
WHOOPS: NBC's decision to air NBA Finals postgame programming on cable's CNBC was applauded by viewers, but apparently not by some affiliate stations.
Ratings for the NBA postgames was up 150 percent from CNBC's usual average for those time slots. However, some affiliates complained to the network about NBC telecasters urging viewers to switch to CNBC after the game - and away from local newscasts.
One network executive said the repeated NBC reminders about the CNBC postgame was done ``to get the sports fans away from ESPN.'' It's also a cross-promotional situation that's likely to continue when the new cable outlet, MSNBC, signs on and is promoted on NBC News shows.
BULLISH: The average Nielsen rating for the NBA Finals on NBC was 16.7 (percentage of U.S. TV homes), and the Chicago-Seattle six-game series ranked behind only the 1993 Bulls-Phoenix series (17.9 average).
The series rating was up 20 percent from the 1995 Finals, and Sunday night's Game 6 had the highest viewership - 60 million people - of any game in the league's 50-year history. The 1993 Game 6 had 58.5 million viewers.
Those numbers are projected from an 18.8 rating this year and a 20.3 in 1993. The viewer number is higher, despite a lower rating, because the number of homes with TV is larger.
NEW NAME: After success with its own creation, the Extreme Games, in 1995, ESPN is back with the ``alternative'' Olympics from Rhode Island starting a seven-day run Monday.
They're now called the ``X Games,'' to provide additional marketing and commercial sales and international opportunities. Seems ``extreme'' didn't translate too well overseas.
The 23 events will air for 35 hours, with 22 on ESPN and 13 on ESPN2. Women's downhill in-line skating and wakeboarding have been added.
Sponsorships were sold out long ago. So, it's not surprising ESPN has created the first Winter X Games for a four-day run in January 1997, from Colorado or California snow country.
LENGTH: Long : 105 linesby CNB