There is a quiet but furious debate going during these Games: Hockey or figure skating?
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Despite the surprising success of the U.S. hockey team, CBS has stuck to its original game plan, using the Winter Olympics figure skating competition as the centerpiece for its prime-time telecasts. The network, already gambling more than $273 million on the Games, wasn`t about to take risks.
”We did a lot of research coming into this Olympics,” explained CBS Sports President Neal Pilson. ”It was my judgment that prime-time hockey was a very risky proposition. Some of ABC`s lowest-rated nights were based on hockey. All our research indicated hockey, especially in the first week, is simply not a strong prime-time event.”
ABC learned that lesson the hard way in `84, when, coming off its
”Miracle on Ice” success in 1980, the network based a lot of its Winter Games programming on tape-delayed hockey games from Sarajevo. The U.S. hockey team faltered, and so did ABC`s ratings, tumbling from a 23.6 for Lake Placid to 18.4 for Sarajevo.
”We conducted a study while (the 1988 Calgary Winter Games were) taking place,” added Rick Gentile, CBS Sports vice president for Olympic
programming. ”We asked people how they felt about watching hockey if they already knew the final score. The reaction was generally negative. That was not the same reaction to figure skating.”
Mark Harrington, CBS Sports vice president in charge of Olympics, looked at it another way. ”If we were to show a hockey game in prime time,” he said, ”it would take 2 1/4 hours. We`d show nothing else that night.”
When the U.S. team reached the Olympics semifinals, however, CBS harnessed its resources to preempt its normal daytime programming to show Friday`s contest live rather than tape it for prime time or let cable partner TNT show it.
”We wanted to do the game for several reasons,” said Gentile. ”It`s the No. 1 story right now. We are the priority broadcaster of the Olympics. We`re the rights holder. If we`ve decided to change our broadcast schedule to accommodate the game, that`s our right to do.”
TNT officials aren`t complaining, especially since they`ll be doing this all over again in two years. ”It`s no surprise to us,” said Kevin O`Malley, Turner Sports executive vice president. ”The prospect was out there all along that CBS would want to seize on it. It would have been unrealistic to believe CBS would let us carry all the hockey.”
TNT will carry the other semifinal between Canada and Czechoslovakia at 2 p.m. Friday.
CBS will charge advertisers ”incrementally” (read ”more”) for their participation in Friday`s hockey game, all of which will help a network sports department awash in red ink for all its rights spending.
Most of CBS` coverage has been devoted to figure skating; pretty to look at but without much substance. After all, if ice dancing is here, can ballet be far behind? (And all those Marinas and Sergeis probably would win all those medals, too.) In contrast, Canada`s CBC has given the Games 170 hours, mostly covering hockey.
”Just as the American audience is driven by figure skating,” said Harrington, ”they (Canadian audiences) are driven by hockey. It`s the national sport there. It`s not the national sport in America. We`re trying to balance everybody`s desires and all this programming. . . . And people want to see a lot of skating.”
But, apparently, not a lot of hockey. For unless the U.S. winds up in the gold-medal game at 7:15 a.m., CBS has no plans to come on the air until its scheduled 8 a.m. start.
Pilson, who, as an acknowledged rabid hockey fan, puts network before personal beliefs, said, ”We`ll make that call later.” A lot later. Maybe like never.
– WBBM Radio, the local CBS affiliate, will monitor the U.S. hockey game and provide ”instant updates” for listeners in addition to replaying the contest in its entirety at 8 p.m. Friday. If the U.S. loses, WBBM will air the bronze- medal game immediately after the Hawks-Red Wings contest Saturday. If the U.S. wins, WBBM will carry the gold-medal game live at 7 a.m. Sunday. ”We`re trying to please everybody,” said WBBM programming boss Chris Berry. ”If they win (Friday), we might have a pretty good audience for the replay. So we`re hoping they win.”
– And how are the Olympics playing in Chicago? Not even the world champion Bulls can beat them. On Monday night, the Bulls-Cavaliers game on WGN-Ch. 9 had a local Nielsen rating of 15.9 with a 22 share, while WBBM-Ch. 2 had a 24.0/33 for the Olympics. Go figure. . . . CBS` surprising ratings ride hit a bump Tuesday when the network finished second for the first time since the Olympics began. ABC`s regular lineup had a 16.2 national Nielsen rating and 25 share compared to 15.9/24 for CBS (which had no figure skating to televise). CBS, however, bounced back the next night with a 22.8/35 national prime-time average, the highest Wednesday overnight rating for any network this season. That gave CBS a 19.2/30 average for 12 nights-1 percent higher than ABC`s 19.1/29 for the first 12 nights of the 1988 Winter Games.
– NBC has added some new talent the past few days-former gold medalists Michael O`Brien and Mary Wayte as swimming analysts for its Olympics coverage, and Magic Johnson as an NBA analyst for some regular-season and playoff games. Johnson, who announced his retirement Nov. 7, had a successful tryout Feb. 2 during the Bulls-Lakers telecast. ”I thought I`d give it a try for one game, just to see if I liked it and to see how I would do,” said Johnson. ”Well, I loved it.”
– WBBM sportscaster Brian Davis isn`t the only Chicago radio person at the Winter Olympics. WSCR`s Abby Polonsky is there, too, working for the CBS Radio network as a producer. Polonsky even took time out from her late-shift duties with colleague Todd Ant to tour a 500-year-old Savoie house, complete with an abundant cheese cellar. But when it came time for the ritualistic pin exchange, their tour guide had no interest, preferring to treat his guests to some wine, some cheese . . . and the Olympics on a big-screen TV.
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