Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: SATURDAY, February 16, 1991                   TAG: 9102160290
SECTION: SPORTS                    PAGE: B1   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: JACK BOGACZYK
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Long

EARNHARDT ALLOWS CAMERA - AS LONG AS IT SITS STILL

The remote cameras for the CBS telecast (noon, WDBJ) will travel with pole-sitter Davey Allison, Mark Martin, Richard Petty and Dale Earnhardt. Sponsors, of course, love the cameras because of the exposure time they provide. However, unlike some other networks, CBS does not pay NASCAR teams to put cameras in cars.

CBS announced Allison, Martin and Petty as camera-car drivers a month ago. Earnhardt balked at the offer and remained reluctant until CBS agreed to one restriction on the Earnhardt camera.

Regularly, in-car cameras rotate 360 degrees to provide viewers with differing angles from the track. A CBS spokesman said the network agreed to give Earnhardt a fixed-position camera that will shoot in one direction only. Earnhardt agreed, because the stationary camera would cut down on driver distraction.

CBS is paying $2.275 million for the Daytona 500 rights. How big is this race? That's about 45 percent of all of the telecast rights fees Winston Cup racing will earn in 1991.

It won't be snowing at Daytona, which is good news to CBS Sports racing commentator Chris Economaki. Economaki, 70, is wearing a cast on his broken right arm after he fell in January on a snow-covered sidewalk in Finland.

Economaki was invited by Soviet officials to be a guest at a Go-Kart race in Leningrad, so he flew to Helsinki for a stopover before going on to the Soviet Union. While out walking, the longtime publisher and editor of National Speed Sport News fell.

"My right hand hit the ground first, and I heard a sound like a broomstick snapping," Economaki said. "The doctor at the hospital, while trying to bring the arm back into line, pushed it too far and made it a complete break."

Economaki never made it to Leningrad. His Finnish doctor suggested Economaki return home, where his doctors wanted to put a rod in the arm to stabilize it. Economaki said he had to work the Daytona telecasts first. So, he is scheduled for surgery on Tuesday.

CBS will reveal its announcing teams for its 63-game coverage of the NCAA basketball tournament next week, and Dan Bonner will be one of the first- and second-round game analysts. So will Mimi Griffin.

Bonner, the former Virginia forward who has worked ACC games for a decade, finally is getting a network break after being ranked about sixth among ESPN's analysts. Bonner has been a superb game dissector for quite a few years, but outside the ACC he's little-known because he isn't into screaming, calling guys aircraft carriers or kissing up to coaches.

Griffin, who worked a few NCAA men's tournament games for NCAA Productions and ESPN last year, is CBS Sports' women's basketball TV analyst. Griffin will work with Brad Nessler, who regularly calls ACC games for Raycom and Jefferson-Pilot.

Griffin said she believes the sport needs three officials in a game.

"The game has progressed to the point where even the very best officials can't keep pace," she said. "A third official picks up a lot of what goes on in the paint, lessening the advantage physical teams like Georgia currently have."

An NBA source said Billy Cunningham, a former NBA analyst for CBS, will return to the network for early round NCAA telecasts. Cunningham, a superb analyst, left CBS in good stead, but with a conflict of interests. He is a part owner of the Miami Heat.

The CBS euphoria about the 7.6 Nielsen rating for No. 1 vs. No. 2 - Nevada-Las Vegas over Arkansas - is much ado about nothing. It's only one game. True, no game has been rated higher since SMU-North Carolina received an 8.6 in January 1985, but CBS' season rating for college basketball is a paltry 3.1.

Ratings aren't going to improve because of the glut of college basketball on the tube. UNLV's dominance likely will have a negative impact on the NCAA Tournament telecasts on CBS as well. This week, CBS' primary basketball play-by-play man, Jim Nantz, said people will tune in to see UNLV. Nantz should leave the analysis to Billy Packer.

Nantz also said that among teams in the Big East and ACC, only Duke has a chance for a No. 1 regional seeding in the tournament. Should no ACC or Big East team be a top seed, it would be only the second time since tournament seedings began in 1979 that's happened.

The Metro Conference shouldn't be surprised if Raycom Sports asks for a renegotiation of the basketball telecast contract with the league. The Metro has a five-year, $4.3 million deal that began this season, but Metro defections certainly diminish the marketability of a package that won't have much oomph other than Louisville, which is down this year.

The possible additions of South Florida and UNC Charlotte to the league wouldn't help Metro television; it would just save the conference. The Metro would be gaining schools in markets ranked 13th (Tampa, Fla.) and 31st (Charlotte, N.C.) by Nielsen. But markets are meaningless if they don't deliver television homes. Just ask the Atlantic 10, which has played in the Big East's shadow for a decade.

The lack of Metro games on ESPN - when even some lesser basketball conferences like the Western Athletic, Big West and Midwestern Collegiate are shown - is another Metro embarrassment that isn't likely to improve.

\ AROUND THE DIAL: Raycom has assigned Fred White and Terry Gannon as its announcing team for the Metro Conference basketball tournament at the Roanoke Civic Center next month. . . . Cable's USA Network has signed a two-fight deal with promising heavyweight Tommy Morrison, the "Rocky V" pugilist. USA has Morrison on "Tuesday Night Fights" next week against former champion Pinklon Thomas. . . . The Nashville Network's announcement that it will televise NASCAR Winston Cup events was accompanied by a Group W research claim that the network already televised the most motorsports of any network in 1990. That's like patting yourself on the back, TNN. According to figures from an independent source, the A.C. Nielsen Co., ESPN aired 925 motorsports hours in 1990, compared to TNN's 595 1/2. . . . To viewers who don't want to waste their time watching the Foot Locker Slam Fest taped tournament at halftime of ABC's college basketball: The winner will be Montreal second baseman Delino DeShields, a former Delaware high school basketball star who signed with Villanova before taking the Expos' offer.