THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Friday, October 11, 1996 TAG: 9610110698
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: C4 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY LARRY BONKO, TELEVISION WRITER
LENGTH: 53 lines
Should the Baltimore Ravens be a Sunday TV fixture in Hampton Roads? For some fans, including a number of Pittsburgh Steelers faithful, that's harder to take than flat Iron City beer.
Last week, I mentioned that Ed Munson, the general manager of WAVY-TV, wanted the NBC affiliate to carry Ravens games the way local affiliates for other networks - first CBS, now Fox - broadcast Washington Redskins games. In fact, Munson asked NBC to send two more Ravens games this season than he had originally scheduled.
More than 150 readers called my Infoline number - 640-5555, category 2486 - to agree or disagree with Munson. About two-thirds of those responding said they don't want a Ravens monopoly here:
``No Baltimore Ravens, no Washington Redskins, no Carolina Panthers week after week. Just give us the best games,'' Mark Hoke said.
``It's bad enough that the local Fox station is tied up with the Redskins game week after week. The last thing I want to see are Baltimore games every week. If this keeps up, I'll move out of the state,'' traveling salesman Henry Dubose said.
``I do not share WAVY's enthusiasm for regional coverage. It cheats the viewer out of seeing the best game,'' Chris Astal said.
Still, a fair number of callers like seeing the Ravens, even if the players are mediocre. That includes people who supported the team when it played in Cleveland. Others have waited more than a decade - since the Colts bolted from Baltimore to Indianapolis in 1984 - to see the NFL back at Memorial Stadium.
``I'm cheering for them as hard as I can,'' Darren Owens said.
For Pittsburgh fans, more Ravens games means fewer Steelers games. In previous seasons, Steelers games were on WAVY regularly.
But Steelers supporters have a plan when no Pittsburgh games appear on network TV. On Sundays now, they flock to sports bars like Bubba's Beach Club in Virginia Beach to see the game on satellite. ``Steelermania,'' waitress Donna Hepner calls it.
Several callers including Mark Marsh and Mike Moore liked it better when WAVY let the viewers pick the game of the week.
``Let's open it to a vote again,'' Moore said.
Tip of the day: You can see an hour of The Fabulous Sports Babe's radio show weekdays at 1 p.m. on ESPN2. The Babe does two hours on WGH radio starting at noon.
Back to the bigs: Bob Rathbun, the local play-by-play guy who made it to a major league broadcast booth with the Detroit Tigers after sharpening his skills in Norfolk, has been picked by SportsSouth in Atlanta to do Braves' baseball on pay-per-view in 1997 and the Hawks starting Nov. 1.
Option play: ABC covered college football's premiere game last Saturday (Penn State-Ohio State) but not in this market. WVEC gave us Virginia-Georgia Tech, which sent Big 10 fans over to pay-per-view. TCI cable in Chesapeake said the Penn State-Ohio State game drew a record response. by CNB