DUNPHY FACES LIFE AFTER KCBS.

Byline: PHIL ROSENTHAL 

``Thirty-six years from the desert to the sea,'' veteran broadcaster Jerry Dunphy said, echoing his trademark on-air greeting, then laughed. ``And 21 months remaining on the contract.''

Dunphy, 74, the dean of Los Angeles newscasters, has been dumped as an anchorman at KCBS (Channel 2) with a $1.2 million-a-year contract that still must be paid off, and he's not sure why.

``I'm stunned and dazed,'' Dunphy said from Aspen, Colo., where he continues to struggle to figure out exactly what happened.

KCBS news director Larry Perret declined to comment Tuesday. A station spokeswoman said: ``We understand (Dunphy's) reaction. We're disappointed he feels that way.''

Ten days earlier, Perret summoned Dunphy into his office and told Dunphy that the station planned to shuffle its early news lineup next month and there would be no anchor slot for him.

``If nothing else,'' Dunphy said, ``to a well-dedicated professional, it's embarrassing.''

So, Dunphy - who previously fronted successful news operations at KABC (Channel 7), KNXT (now KCBS) and KCAL (Channel 9) - gathered his dictionary, his earpiece and his family photos into a box and headed straight home to Encino.

``What could have gone so awry?'' said Dunphy, who, legend has it, was one of several newscasters on whom Ted Knight modeled his Ted Baxter character on ``The Mary Tyler Moore Show.'' ``I don't get it. I've got a pretty solid reputation.''

It was only last year that KCBS lured Dunphy away from KCAL, which had launched its three-hour, prime-time news block around him. KCBS' plan was to use Dunphy to get Channel 2 out of the ratings doldrums.

But, while Dunphy discerned not ``one hint of dissatisfaction,'' KCBS failed to follow through on its initial promotional blitz and never got the ratings surge it so desperately sought.

That might have to do with CBS' network troubles and the station's soft news stories, such as its big February ratings sweeps report that looked to link people's blood types to their romantic compatibility. But Dunphy lost his anchor chair.

``A little over a year ago, they pulled out all the stops to get me,'' he said. ``Here it is, 14 months later, I'm no longer part of the master plan.

``They've hit me in the stomach pretty hard. It took my breath away. ... I just don't understand what they're thinking. I can't imagine that they're going to do better just because they got rid of me. I think I had a contribution to make there. Experience, you know.''

Dunphy will continue to draw KCBS paychecks while he figures out his future. He has been working on putting together a potential syndicated series, ``The Stars: Then and Now,'' which would combine archival celebrity interviews with new ones. He won't rule out a return to local news.

``I just want to think things through,'' Dunphy said. ``I may decide, `Hey, enough already,' but that's not my nature. As long as I'm clicking around and making sense and making a contribution, why shouldn't I continue?

``There are a lot of areas here that we haven't touched upon (in Los Angeles TV news) that affect the quality of life in our city. There should be pieces within every newscast that reflect a little deeper look that we're not taking.''

At KCBS, they're too busy investigating romantic compatibility. They're too busy looking for blood.

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