FOR X RATINGS, GAMES GO LIVE.

Byline: TOM HOFFARTH Media

To understand why organizers of an event like the X Games feel the need to raise the bar and go big air live for its four-day coverage from Los Angeles this weekend, go back just a week to a guy revving up his motorcycle on an aircraft carrier in New York Harbor.

Robbie Knievel's leap over some parked airplanes on the USS Intrepid that TNT carried last Friday wasn't taped. Anyone who got sucked into watching had to find out not only if Evel's kid would make the jump, but also if on the landing he'd slide off the end of the ship and drop 70 feet into the shallow water where frogmen were supposedly waiting to rescue him.

The competitors at the X Games may be squawking about having to squeeze into ESPN's schedule to keep everything live, but the network is trying to convince them it's to their benefit as well.

``If you're casually clicking around and you see a guy atop a 60-foot big air skateboard jump and it says 'live' in the corner of the screen, that sets up a lot of intrigue and mystery as to what's going to happen,'' explained Rich Feinberg, executive producer of the X Games for ESPN and ABC.

``Part of the reason for going live is to bring in a larger net of viewers. All big-time events are live these days. The fact is, after all these years, we feel comfortable with the athletes and the venues and the production team to kick it up a notch.''

But is everyone involved with the X Games ready for such a leap of faith?

Starting with the two hours live Thursday night on ESPN, the all- sports network and partner ABC will combine for 14 hours of live X Games coverage through Sunday, although the final two hours Sunday night will be delayed on the West Coast.

Last year's TV schedule for the X Games from L.A. was spread over six days and included only a few live hours on ABC on a Sunday afternoon. All X Games before that were strictly taped, edited and repackaged for ESPN and ESPN2 to spread over a week.

The test run for an all-live Summer X Games came during last January's Winter X Games from Aspen, Colo. The Winter X Games also were consolidated into four days, with most of the 15 hours live. The networks reported viewership increased on ESPN (30 percent) and ABC (16 percent) over the previous year.

Feinberg and his hundreds of production staffers are familiar with the L.A. landscape from doing last year's event around Staples Center, the Huntington Beach pier and the Long Beach Marine Stadium, which makes going live a little less stressful for them. But tell that to the surfers who are waiting for a wave while the live camera is on them. Or to the skateboarders whose adrenalin rush doesn't correspond to the TV schedules.

``We're not very choreographed people, so it's tough to do it,'' motocross rider Travis Pastrana told the Associated Press.

Whether the X Games stick with a live format for years to come depends on factors such as the host city, what events are added or dropped and programming windows.

``We just want to do it justice,'' said Feinberg, who has taken part in all 10 years of X Games telecasts. ``I'm in the storytelling business and I want to do it right. Sometimes you can only fit a 2-ton monkey into a small box, so it's all about getting programming into its best coverage. My mission is all about making sure ESPN's X Games are the most progressive on the planet Earth.''

--Give it to me straight: Since ESPN has finished turning ``SportsCenter'' into an Alanis Morissette-a-paloosa with a contrived week-long report of ``music in sports,'' isn't it ironic that the all-sports behemoth gets back into self-promoting its quarter century of greatness by bringing back some ``SportsCenter'' anchors guaranteed to remind everyone of the days when obscure catchphrases didn't suffocate the news and the job couldn't be had by simply getting your dorm mates to flood a phone vote and help you win a reality show?

Craig Kilborn (Sunday, with Dan Patrick), Charley Steiner (Monday, with Bob Ley), Gayle Gardner (Tuesday, with Stuart Scott), Greg Gumbel (Wednesday, with Chris Berman) and George Grande (Thursday, with Berman) will return for an encore on the 8 p.m. ``SportsCenter'' shows during what's called ``Old School Week.''

Anyone missing an invite? Ah, Keith Olbermann.

Mark Shapiro, ESPN's chief of such decisions, admitted to reporters on a conference call that ``you can't look back at the history of ESPN and not think about'' Olbermann, who injected the Bristol, Conn., circus with his wit and charm from 1992 to '97 after six years as a sportscaster at KTLA and KCBS in L.A.

``But as a result of his history of repeated criticism (of ESPN after his departure), we didn't want to bring him back,'' Shapiro continued. ``The damage he'd bring to our newsroom in one night could put us in damage control for days.''

Shapiro later explained that Olbermann joined the chorus of criticism of the hiring of Lisa Guerrero as a sideline reporter for ABC's ``Monday Night Football,'' which is part of the ESPN family, was the more specific reason why he wasn't asked to come back.

As if ESPN's own on-air anchors weren't making their own digs at Guerrero during last season. All this shows is that ESPN and its 25 years of itself isn't beyond revisionist history.

``Obviously, I'm disappointed,'' said Olbermann, who has found a perfect vehicle for his talents on MSNBC's weeknight ``Countdown'' show. ``It would have been a lot of fun especially to work with Dan again. But, last time I looked, it's their network, not mine.''

As for Shapiro's apprehension about ESPN coming apart at the seams upon his arrival, Olbermann said: ``I think he's overestimating my super- human powers.''

SOUND BYTES

WHAT SMOKES--ESPN's coverage Sunday morning (10 a.m.) of the Pro Football Hall of Fame ceremonies that will include John Elway's induction works nicely in having Elway's former Denver Broncos teammate, Tom Jackson, as one of the broadcasters. ``Best player we ever had,'' Jackson said of the quarterback who went through Granada Hills High. ``Best quarterback that I know. It's just an oddity that the first Bronco to be inducted is the greatest Bronco ever, but it will make this moment even more special for me.'' Elway will also do a halftime interview during the Hall of Fame exhibition between Denver and Washington from Canton, Ohio, when Al Michaels, John Madden and Michele Tafoya debut together Monday at 5 p.m.

--By the way, the new edition of the ``Madden NFL 2005'' video game that ships to stores Monday has, aside from Madden and Michaels doing the cyberbroadcast, Jill Arrington as the sideline reporter. A spokesperson at EA Sports said the game makers used Arrington, recently hired by ESPN to do college football, even though Lisa Guerrero was still in the ``MNF'' mix and before the addition of Tafoya. Interestingly, the ``Madden NFL'' games used Melissa Stark as its sideline person for the past several years - even in 2004 after she had quit ``MNF.'' The other broadcasting twist to this year's game is the addition of sports talker Tony Bruno to do a virtual radio show on the franchise-mode feature. Bruno, the syndicated weekday morning host heard on KXTA-AM (1150) and included on the 101 ``Best of L.A.'' list by Los Angeles magazine, recorded about 30 hours of material for use on the video game.

WHAT CHOKES--Back in the day when Tiger Woods took on David Duval in the first ``Monday Night Golf'' prime-time battle, then known as the ``Showdown at Sherwood'' from Wayne Gretzky's backyard in Thousand Oaks in '99, there was plenty of intrigue and curiosity that drove viewers to the tube. When ABC's ``Battle at the Bridges'' paired Woods with Hank Kuehne against Phil Mickelson and John Daly on Monday for an advertised long-ball affair, there was only the dread that this thing was running so long with all these out-of-bounds shots that we'd not only miss the re-run of ``Jeopardy!'' but half of ``Wheel of Fortune.'' And that was without them playing the 18th hole. Ratings show about half as many viewers (3.6 for Monday vs. 6.9 for 1999 and 7.6 for 2000) are willing to sit though the nearly five hours of an exhibition that's now spread over two channels and needs portable floodlights on the last three holes. The novelty is over. The contract between the network and sponsors calls for one more in 2005. If they want to save it, play it in Hawaii (where daylight never ends), pair up Bill Murray and Daly against Michelle Wie and Woods, and no one wears anything with a Nike logo.

--FSN West officials admit finances did lead to a contract impasse with college football analyst Tom Ramsey, resulting in the former Kennedy High and UCLA star quarterback balking at re-signing for a lower salary to stay on with the Pac-10 national cable package. Candidates to replace him on short notice include anyone from former UCLA coach Bob Toledo to current USC radio sideline reporter Petros Papadakis, but if the network wanted to be bold, it might take a chance on someone none of us have heard of. FSN West, which is in charge of the production for the Pac-10 package, also has replaced Steve Physioc (who has schedule conflicts with doing more Angels games this season) on play-by-play with the unbearable Barry Tompkins. The first of 13 FSN national telecasts is Sept. 5.

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