NUMBERS DON'T DIMINISH FOX EFFORTS.

Byline: TOM HOFFARTH MEDIA

If Fox's Executive VPs in Charge of Constant Worrying could just find a way to harness the technology from its own wacked-out radar gun that has been off the charts in measuring the deliveries of the Detroit Tigers' pitching staff this fall. Then it could use it to gauge the real TV audience that's been delivered during the major league baseball playoffs, so maybe spirits would be higher around their Hollywood office space.

Instead, too many get sucked into the changeups thrown out by the Nielsen nincompoops, misconstrued data that continues to insist that no matter how far a these series go -- four games in the ALCS or seven in the NLCS -- it keeps looking worse percentage-wise when compared to years gone by, and media writers love to regurgitate them as proof that the sport is struggling.

Rather than scream at you like Tommy Lasorda insisting that it's your duty to watch the postseason, we'll simply note that even apushed-to- the-limit NLCS featuring the New York Mets won't pull Fox even in the ratings from a year ago -- it'll be down ``just a tad, a percentage point or two,'' admitted network sports president Ed Goren with some surprise.

Since we prefer to focus more on quality than quantity, the creative gruntwork that Fox puts into each telecast as it heads into its ninth season of covering the World Series, which starts Saturday in Detroit, won't be overlooked here.

``I couldn't be more proud of this production crew,'' Goren said Thursday from New York. ``We joke that we'll get to sleep in November, but our technical crew, with all the rainouts we've had, really have had a brutal run. Butnight after night, they perform to an Emmy Award-winning level. And that's what we can control.

``The reality is, the stuff we can't control (ratings, the length of a series) is what can rip you apart emotionally. We can't take it personally. You want to do well for the company and want the biggest stage, and you don't want to come off as concerned or negative in what's being said, but in this sports landscape, where we've had back-to-back four-game World Series sweeps, we're getting more eyeballs than 80 percent of whatever else is on prime time.''

That said, Fox has indeed decided to bail out some of its postseason inventory, and ratings do have something to do with it. It will take just one of the league championship series between 2007 and 2014, allowing TBS this week to submit a winning bid on covering the other LCS. Fox's reason for scaling back on baseball was because it decided as a company that its prime-time lineup was strong enough to deliver a stronger audience, and it could use its LCS and World Series to promote that fact.

If Detroit holds form and manages to pull off another sweep in the World Series, Fox's new pull-back philosophy will look even smarter.

The speed by which the Tigers' pitchers do so is another story for conspiracy theorists.

According to the radar guns used on the Fox telecasts during the ALDS between Detroit and Oakland, an inordinate number of Tigers' pitchers were hitting at or better than 100 miles per hour. Rookie Joel Zumaya may be fast, but a consistent 103 mph?

``I think the gun we used was the same one a cop on the 405 used on me recently,'' Goren said. ``Yes, it did seem a bit high, but moving forward, I think maybe we can contrast what our gun says versus what they post in the stadium.''

Adds play-by-play man Joe Buck: ``There's no secret meeting of the brotherhood of Fox where it's decided that, `Wouldn't it generate great ratings if (Justin) Verlander was throwing 107?

``It's got a lot of attention and it's interesting story, but you just flash the numbers and then choose to believe it.''

Kind of like the ratings.

`Ticket' punch-out came unnecessarily

In signing off on an email where he tactfully explained what was behind all the pinks slips that were handed out to all the local employees at KMPC-AM (1540) ``The Ticket'' on Wednesday, axed station VP/ general manager/program director Roger Nadel said: ``I think that you'll find it difficult to tell much difference between what you hear (Thursday, the first day of all-syndicated programming) from what you heard today.''

And therein lies the problem.

It was less than a year ago when local shows generated by Petros Papadakis, Fred Roggin and Dave Smith, combined with plenty of USC football and basketball coverage, gave the underdog all-sports station a decisive bite when put up against what was being offered at rivals KSPN-AM (710) and KXTA-AM (570), as well as San Diego's XXSports Radio (1090).

Go back to our annual rankings of the Top10/Bottom 5 sports-talk show hosts that came out in January. Papadakis (No. 1), Smith (No. 3), and Roggin (No. 6) were an effective and very entertaining block between noon and 7 p.m.

Once the station lost the USC rights to 710-AM, major advertisers left, and many of the now-departed local hosts were upset about that the station management didn't consider that property a priorty. A desperate attempt to juggle the lineup in June -- Smith went to the middays as part of The Sporting News Radio syndicated team (with Tony Bruno and Mark Willard, who also started as local personalities at the station), Papadakis was uprooted and transplanted in drive-time (where the station signal was cranked down after sunset and affected his loyal following), and Roggin bailed out at the urging of the management who didn't want to pay his salary any longer -- signaled the beginning of the end.

It's disappoiting that the business of maintaining quality radio of any format will continue to be decided by fickle corporate ownership -- in this case, the underminding guidance by Sporting News Radio president Clancy Woods. Nadel, who came over from all-news KNX, should have succeeded because KMPC had an audience -- maybe not one that registered well in the archaic Arbitron books, but one that was loyal to the end.

-- Tom Hoffarth

CAPTION(S):

2 photos, 2 boxes

Photo:

(1) Does Tigers rookie Joel Zumaya really throw a 103 mph fastball? Fox's radar guns say so.

Stephen Dunn/Getty Images

(2) BRUCKHEIMER

Box:

(1) WHAT SMOKES

(2) WHAT CHOKES