PASS SAT, GO TO ELECTORAL COLLEGE.

Byline: TOM HOFFARTH Media

Questions under consideration for the revised edition of the sports media Sarcastic Attitude Test (SAT), given annually to those who aspire to remain in a vegetative state of mind while filtering information from TV, radio, print and other hearsay:

--Which scientific theories best describe how the XFL continues to survive each week despite a proportional decline in ratings:

a) The Law of Diminishing Returns does not apply to network-televised sports as long as one giant advertiser continues to believe it is reaching the male 12-17 demographic.

b) The Ebersol Ego Factor is immune to Neilsen Kryptonite.

c) The Jerry Lewis Syndrome holds true - if it doesn't play in the U.S., there's always France.

--What technical innovation will the XFL eventually be credited with introducing:

a) Cameramen on the field.

b) Audio access to coaches in the press box.

c) A voice-deactivated microphone to filter out anything intelligent that might possibly come out of Jesse Ventura.

--The name of Bob Costas' new HBO show is:

a) ``On The Record''

b) ``Off in My Own Little World''

c) ``Crouching Costas, Hidden Agenda''

d) ``Spongebob Smartypants''

e) ``Hey, Point the Camera Back Down Here, I'm Not Finished Doing My Dennis Miller Impression''

f) ``You Mean I Can Curse on Cable?''

g) All of the above.

--The recently completed season of ABC's ``Monday Night Football'' caused new producer Don Ohlmeyer to:

a) Consider retirement.

b) Replace Dennis Miller.

c) Seek a restraining order against Eric Dickerson's agent.

--Loosely translated from Swedish, ``Verne Lundquist'' means:

a) The quest for green underwear.

b) Monkeybone.

c) You are related to the ``Hey Verne'' guy.

--The next logical name change for Fox Sports Net would be:

a) Fox Sports Super Duper Cable Channel.

b) See Spot Run.

c) Does It Matter What We Call It? Just Watch, Lame-o, Or We'll Send Olbermann Over to Get In Your Face.

--In response to viewer complaints about offensive language that occasionally goes over the airways on live sporting-event coverage, more networks will likely resort to:

a) A five-second delay.

b) A six-man censor crew.

c) A perpetual scroll of the seven words you can't say on TV, with George Carlin as a game analyst.

--Sean McDonough is to Dick Vitale as:

a) Sominex is to caffeine.

b) Dry heaves are to alcoholism.

c) Hairpieces are to ``February Sweeps.''

--The origin of March Madness can be traced to:

a) 1979, when Larry Bird and Magic Johnson met head to head in the NCAA Tournament final the same year ESPN started televising all the early-round games.

b) 1992, when it became a TV-created marketing campaign intended to drive viewers to the exploitation of college basketball's postseason.

c) 2001, when it got people thinking: ``What would Billy Packer look like as an XFL cheerleader?''

--Interest in televised golf is most dependent upon:

a) The quality of the broadcast.

b) The success of Tiger Woods.

c) The persuasiveness of CBS executives to get Jill Arrington out as a course reporter and explain the Stableford and Four-Ball Stroke Play scoring systems.

--Essay question: In 200 words or less, disprove the following statement: ``Vince McMahon is Satan.''

SOUND BYTES

WHAT SMOKES

--Who at KCOP Channel 13 wants it to rain for Sunday's five-hour L.A. Marathon coverage? Depends on who you ask. ``When it poured last year, the people who usually sit and watch the race out on the street were inside watching on TV, so our sales department would love it to rain,'' said Dave Goetz, who produces the race TV coverage starting at 8:30 a.m. ``But from a production standpoint, we had a cameraman close to getting hypothermia last year and we kept losing equipment. It's a hard show, but that's what makes it great. You never know what's going to happen.'' Goetz, producing for his fifth year, has 32 camera positions (including four mounted on motorcycles that need helicopters above to transfer the signal) and a technical crew of more than 200. Barry Tompkins, Larry Rawson, Rick Chambers and Michelle Bonner are the key on-air people for a staff of 13 reporters and analysts.

WHAT CHOKES

--Howie Long, as ``Jack the helicopter pilot,'' not only gets eighth billing in ``3000 Miles To Graceland,'' but - and I hate to give this away, so turn your head if you don't want to know the ending - that lame death scene he tries to pull off must have been the result of watching too many bad cowboy movies. It's painful enough to listen to him sing a few lines of Paul Simon's ``50 Ways to Leave Your Lover.'' Next time, slip out the back, Jack.

--On the same day the league announced it was getting rid of the ``bump and run'' rule, the XFL bumped Jerry ``The King'' Lawler off its broadcast crew and will run with Dick Butkus, the league's director of competition, on Saturday night's backup game. Actually, Lawler reportedly quit in protest over the firing of his wife, Stacy ``The Kat'' Carter, but in the world of Vince McMahon, where story lines are created to spark interest, who knows what really happened. Saturday's main game at 5 p.m. pits the Xtreme and New York/New Jersey Hitmen, whose coach, Rusty Tillman, has some sort of NBC-created feud going with game colorman Jesse Ventura.

--Did you see Lisa Guerrero try to explain baseball's new strike zone? The Fox Sports Net reporter, at Vero Beach, Fla., this week with the Dodgers, created an interesting visual as she showed viewers of the 11 p.m. Regional Sports Report that the top of the new target for pitchers would be ``at the chest, 2 1/2 balls down.'' Back in the studio, co-anchors John Fricke and Gaard Swanson did the appropriate thing. They paused for a few seconds, then burst out laughing.

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Box: SOUND BYTES (see text)