[BC] Sports runover - was Along the lines of SB coverage

[Xen Scott]

At 10:46 AM 02/06/2006 -0500, Jeff Glass wrote:

>During FB season, CBS is constantly late airing 60 Minutes to the point 
>where I have stopped watching that show... why does it happen every
>bloody Sunday? What is the reason that the game could not start say, 30 
>minutes
>earlier?

The dilemma arose many years ago when NBC was carrying a football game that was
running past its allotted time.  When the 7pm time for a kid's special 
broadcast
of the film "Heidi" arrived, the game was in the last few minutes and the 
score
wasn't close.  NBC dumped out of the game and started "Heidi" on time.

Unfortunately for NBC, the loosing football team managed to score several 
touchdowns
in the last few minutes of the game, after NBC switched to "Heidi", and won 
the game.
This caused a huge outcry of protest from the football viewers upset that 
NBC had
bailed out of the game before it ended.  NBC then compounded the outrage by 
switching
back to the game to show a replay of the final minutes.  This outraged the 
kids and
parents who had tuned in to watch "Heidi".

The solution was for the networks to put in place a new program 
policy.  Carry the
live event to its end and push everything back in time unless the delay is 
so great
that it becomes necessary to preempt an entire subsequent show in order to 
get back
on time, especially when it affects prime time entertainment shows.

The ground rules at ABC News when I was there were that on the weekend, if 
Sports
ran past 6pm but ended before 6:18p, News would do a short show and then a 
normal
show at 6:30p.  If Sports ran past 6:18p then they had to fill until the local
break at 6:28p.  If Sports ran past 6:30, but ended by 6:48p, News would do 
a short
show for the East Coast and a complete half hour show for the West Coast.  If
Sports ran past 6:48p, they had to fill until 6:58p and there was no East Coast
news.  However, we had to do a full half hour news show for the West Coast.
Occasionally we had to do both a short World News and a regular World News just
for the West Coast and yes it was a PITA.

Anybody remember a sports runover that caused Dan Rather to have to do a short
Evening News and he refused, leaving the network in black for six minutes?

Xen Scott