TV analysts create their own madness

Back in the day – and sometimes in the night – I wore a black porkpie hat. I cut quite a figure there for a while. But then along came cable, and middle age, and, well, just like my childhood, kids were making fun of me all over again.

Sure, cable brought better reception and more movies, but it also brought college basketball by the barrel. And, as it turns out, college basketball on TV threatens our very way of life more than Communism, which we had feared for a lot longer.

I mean, the Red menace has disappeared; Bill Raftery is still here.

Yes, we are in the madness that is March, which is both a road to the Final Four and a side street to insanity.

I have written thousands of words in my cable lifetime decrying and denouncing Dick Vitale. To absolutely, positively no avail. If this were a game between us, the final score would read, “Dick Vitale 73, Couch Slouch 0.” On his tombstone, it will say, “Celebrated Basketball Hall of Fame broadcaster.” On my tombstone, it will say, “Died a thousand deaths at the hands of Dick Vitale, Bill Raftery, Hubie Brown, Clark Kellogg and Bill Walton.”

I mention Vitale here because he begat Raftery and Raftery begat Kellogg and, come NCAA Tournament time, you turn on the TV and it’s like hearing a cat fight in front of a whistling tea kettle. They’ve created a new English – sort of a “slanguage” – and they talk with a false urgency, as if at any moment the ozone layer is going to crack and we’re all going to freeze to death.

Kellogg is the UFO of studio analysts – indefinable, unexplainable and, quite possibly, sent here from an alien world to weaken earthlings’ resolve. To wit:

“He’s going to go rack-to-rack for the left-hand throw down!”

“They’re doing it on the glass, buffet-style with plenty of seconds!”

My sympathies to Greg Gumbel, the affable, competent anchor who is calm and unflinching under the avalanche of suffering he endures on CBS’ NFL and NCAA studio shows.

(Column Intermission: I tuned to C-SPAN last week for the House hearings on steroids and got TV culture shock. What, no pregame show? No talking heads? No “Tilt” promos? At least on ESPNews, you got hoops scores crawling across the screen while Jose Canseco squealed and Bud Selig squirmed. C-SPAN did the whole thing with, oh, two cameras – it had the production values of “The Honeymooners,” only the room was larger. Anyway, I’m not watching Congress again unless E! gets the contractual rights.)

Out at courtside, in the closing seconds of the Ohio-Florida game, Raftery offered this:

“Would have been a prime time to get to the rim and get the deuce. The one thing you have to do is drive and kick if you want three or get a catch on the box and look out.”

I’ll say this – Raftery does more with one-syllable words than anyone since Barney Rubble.

Actually, Raftery is a CBS rarity; of its eight game analysts during the weekend, he was the only one without ACC ties. Everyone else – Jay Bilas, Dan Bonner, Len Elmore, Mike Gminski, Billy Packer, Jim Spanarkel and Bob Wenzel – played and/or coached in the ACC. Apparently, the ACC has the best RPI in basketball and broadcasting.

Plus, if you went to Duke – where you probably learn bigger words (“perimeter”) and fancier expressions (“dribble penetration”) – you get preferential treatment, just like in real life. Bilas, Gminski and Spanarkel all played at Duke, and Wenzel, as a Duke assistant, coached Gminski and Spanarkel. Even CBS’ non-jock studio savant, Seth Davis, went to Duke and works for Sports Illustrated – that’s two strikes against him, but he seems like a pleasant fellow so I won’t scuff him up today.

Anyway, in the face of all the overheated analysis, I decided, through a medium, to try to contact the late, great Al McGuire. McGuire was so good, he could be standing barefoot on broken glass wearing a porkpie talking about residential grout cleaning and he’d be more entertaining than these stiffs.

Ask The Slouch

Q. You’re an L.A. kind of guy – with Shaquille O’Neal in Miami, are the Lakers still the big ticket in town? (Todd Talbot; Frederick, Md.)

A. I don’t want to say the mystique is gone, but Jack Nicholson skipped a Lakers game last week to watch an Emilio Estevez film festival on Bravo.

Q. On her new CD, Loretta Lynn sings, “Portland Oregon and sloe gin fizz/If that ain’t love then tell me what is.” What is your response? (Andy Grossman; Boston)

A. “Reno Nevada and a court order restraining me from coming within 400 feet of my first ex-wife/If that ain’t divorce then this ain’t my life.”

Q. Is there any technical innovation that could do for TV bowling what the “hole-card cam” did for TV poker? (Simon Lester; Wellington, Fla.)

A. I might stick a hidden microphone in Pete Weber’s confessional booth.

Q. Do you think Manute Bol was juicing? (Bernie Erenberger; Whitefish Bay, Wis.)

A. Pay the man, Shirley.