Columnist Tim Graham: Local fans can dig into a baseball buffet

Tim Graham

Wednesday, March 31, 1999 | 9:29 a.m.

Tim Graham's media notebook appears Wednesday. His page 1 column appears Thursday. Reach him at 259-4078 or tim@lasvegassun.com

Baseball junkies, rejoice.

Not only because the season is days away, but also because you're in Southern Nevada.

Because of our mish-mash media market, it can be argued no other region affords so many radio and television options.

So break out your road map and your flow chart. It's time to decipher what teams will be on what stations at what times.

Viewers don't need DirecTV to see a game virtually every day. The weekends are covered by Fox Sports' "Saturday Game of the Week," FX's "Baseball Saturday Night" and ESPN's "Sunday Night Baseball."

Fox Sports West offers 50 Anaheim Angels dates and Cox Communications airs several San Diego Padres games. Locally, Telemundo affiliate KBLR Channel 39 carries Arizona Diamondbacks games in Spanish.

For those with a satellite dish, you can catch even more action on Fox Sports West 2 (Los Angeles Dodgers) and Fox Sports Arizona (Diamondbacks) without additional charges.

The local radio menu is abundant as well.

KBAD 920-AM once again has the Las Vegas Stars. But sister station KENO 1460-AM, once the rights holder to the Padres, won't have a team. It instead will offer ESPN Radio's "Sunday Night Baseball" schedule, which is accented by opening day and holiday games in addition to the entire postseason.

"We thought about carrying a team," said KENO program director Seat Williams, who spoke with the Angels and New York Yankees. "But we want to have some talk available for the listeners. So we're going to leave the KENO side for that."

Elmore Sports, sports programming brokers for KSHP 1400-AM, also weighed the Yankees and Angels after dropping the Oakland Athletics. It opted for the Angels.

For the 20th straight season KDWN 720-AM is Southern Nevada's radio home for the Dodgers. The team has been on in Las Vegas -- before KDWN, it was on the old KORK 920-AM -- for more than 30 years.

"If we didn't already have the Stars here," KDWN's Buzz Jones said, "I wouldn't be afraid to call the Dodgers Las Vegas' home team."

The Diamondbacks can be heard again on KSFN 1140-AM, which also carries UNLV baseball.

KRLV 1340-AM airs a smattering of Chicago Cubs games on the weekends, scheduling them around its Motor Racing Network programs.

* WONDERING ALOUD: What was with KLAS Channel 8 sports director Dave McCann devoting as much time -- if not more -- to UNLV's basketball championship in 1990 as he did Connecticut's Monday night?

McCann narrated highlights from the Rebels' 9-year-old victory over Duke as if it had just happened. I'm halfway surprised he didn't start the segment by saying "Channel 8 has learned UNLV won an NCAA basketball title."

We know McCann loves UNLV, and it's becoming more apparent he will do whatever he can to give the athletic department positive publicity. But that was a waste of time.

* QUOTABLE: "It's about time we (the U.S.) started fighting someone who will fight back. We're stepping on these little countries like cockroaches: Somalia, Grenada, Iraq. UNLV has a tougher schedule than that." -- comedian Rich Hall on ABC's "Politically Incorrect"

* STATIC: The NCAA men's basketball championship drew the worst rating in 27 years. Connecticut's dramatic 77-74 victory on CBS scored a 17.2 rating and a 27 share. ... The women's title game Sunday on ESPN scored an event-record 4.3 rating. The game was viewed in 3.2 million homes, the second most for any ESPN college game -- including men -- ever. ... KSHP has added the 1999 CART Fed-Ex Championship series to its extensive sports menu. Coverage begins with the Long Beach Grand Prix on April 18. The station also has the most live horse racing on Las Vegas radio, including Saturday's Santa Anita Derby. ... Sports Emmy Award nominations were released last week and CBS leads the way with 30, including 17 stemming from the 1998 Winter Olympics. NBC has 19 nominations, followed by HBO with 14, Fox with 13 and ESPN with 12. ABC was last with nine.