Columnist Ron Kantowski: Taking a TiVo timeout

Thursday, March 21, 2002 | 10:12 a.m.

Ron Kantowski's insider notes column appears Tuesday and his Page One column appears Thursday. He can be reached at ron@lasvegassun.com or (702) 259-4088.

When my 1988 pickup truck did a Bob Knight and blew all its gaskets at once last weekend, I was left with a difficult decision on the side of the road:

With Creighton and Florida locked in a double-overtime barnburner, option two was seeded higher. But after taking a 30-second timeout and considering that it was five miles from home to the office, and that the closest I've come to distance running was watching both Steve Prefontaine movies on pay-per-view, the decision was made to spend Saturday kicking tires and looking under hoods.

Thank God -- or at least Dick Vitale -- for TiVo.

For lack of a better description, TiVo is a high-tech VCR that uses a computer hard drive instead of videotape to record television programming. But that doesn't do it justice. It's like comparing a Winston Cup Pontiac (VCR) to a Formula One Ferrari (TiVo).

Until last Saturday, I thought Tivo's biggest attraction was ease in recording. I was able to preserve eight-plus hours of March Madness with one click of a button.

But after spending the day discussing "E-Z financing" with used car salesmen, I stumbled upon TiVo's more valuable use. Its rapid-fire fast forward system makes it possible to watch an entire game in about 10 minutes.

The key, of course, is to turn off the car radio when you're out and about and avoid the home electronic stores and guys with their faces painted in the Duke school colors. Knowing the score in advance spoils everything, unless you want to make a wager on the outcome with your unwitting neighbor from Sri Lanka.

But here's what I did upon returning home. For each game, I fast-forwarded to about eight minutes remaining. If the spread was within single digits, I kept watching, zapping every "Like a Rock" commercial, timeout, and officials' huddle at the scorer's table. Once the deficit reached double digits, I zapped to the final buzzer, letting Greg or Clark tell me the final score.

I was able to watch the entire second round in 45 minutes. Were it not for Notre Dame playing Duke way tougher than expected, it might have been 35.

Next to a recurring subscription to Anna Nicole-Smith's website, the monthy charge for TiVo might be the best $9.95 a sports fan could ever spend.

But just when I thought I had "invented" a new system, Major League Baseball decided to take condensation athletes to another level. For a modest fee, personal computer users will be able to purchase truncated versions of any major league game this season.

According to the MLB website, fans will be able to watch every hit, run and out in a game -- about 85 pitches -- resulting in an action-packed video stream of a complete ballgame that runs for only 20 minutes.

Action-packed? Twenty minutes? Now there's two phrases that haven't been associated with baseball since Mitch Williams last got up in the bullpen.

The bottom line is that all this new technology is going to provide sports fans with a more efficient way to keep up with the home team, and leave more time for yardwork, household chores and visits from the in-laws.

On second thought, maybe I'll just hang on to that old VCR.