Mountain West’s TV strategy: Remote control hide-and-seek

By Ron Kantowski

Thursday, Aug. 27, 2009 | 2 a.m.

When I think of the great disasters of modern television history, the first one that pops into mind is “My Mother the Car” starring Jerry Van Dyke. The second one that pops into mind is the Mountain West Conference’s current TV deal.

I still don’t know what the MWC presidents were thinking a couple of years ago when they elected not to re-up with ESPN so they could start their own TV network. But I am certain that your mother could have negotiated a better deal, even were she relegated to speaking through the radio of a 1928 Model T.

It took years but you can finally pull in most of the games, at least if you have a fat wallet and a TV Guide the size of William “Cannon” Conrad. The Mountain West is college football’s answer to “Seinfeld” reruns, with the exception that a lot of people still watch “Seinfeld” reruns. But, like Jerry, George, Kramer and Elaine, you can get MWC games on practically every channel on the dial.

• You can get them on The Mtn.

• And ESPN.

• And Fox Sports West.

• And Fox Sports.

• And Versus.

• And ESPN2.

• And CBS College Sports.

•And the Big Ten Network.

• And ESPN U.

• And Fox College Sports.

And that’s just in September. I kid you not. Mountain West games will appear on 10 different networks during the first month of the football season.

That is, unless you are a DirecTV subscriber.

Unless some last-minute deal is worked out before Monday, dish owners are going to encounter technical difficulty beyond their control in tuning in Mountain West games on Versus. It’ll be like “The Outer Limits.” You won’t be able to control the horizontal or the vertical because DirecTV this week said it will no longer carry Versus when its current agreement expires Aug. 31.

Some of the marquee games in the Mountain West — Texas at Wyoming, Florida State at BYU, Air Force at Utah, TCU at BYU — have been farmed out to Versus. So what, many UNLV fans might say. I don’t give a whit about Texas at Wyoming.

But they may give two whits on Halloween night when the Rebels travel to TCU. Trick or treat? You get a stale popcorn ball, UNLV fans. If you own a satellite dish, I hope you enjoy watching some guy build an addition onto his ranch home on the Home & Garden channel, because I’m afraid that’s all you are going to get.

By the end of the season, TCU fans will probably have the skills to build two additions onto their homes as four Horned Frogs games are ticketed for Versus.

Robert Mercer, director of public relations for DirecTV, told the Los Angeles Times that “Versus’ overall ratings are poor and have not increased nearly enough to justify what we’re paying them, let alone the significant increase they’re asking for.”

Ouch! When it comes to adding insult to injury, that’s like Mike Tyson biting Evander Holyfield’s ear, then whispering in what’s left of it that his mother wears army boots.

I can’t decide what’s worse: The fact that eight Mountain West football games — and about an equal number during basketball season — may not be available to DirecTV subscribers; or, that even if they were, hardly anybody would be watching.

According to Nielsen ratings, Versus is averaging 3,000 more viewers at any given time since reinventing itself from its Outdoor Life Network origin. Yet on DirecTV, Versus ranks only 61st among 74 English-advertising supported cable networks.

That’s like broadcasting games out of Wayne and Garth’s basement. It’s got to be the worst example of exposing your product since that guy streaked across the stage at the Academy Awards.

Now you know why New Mexico is having trouble recruiting running backs from Texas.

I keep going back to what Kirk Herbstreit, the ESPN college football analyst, said when somebody asked him what he thought about Air Force a couple of years ago.

“I dunno,” Herbstreit said. “I don’t get that channel.”