Assault on Houston for Local TV

Welcome to Opening Day. No, I don’t mean for the Reds, though they take on the Brewers at a chilly Great American Ballpark this afternoon. And the Bats don’t open up at Slugger until next week.

No, it’s opening day for the local TV station assault on Houston (imagine graphic: ASSAULT ON HOUSTON! 2011). So if you really don’t want to miss a moment of the UK coverage, let this be your guide. Or go back to calling in and complaining about UK fans to Tony Vanetti on the radio.

From WAVE, a UK fan at the Lexington airport

WAVE-TV, which claimed last night to be the ONLY local station to be there with a camera when the Cats took off from Lexington and landed in Houston last night, will have three on-air types in town– sports director Kent Taylor, reporter Connie Leonard and Kendrick Haskins. Good move by WAVE to pair its married personalities on the road (Taylor and Leonard) to save on expenses. But, and I’m trying to be nice here,  the station would be better off leaving Haskins behind the camera.

It was great to see that Jon Chrisos, at the Lexington airport last night, found a dude with missing teeth to interview about the Cats. And WAVE brought UK legend Rick Robey into its studios for an interview with Scott Reynolds.

WAVE will air a special Friday night at 8 on the Cats, though it appears from their promotions they’re trying to squeeze Butler into the local viewing area.

Weird thing last night on Fox41. No sports anchor. That’s because all three of its on-air personnel — Tom Lane, John Lewis and Pat Doney — were on their way to Houston. News Director Barry Fulmer, in an  e-mail, worte this:

“UK going to the Final Four is important to our community and we want to make sure we give the event the right amount of coverage.  Live reports from Houston start tomorrow and will continue until through the weekend.”

It almost seems like WHAS-TV, which is merely sending sports reporter Adam Lefkoe, is on the short end of coverage. But choosing WHAS-TV for your Cats’ coverage can pay off. Lefkoe, along with sports director Matt Hobbs, bring a distinct energy to their reports, and always seem to ask questions that I want answered. It makes them worth watching, i.e. they’re more entertaining than the competition, and are most likely to recognize Jay-Z if he walks in the locker room.

They’re also the most likely to lace their reports with pop culture references. Hobbs reported last night that the rapper, who ownes a piece of the New Jersey Nets, may have broken a rule or two fraternizing with UK’s potential top draft choices Terrence Jones and Brandon Knight.

Of course, the game itself is on WLKY-TV Saturday night at 8:47. And the CBS affiliate is determined to win the race for most hours devoted to UK.  GM Glenn Haygood tells me that Sunday’s game against North Carolina was the second-highest rated basketball game ever broadcast in the Louisville market, eclipsed only by U of L’s 2005 Final Four loss to Illinois. He’s expecting a bigger number Saturday night.

You’ll see sports director Fred Cowgill, along with anchors Rick Van Hoose and Natasha Collins (?) from various locales in Houston.  Haygood seems to have spared no expense in capitalizing on this one, as evidenced in this email:

“It’s a huge presence.  Once all the crews are in place, there will be 16 staffers from WLKY in Houston.  We are also moving a huge inventory of newsgathering equipment to Houston.  The satellite and microwave trucks, multiple news SUV’s, set fixtures and lighting, portable edit suites, etc. will all be in place.  Plus, we’ll have a robust capability to deliver content to our web and mobile platforms.

“Our viewers have come to expect that WLKY will deliver great content, and there will be a huge volume of that great content created in Houston this weekend.  If you’ve watched our special coverage of the Road to the Final Four over the last few weeks, you’ve seen a good cross section of what we deliver.  Big Blue Nation deserves nothing less than the best coverage from WLKY!”

Had enough? If you want to avoid all this hoops news, skip local news until Monday. And it IS opening day for the baseball season.