Fox's theft of the NFL package CBS had held for nearly four decades made a lot more headlines, but last week's news - that 12 affiliates, nine of them CBS, will switch to Fox - is much bigger news.
This may indeed be the biggest news since ABC began to challenge CBS and NBC some 40 years ago.To understand how big this news is requires some understanding of the current status Fox holds in the network pecking order.
The Big Three Networks - ABC, CBS and NBC - each have approximately 200 local affiliates. And the majority of those broadcast on the more powerful VHF (2-13) channels.
Fox, on the other hand, had a total of 140 affiliates before its purchase of the NFL rights. (It has picked up a few since then.)
And those affiliates were hardly the cream of the crop. Only 19 were VHF affiliates, and only six of those were in major television markets.
Hardly an equal battle. No matter how high the quality of Fox programming (and that's an entirely different topic), it could never reach the audience levels of the Big Three.
(How important are VHF stations? Important enough that Fox bought Utah's KSTU-Ch. 13, a station in a midsize market - No. 38 - just to gain a VHF platform.)
Conventional wisdom was that the Big Three grip on all those powerful stations was unassailable. Many of those affiliation agreements go back decades.
But Fox owner Rupert Murdoch, the man who has shaken TV up more than anyone dreamed possible, pulled off an enormous coup. What he did was basically so simple that, in retrospect, it's hard to believe no one thought of it before.
It wasn't cheap. It cost Murdoch $500 million.
But he spent that half a billion bucks to buy 20 percent of New World Communications Group Inc., which either owns or is in the process of buying a dozen VHF stations, many in big markets. He bought himself powerful stations in Atlanta, Cleveland, Dallas, Detroit, Kansas City, Milwaukee, Phoenix, St. Louis and Tampa.
Three smaller-market stations - Austin, Texas, Birmingham, Ala., Greensboro, N.C. - also come in the package, but what Murdoch really wanted was those big-market stations. The Big Three networks have more than 200 affiliates each, but most of those are in smaller cities. A relative handful of stations in big cities broadcast to a majority of the nation's television viewers.
To understand just how big a deal this will be in many cities, try to imagine that, locally, Fox was broadcast on Ch. 14 - and then, overnight, it switched to Ch. 5.
When Murdoch said that this deal would help level the playing field, he wasn't kidding.
Once all these affiliate switches are made, it's possible - just possible - that the fourth network will no longer be No. 4 in the ratings. That the Big Three will no longer have a lock on that title.
And that would indeed be a shock to the entrenched television establishment.
FOX FALLOUT: Murdoch has more than hinted that he isn't done yet - that he's looking at similar deals that will bring even more powerful affiliates into the Fox fold.
And that's just one of the effects of last week's announcment. Others include:
- An unconfirmed rumor that CBS is trying to outmaneuver Fox and New World in part of the deal. New World is in the process of buying seven of the stations in question - and CBS reportedly is looking at trying to outbid them on a couple of those.
- Although eight of the 12 stations that apparently will be switching to Fox are CBS affiliates, it has yet to be determined that the Big Eye will be the hardest hit by all of this.
In the cities in question, CBS isn't targeting low-powered UHF stations as its new affiliates - it's targeting NBC and ABC affiliates.
And CBS, the leader in daytime, prime-time and late-night programming, is in pretty good position to lure some of those stations away. Some interesting battles are in the offing.
- All of the Big Three networks are looking at buying into station ownership groups in order to preserve their current affiliations.
- And, as in any business deal, people get hurt.
Last week we talked about how former KSTU news director Lisa Gregorisch suddenly had the rug pulled out from under her. She left to start a news operation at Fox-owned KDAF in Dallas, and that new newscast was just weeks away from its debut date.
But with the impending switch of Dallas' CBS affiliate to Fox, those plans were suddenly canceled. (Fox will sell KDAF, and it didn't want to create a news operation that would compete with its new affiliate.)
Gregorisch will land on her feet. She's still employed by Fox and is doing some consulting for KSTU right now as she awaits a new assignment.
Others were not as lucky. Many reporters, anchors and behind-the-scenes staffers had quit other jobs to go to work for KDAF - and they're out of luck.
OLD NEWS: KSL-Ch. 5 is devoting a half-hour of prime time (7 p.m.) to a repackaged, month-old interview that anchorman Dick Nourse did with Ross Perot last month, calling it the "Power of Perot."
Segments from that interview, which took place way back on April 26 - and which would have been really newsworthy if it had taken place about a year and a half earlier - were seen on KSL newscasts shortly thereafter.
There's no truth to the rumor that KSL is also considering doing interviews with Walter Mondale and Michael Dukakis.
HOW'S THAT? A headline on the front of the May 23 issue of the trade publication Electronic Media was rather eyecatching:
POLICE INVESTIGATE ABC BOMB
Hmm . . . if the cops are going to start investigating TV shows that bomb, they won't have time for anything else.
(A colleague suggested ABC execs will undoubtedly plead insanity.)