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Monday, December 11, 2000

Yesterday's Steelers television broadcast was brought to you by The Pope of Giants Stadium. That's what CBS partner Greg Gumbel called Phil Simms. The color commentator walked into the building before the game, and it was as if Simms became Norm and the place became the Cheers tavern: He knew everybody's name. When you play quarterback for the Giants as long as Simms, that's understandable.

When you play quarterback for the Giants as long as Simms, it's also understandable when a color commentator lapses into plural speak, into a tone supportive of his former team and former teammates.

When cornerback Jason Sehorn made a close defensive play, Simms gushed and stumbled. "Good for him," he said.

Simms also slipped into pro-Giants speak when it came to their defensive line.

Look, it wasn't that bad. He didn't noticeably root or tilt his commentary one way, and if you think he did, then you're biased. The old Giants quarterback has grown into a consummate broadcaster.

"As a player, a broadcaster, a fan, I hate the squib kick," Simms intoned after such a Steelers move in the second half. Then he criticized his former team for failing to make an all-out attempt at transforming good, post-squib field position into points. So there.

Simms is the best single color commentator in football. He is to that game what John McEnroe is to tennis and Johnny Miller to golf. He calls it honestly. He calls it the way I want to hear it.

You go, Pope.

'SportsBeat' simulcasts

You soon will hear Stan Savran's voice on WBGG-AM, aka Sports Radio 970, The Burgh. Savran, who signed off his 8-9 p.m. WEAE-AM show Friday after a two-year run, and his co-host du jour will have their Fox Sports Net Pittsburgh weeknight "SportsBeat" simulcast on the Fox Sports Radio local affiliate. More often than not, his partner will be Guy Junker, who is also occupied with the station's nightly "Regional Sports Report." The simulcast -- either with a 6:30 or 7 p.m. start -- will commence Dec. 18 on non-Penguins WBGG nights.

It was only natural that Savran's Fox ties would remove him from WEAE's ESPN Radio 1250 mix and plunk him into the lineup for WBGG (the former WWSW-AM). The question remains, will Savran begin to miss the weeknight 8-9 p.m. radio show? Will he listen from the press box and begin to hanker anew for a talk-radio show?

Let me be so bold as to predict: You will hear Savran's show on WBGG in 2001, too.

Stan 'n Guy, love the ... shirt? Just in time for the holidays, Fox Sports Net Pittsburgh is offering a cute caricature of its "SportsBeat" hosts to fit you to a T. Order forms online via http://www.foxsports.com/pittsburgh/stories/sportsbeat_tshirt.sml.

Fox Sports Net Pittsburgh and KDKA-TV, to name a couple, will air one-hour specials about Mario Lemieux at 7 p.m. today.

Program notes

ESPN Classic will air its "Road Show" -- think ESPN's "College GameDay," but nostalgic -- Saturday from Gate B at Three Rivers Stadium. Charlie Steiner and Rocky Bleier will serve as hosts during the 9 a.m.-noon broadcast, which also will feature live visits with Franco Harris, Mel Blount, Chuck Noll, Myron Cope and formerPirates Bill Madlock and Jim Leyland. The show additionally will air taped interviews with Lynn Swann, Jack Ham and other assorted former Steelers. The show is open to the public and merchandise is expected to be given away.

After the show, ESPN Classic will spin an all-Pittsburgh lineup: The 1974 All-Star Game from Three Rivers, noon; 1979 World Series Game 5, 12:30 p.m.; the 1994 All-Star Game, 2:30 p.m.; the Immaculate Reception 1972 playoff, 4:30 p.m.; Steelers' Super Bowl years highlights, 5-7 p.m.; and, for some head-scratching reason, 1992 NLCS Game 3 to close the day at 7 p.m. (That was a Tim Wakefield victory. At least it isn't the Francisco Cabrera game five days after that one.)

Terry Bradshaw has a relatively legitimate excuse for missing the Steelers' Three Rivers finale Saturday: He'll be busy working with the rest of the Fox studio crew ... aboard the U.S. Harry S. Truman somewhere in the Mediterranean Sea.

Seems he met the Secretary of the Navy this summer, and the two hatched this plan to put the show on a working vessel. Bradshaw sent his Steelers regards via a humorous video message to be played on the stadium scoreboard Saturday.

All you local electronic-media outlets can shut your mouths now. Kevin Allen of USA Today broke the story of Lemieux's comeback. It might have been heard first locally on this radio station or that TV station, but, in the journalism business, the issue is who revealed the details first. And that was Allen on the Web site of the so-called nation's newspaper.

You can reach Chuck Finder at cfinder@post-gazette.com