KNUS's 'Artificial Turf' a sports-talk winner

You have to like a sports-talk show that poses provocative questions like: Which Olympics sport is a waste of time? Why didn't coaches give kids water during football practice back in the day? Were the Colorado Rockies already done for this season in April?

Indeed, that's the kind of flip, funny and frothy fare listeners get each Sunday at 8 p.m. on KNUS-AM/710's Artificial Turf, which, for my money, is the best sports-chat show in the Denver radio market.

Each week, KNUS sports director Bill Rogan -- a Duquesne University grad, sports history geek, and deft needler -- hangs out behind the mic for three hours with pals who crack wise about football, baseball, basketball, high school sports, and even horse racing.

They debate why Oakland Raiders fans are “knuckleheads.” Why NFL teams like the Broncos are “extortionists” for jamming exhibition game tickets down season-ticket holders' throats. Who's better looking between tennis sisters Serena and Venus Williams. And whether Rockies manager Clint Hurdle knows what he's doing.

It's acerbic, sassy, timely and, at times, juvenile. But it can be a load of laughs. Heck, even the bumper music between segments – Jimi Hendrix, Johnny Cash, the Stones – is cool. 

Bet on this: The Artificial Turf guys are a big step ahead of their slicker, self-important brethren at ESPN Radio 1600; the spotty Mile High Sports/AM 1510 gang; and the in-hiding crew at FM Sports Radio/104.3/The Fan led by the ageless Irv Brown and the Sage of Denver, Joe Williams.

In short, Artificial Turf's formula -- local guys, local talk, let 'er rip – is worth checking out.

BRONCOS REDUX: Listen up, ESPN producers. There's something to be said for running an NFL television broadcast smoothly and professionally, as CBS did with Sunday afternoon's Denver-San Diego footballpalooza. CBS's Dick Enberg and analyst Randy Cross knew their players, pointed out the officials' shoddy work, and were scarily accurate in predicting tactical maneuvers. In other words, they knew their stuff, which many times can't be said about ESPN's Monday Night Football booth dwellers.

GOODBYE, EDDIE CROWDER: Sad is the only way to describe the scant coverage the Big 3 local TV stations – KCNC, KUSA and KMGH -- gave to Eddie Crowder's passing last week. In a class with John Elway, Denver's Phipps Brothers and magnate Bill Daniels, the University Colorado's Crowder was a titan on the Front Range sports scene.

A top QB at Oklahoma in the early 1950s, Crowder arrived in 1963 in Boulder, where he took over one sorry football program. Through 1973, though, Crowder amassed a 67-49-2 record and steered the Buffs to five bowl games. Later, as the school's AD, he hired luminaries like Bill McCartney and Ceal Barry.

But all Crowder got on last Wednesday's 5 p.m. newscasts was a couple of lines – a telling comment on the narrow focus and historical ignorance the town's sports anchors bring to their cushy jobs.