Instant Replay

Instant Replay images come up short with camera-binoculars from Bushnell The idea behind Bushnell Corp.'s Instant Replay sounds great: high-quality binoculars equipped to shoot digital photos or streaming video. Who wouldn't want to grab solid footage of great athletes without having to lay out the money for field-level seats or wrestle with a zoom lens? But the Instant Replay is not the easy solution. The binoculars feature eight-fold magnification and, at a pound and a half, are relatively easy to hold, though the hand strap will be uncomfortably loose for most users.

PALM BEACH, Fla. - Unlike the way he felt about instant replay most of last season, Ravens coach Brian Billick felt like a winner yesterday. A leading advocate for reforming the system, Billick was satisfied when NFL owners agreed on a five-year extension of instant replay rather than making it permanent. The only modification approved was granting a third challenge to a team if it is successful on both of its allowable replay challenges. Billick, however, wants more changes, including narrowing the scope of reviewable plays.

PALM BEACH, Fla. - The Ravens' support for instant replay won't be challenged by coach Brian Billick. In what should be the most substantial news coming out of this week's annual NFL owners meetings, the Ravens will be among the teams expected to push for the system to become a permanent fixture. The proposal needs to be approved by 24 of the 32 team owners. At the very least, instant replay will be extended for five years if there's not enough support to make it permanent. According to a Ravens spokesman, owners Art Modell and Steve Bisciotti - the outgoing owner and soon-to-be sole owner, respectively - support instant replay and will endorse the proposal.

On a day when the rest of the AFC North failed to escape with last-minute comebacks, the Ravens survived in the end by delivering a familiar - if not excruciating - replay. Whether they were going on memory or might yesterday, the Ravens forced three turnovers in the fourth quarter, including Ray Lewis ' interception with 44 seconds left, to sidestep an upset and ring up a 24-17 win over the Jacksonville Jaguars. Just like last Sunday, another big play by Lewis and fourth-quarter turnovers were the major difference.

First of all, there is no "instant" in instant replay. Secondly, all replay seems to do is invite more replay. The firestorm Ravens coach Brian Billick created last week after two replay calls went against him has flickered at several other venues this season. He isn't the only coach hopping mad about the ineffectiveness of a replay system that has been tweaked into silliness. After the Tampa Bay Buccaneers lost a Week 5 Monday night affair to the Indianapolis Colts, in part because the officials made a critical mistake allowing an illegal onside kick and because of an obscure "leaping rule" call, coach Jon Gruden was left scratching his head.

Burned by instant replay in Sunday's 26-6 win over the Denver Broncos, the Ravens are trying to rekindle a replay of another sort. A 6 1/2 -point favorite over the reeling Jacksonville Jaguars, the Ravens are a win away from closing out the first half of the season at 5-3, a magic record for this franchise. The only two playoff berths in the team's eight-year history -- including the Super Bowl championship three seasons ago -- came when the Ravens won five of their first eight games. Unlike those other roads to the postseason, the Ravens could reach the halfway point on top of a division.

SO HERE WE are again, just days away from the Super Bowl, the Siegfried and Roy of sports events in this country. Steeped in the usual industrial-strength hype and excess, this year's big game is expected to draw 130 million viewers in the United States and another 670 million from around the world. It's nice to know the first peek foreign viewers get at our culture may be that classy Miller Lite commercial where two bosomy women get in a cat fight over whether the beer tastes great or is less filling and end up ripping each other's clothes off and mud-wrestling.

Roone Arledge, the ABC executive who did as much to shape the look of American network television as anyone except its founders, died yesterday of complications from cancer. He was 71. Mr. Arledge was pronounced dead at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center in New York, said ABC spokesman Jeffrey Schneider. A 36-time Emmy winner, Mr. Arledge, who retired in 1998, defined thinking outside the box from the moment he arrived at ABC in 1960. Among the groundbreaking programs he introduced in his career - which included a decade as president of the network's news and sports divisions - were Monday Night Football, Wide World of Sports, Nightline and 20/20.

ASHBURN, Va. - Fred Smoot says he's in. Darrell Green isn't quite as confident. When the Washington Redskins visit the Dallas Cowboys on Thanksgiving Day in a series that dates to 1960, the Redskins may have to try to end a nine-game losing streak against Dallas with a hobbled secondary. The biggest question mark is Green, who injured his left hip flexor when he leaped to knock down a potential game-winning touchdown pass from St. Louis Rams quarterback Kurt Warner to wide receiver Torry Holt in Sunday's 20-17 Washington win. Green, who was in such pain that he slept in a chair after Sunday's game, did not practice yesterday and said he did not know if he would be ready to play Thursday.

EAST RUTHERFORD, N.J. -- The NBA appears primed to join the NFL in adopting a limited form of instant replay to assist game officials for next season, league officials said yesterday. Appearing before the media to discuss the state of the game between games of the NBA Finals, commissioner David Stern and his deputy, Russ Granik, said the league likely will set up a replay system that would be used to determine whether shots at the end of quarters, halves and the end of games were launched before time expired.