Way Out Games

Last updated
Way Out Games
Genre Game show
Directed by Richard S. Kline
Presented by Sonny Fox
Mark Maxwell-Smith
Country of originUnited States
Original languageEnglish
Production
Production companies Barry & Enright Productions
MGM Television
Original release
Network CBS
Release11 September 1976 (1976-09-11) 
2 April 1977 (1977-04-02)

Way Out Games is a 1976-1977 weekly athletic competition game show where a total of 51 teams representing the United States and Puerto Rico competed in a series of athletic events, with emphasis based on humor and the unexpected.

Contents

Way Out Games aired on CBS from September 11, 1976 to September 4, 1977 and was hosted by Sonny Fox. The show was produced by Barry & Enright Productions in association with MGM Television, and originated at Six Flags Magic Mountain in Valencia, California. [1]

Gameplay

Every week, three different teams would compete in various athletic events and would earn points for winning an event. The team that won the first event scored one point, the second event awarded two points, and the final event awarded three points. The team with the most points after the third event would come back on a later show to compete against other winning teams. Prizes and trophies would also be given to the winners.

There would be 17 weeks of regular competition, 6 weeks of Quarterfinals (with one Quarterfinal having only two teams), 2 weeks of Semi-Finals, and a Championship Final, with one match each week.

In the Championship finals, shown in April 1977, Oregon defeated Indiana.

Broadcast history

Way Out Games aired Saturdays at 12:30 P.M. Eastern from September 1976 to January 1977. It then moved a half-hour later to 1:00 P.M. Eastern from February to April 1977. Then it aired at 7:00 A.M. Sundays from April to September 1977.

Some CBS affiliates even dropped Way Out Games midway through its run in favor of syndicated series (like Soul Train ) and sports, such being commonplace among Saturday morning series after 12 Noon and on Sunday mornings.

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">National Rugby League</span> Australasian rugby league football competition

The National Rugby League is a professional rugby league competition in Australasia which contains clubs from New South Wales, Queensland, Victoria, the Australian Capital Territory and New Zealand.

<i>American Gladiators</i> (1989 TV series) American television program

American Gladiators is an American competition television program that aired weekly in syndication from September 1989 to May 1996. The series matched a cast of amateur athletes against each other, as well as against the show's own "gladiators", in contests of strength and agility. Following the success of American Gladiators, other countries began to produce their own versions of the show.

It's a Knockout! is a British game show first broadcast in 1966. It was adapted from the French show Intervilles, and was part of the international Jeux sans frontières franchise.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">NFL on American television</span>

The television rights to broadcast National Football League (NFL) games are the most lucrative and expensive rights of any sport in the world. Television brought professional football into prominence in the modern era after World War II. Since then, National Football League broadcasts have become among the most-watched programs on American television, and the financial fortunes of entire networks have rested on owning NFL broadcasting rights. This has raised questions about the impartiality of the networks' coverage of games and whether they can criticize the NFL without fear of losing the rights and their income.

<i>NBA on CBS</i> American TV series or program

The NBA on CBS is the branding that is used for weekly broadcasts of National Basketball Association (NBA) games produced by CBS Sports, the sports division of the CBS television network in the United States. CBS aired NBA games from the 1973–74 NBA season until the 1989–90 NBA season.

<i>NBC Sunday Night Football</i> American television series

NBC Sunday Night Football is an American weekly television broadcast of National Football League (NFL) games on NBC and Peacock in the United States. It began airing on August 6, 2006, with the Pro Football Hall of Fame Game, which opened that year's preseason. NBC took over the rights to the Sunday prime time game telecasts from ESPN, which carried the broadcasts from 1987 to 2005. At the same time, ESPN began broadcasting Monday Night Football when it was dropped from sister network ABC. Previously, NBC had aired American Football League (AFL), and later American Football Conference (AFC), games from 1965 until 1997, when CBS took over those rights.

The Major League Baseball Game of the Week (GOTW) is the de facto title for nationally televised coverage of regular season Major League Baseball games. The Game of the Week has traditionally aired on Saturday afternoons. When the national networks began televising national games of the week, it opened the door for a national audience to see particular clubs. While most teams were broadcast, emphasis was always on the league leaders and the major market franchises that could draw the largest audience.

The Prime Time Access Rule (PTAR) was an American television broadcasting regulation enforced by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) from September 13, 1971, to August 30, 1996. It was instituted under concerns that television networks controlled too much of their affiliates' programming, and that there was not enough competition in program production and distribution. Under the regulation, commercial television networks were prohibited from airing programming in the 7:30 p.m. ET/PT half-hour on weekdays and Saturdays, and the 7:00 p.m. and 10:30 p.m. ET/PT half-hours on Sundays, on stations in the top 50 media markets. Despite only applying in the largest markets, the PTAR was practiced nationwide.

A doubleheader is a term used by television networks to refer to two games involving the same sport that are shown back-to-back on the same network, even though the events do not involve the same two teams. A doubleheader purposely coincides with a league's scheduling of "early" and "late" games. In North America, games usually start at the same time period in different time zones. The concept is less often extended to three games—a tripleheader—or, much more rarely, a quadrupleheader of four games.

<i>NFL Cheerleader Playoffs</i> American TV series or program

NFL Cheerleader Playoffs is a television show that debuted in 2006 on the NFL Network. The official channel of the National Football League premiered each episode on Saturdays at 3 p.m. Eastern Time (ET).

A graveyard slot is a time period in which a television audience is very small compared to other times of the day, and therefore broadcast programming is considered far less important. Graveyard slots usually displayed in the early morning hours of each day, when most people are asleep.

<i>College Football on ABC</i> Television series

ABC first began broadcasting regular season college football games in 1950, and has aired games of the now-National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Division I Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS) annually since 1966. After the ABC Sports division was merged into ESPN Inc. by parent company Disney in 2006, broadcasts have since been produced by ESPN, and have primarily used the ESPN College Football branding and graphics instead of the College Football on ABC branding.

<i>College Basketball on CBS Sports</i> American TV series or program

College Basketball on CBS Sports is the branding used for broadcasts of men's NCAA Division I basketball games that are produced by CBS Sports, for CBS, CBSSN, and Facebook.

NFL RedZone is an American sports television channel owned and operated by NFL Network since 2009. As a "special" game-day exclusive, it broadcasts on Sundays during the NFL regular season from 1:00 p.m. to 8:00 p.m. Eastern, or when the last afternoon window game ends. RedZone provides "whip around" simulcast coverage of all Sunday afternoon games airing in-progress on CBS and Fox.

ABC gained the NBA in 1964, the network aired its first NBA game on January 3, 1965, but lost the broadcast rights to CBS after the 1972–73 season with the initial tenure ending on May 10, 1973. As the national broadcaster of the NBA, CBS aired NBA games from the 1973-74 until the 1989–90 season, during which the early 1980s is notoriously known as the tape delay playoff era.

As the national broadcaster of the NBA, CBS aired NBA games from the 1973–74 until the 1989–90 season, during which the early 1980s is notoriously known as the tape delay playoff era.

From 1965 through 1975, in addition to the Saturday night game on CBC, Hockey Night in Canada also produced and broadcast a Wednesday night game on CTV, CBC's privately owned competitor; beginning in the 1975–76 NHL season, these midweek games began to broadcast by local stations. In 1970–71, the Vancouver Canucks joined the NHL, meaning that there were now three possible venues for an HNIC telecast.

During the early 1960s, NFL Commissioner Pete Rozelle envisioned the possibility of playing at least one game weekly during prime time that could be viewed by a greater television audience. An early bid by the league in 1964 to play on Friday nights was soundly defeated, with critics charging that such telecasts would damage the attendance at high school football games. Undaunted, Rozelle decided to experiment with the concept of playing on Monday night, scheduling the Green Bay Packers and Detroit Lions for a game on September 28, 1964. While the game was not televised, it drew a sellout crowd of 59,203 spectators to Tiger Stadium, the largest crowd ever to watch a professional football game in Detroit up to that point.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on American sports broadcasting</span>

When the World Health Organization declared the COVID-19 pandemic in March 2020, all major professional and collegiate organizations responded by suspending operations indefinitely. This effect was passed down to the world of sports broadcasting, which includes live coverage of thousands of events on an annual basis through stations and network available over the air, through cable, satellite, and IPTV companies, and via streaming and over-the-top services.

References

  1. Woolery, George W. (1985). Children's Television: The First Thirty-Five Years, 1946-1981, Part II: Live, Film, and Tape Series. The Scarecrow Press. pp. 552–553. ISBN   0-8108-1651-2.