Logan's Run and Baseball

(Photo by Jonathan Daniel/Getty Images)

Years ago when I like 12 or something I was devastated to learn that Logan's Run had been canceled. I could not understand why the networks would cancel such an interesting show. It was years later that I learned somewhere that a certain number of TV shows have to be canceled in order to make room for the new shows that are in the pipeline.

When I first heard this I wondered, why kill off a successful show that people really like to introduce something completely new. I mean, isn't the show still scoring in the ratings? Well, apparently, to ensure that the networks always have good programs in development, they are always pumping money into new projects to produce pilots.

This way, when they need a new show to air, they already have something in development and they can just plug it into the prime-time lineup. Sometimes they have something really good in development that they have to bring along or they risk losing it to a competing network.

There are only so many days in the week. There are only so many time slots. Each network might be able to hand onto 40 or so shows, but the core 25 shows take up the bulk of the budget and all the choice time slots.

So what to they do when a new show has to come out of development or be lost? In these situations, they kill aWest Wing, saying the show had gotten too expensive anyhow, or that freeing up the money for this show allows the network to start filming on three pilots, and perhaps on a pilot to be named later.

Now some TV markets have more money than others, and some networks have more money than others. They all have those 25 core time slots, but not all of the can afford the most expensive programming to fill those slots. This is why there is always a certain amount of stupid stuff on TV.

Sometimes networks just decide that the entire lineup needs to be scratched because they have finished last in the rating for the sixteenth season in a row and they want to try something different.

So Logan's Run would not be the last time evil television networks and their advertising cohorts would frustrate my television viewing pleasures. In the ensuing years I would be robbed of Sports Night, News Radio, Ed, Firefly, West Wing, Life on Mars, The Unusuals, The Unit, The Agency, and Star Trek Enterprise, to name just a few.

Just when you think you really love a show, they yank it away from you. However, once in a while you can still see it in reruns on TBS or WGN, though it is never really the same.

Now, granted, some of these shows you might think about and say, 'hey, they could have gotten rid of that show a long time ago.'

I would live to have all my favorite shows on one after the other, all during prime-time, from Monday to Friday, but it is just not in the cards.

This is an ugly truth of the way the game works.  We can get upset about it all we want and blame this network owner or that program director, but very seldom does any complaining every matter.  If we ever want to see the next Lost, then we have to accept that something we already love is going to be lost.

Now, let's talk baseball...

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