Harding vs. Jones? How about 'War of the Rosies??

Decisions, decisions, decisions. I am torn between two topics. Time to be decisive. I will use both topics.

Professional football TV analyst John Madden has opted out of the last year of his contract with Fox in order to join ABC's "Monday Night Football." Mad-den and his partner Pat Sum-merall have for years covered the sport, first on CBS, more re-cently on Fox.

First, Summerall retired at the end of this season; now Madden has departed the Fox broadcast booth to join ABC. Poor John: Had he remained for the last year at Fox, his salary would have been $7.5 million. He has said the move isn't about money: His four-year contract with ABC pays a paltry $20 million, which should keep him off the welfare rolls.

ABC hopes the team of Madden and the current resident "Monday Night Football" guru, Al Michaels, will return the show to its astronomical audience ratings back when Don Meredith, Frank Gifford and Howard Cosell ruled the Mon-day night airwaves. Over the years ABC has hired and fired a combination of ex-football players to team with Al Mi-chaels. None survived.

TV networks dole out high-dollar deals to football commentators because they believe commentators attract viewers to football games. I believe they are wrong. "Monday Night Football" ratings are down, as are the ratings for Sunday afternoon football.

Gone are the days when most viewers watched football just because it was on the air.

When "Monday Night Foot-ball" was at its peak, prime time TV football was a novel experience. It wasn't the annoying personality of Howard Cosell that attracted viewers, it was new; it is no longer new. ABC's efforts to recapture the magic that supposedly existed between the original broadcast crew haven't worked. Viewers then were so desperate for football they watched, not because of, but in spite of, Cosell.

Most recently, ABC tried to raise ratings by teaming Al Michaels with stand-up comic Dennis Miller and former quarterback Dan Fouts, who was a good, knowledgeable commentator. Dennis Miller had nothing to offer. He was as out of place as a cobra at a mongoose convention. ABC believes Madden will return to those thrilling days of yesteryear, when football owned Monday night ratings. Had ABC asked for my opinion, I would have said that viewers don't watch TV broadcasters most of them watch games between teams they want to see play; otherwise, they watch something else.

It's clear that if John Madden doesn't bring up the ratings, like Dennis Miller, Dan Fouts and all the rest, he will be toast millionaire toast, but toast none-theless.

The second topic on the Rusty Saber agenda is the upcoming Fox (the same network that lost John Madden) celebrity TV boxing match between former figure skater Tonya Harding and Bill Clinton accuser Paula Jones.

A classy event indeed. It is hoped you have heard about it, so you know I'm not making this up. Harding's original op-ponent was to have been Amy Fisher, who as a teenager, shot the wife of her adult lover, Joey Buttafucco (I'm not making up this name, either).

Until this very moment, Ms. Fisher had never demonstrated even a modicum of good judgment in public, at least. Per-haps Tonya and/or Paula will exhibit enough judgment not to mention class to likewise cease and desist further participation in this degrading boondoggle.

If the bout is to go on, Paula should be on the lookout for a thug carrying a steel pipe. Nan-cy Kerrigan didn't; look what happened to her. If Fox is actually going to air this travesty, I hope viewers will have the good sense to turn it off.

However, if the show must go on, it should come as no surprise that I have some suggestions. Instead of Tonya Harding and Paula Jones going toe to toe, a match between Ms. Jones and Monica Lewinsky would make more sense. Think about it; these two have a LOT in common.

If the first fight is successful, a celebrity match could follow between Roseanne (I'm uncertain about her last name; it was first Barr, then Arnold I guess it's now just Roseanne) and Rosie O'Donnell. Pay attention here, it could be billed on TV as the "War of the Rosies."

Or, how about a match be-tween Rosie O'Donnell and Oprah? Both have popular daytime TV shows, and both have their own magazines. They could duke it out to see who is "Champion of Daytime TV." A match made in TV heaven!

(Joe McAdoo is former chairman of the communication department at Drury Un-iversity.)