Thanks to a deal brokered between Bangor low power television station WBGR (Channel 33) and the Fox Network, WBGR has secured local rights to numerous pro sports including the NFL, Major League Baseball, and the NHL for the next three years.

The deal, which officially takes effect this week, nets WBGR, a Warner Brothers affiliate located in Glenburn, local TV rights to the Fox baseball game of the week, five divisional playoff games, at least four National League Championship Series games, and at least four World Series games this fall.

“We had talked about this in the past and kicked it around but nothing ever came of it,” said WBGR owner-general manager James McLeod. “But Dan Cashman, a guy who works part-time for us, suggested it again and made a call and things just took off. I guess the timing was right on all sides.”

WBGR will also air all Fox football programs including weekly NFC pregame shows, all the network games in the 17-week regular season schedule – which includes nine doubleheaders, one Thanksgiving Day game, and two Saturday games – plus five postseason contests (one NFC wild card, two divisional playoffs, the NFC championship, and the Super Bowl.

“It’s kind of neat because it’s Super Bowl 33 on Channel 33,” McLeod quipped.

In hockey, WBGR will air all Fox weekly regular season games of the week from February through April plus an undetermined number of conference quarterfinals, semifinals, finals, and Stanley Cup finals games.

In addition, WBGR will carry Fox sports specials such as the Cotton Bowl, the World Cup of Golf, skiing, Grand Slam Skating, and the Toshiba Tennis Classic.

And what does this mother lode of sports programming cost? WBGR has agreed to pay $20,000 in the first year of the deal, which calls for undetermined escalating fees each of the next two years.

It’s quite a step up for a station that started out showing cartoons and old westerns on most of its program schedule when it first went on the air three years ago.

“It’s been a very, very strange summer. We’ve seen some tremendous things falling into place. I’m enjoying it so far,” McLeod said with a laugh. “It sure beats the previous two summers we’ve had. I’m finding I’m much more keen on growth management than crisis management.”

With all the polls, talk shows, and newscasts already devoted to the current Monica Lewinsky-Bill Clinton scandal, do we really need local sports stations getting into the act too?

Ever since its debut several weeks ago, Bangor all-sports (at least until last week) station WZON’s “Question of the week, ” has dealt with sports-related topics from the Mo Vaughn-vs.-Red Sox saga and Antoine Walker’s impending free agency to a poll to determine listeners’ favorite Red Sox announcer.

With all the current sports controversies and events going on internationally, nationally and locally – which present a veritable cornucopia of sports topics – do we really need yet another in a long line of presidential polls – on an all-sports station no less?

It’s bad enough when Sports Illustrated goes on a crusade against clearcutting or the disappearing rain forests with long feature stories better-suited for the pages of National Geographic.

Leave the politics to all-talk stations like Boston’s WRKO or Bangor’s WVOM.