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From today's San Francisco Chronicle, excerpted:

NBC: "American Dreams," "Committed," "The Office." Look for all of these to disappear. "American Dreams" has a loyal fan base and truly was a lucky bubble show in past seasons. But the luck has run out. NBC hasn't had much success with comedies, so it shot a lot of sitcoms. That doesn't bode well for "Committed," which was quirky by half, and "The Office," which pulled off a miracle by successfully Americanizing the British original while retaining its quality, yet ultimately ended up being too subtle and experimental for an American audience.

WB: "Jack & Bobby." Here's a quality show, critically acclaimed, but on the wrong network. That's a deadly and depressing combo. Nobody watched this story about two boys and their quirky mom -- with one of them growing up to become president. Very doubtful to return.

I do watch Jack & Bobby because I have a dual-tuner TiVo, and I would watch The Office but I can't. I don't think the problem is that the shows are too quirky, I think that they've been scheduled very, very badly.

The Office was normally aired against The Amazing Race, House, and even Veronica Mars. My two tuners picked up House and Race, leaving Office for those rare times when one of them wasn't on. It also didn't seem likely to lure ABC's viewers away from According to Jim - it's just not the same kind of comedy.

Jack & Bobby was even worse. Even following Smallville, it was normally aired against The West Wing (whose original executive producer, Tommy Schlamme, created Jack & Bobby; his wife Christine Lahti stars as the title boys' eccentric intellectual mom), Alias, the American Idol results show, and now it's on against Revelations. And that's after they moved it from Sunday Night at 8PM CT, when it was on against Law & Order: Criminal Intent, HBO's original series of the moment, the CBS movie, and lest we forget, Desperate Housewives. There were times that I had to catch it on WB's "Easy View" on Sunday afternoons at 5PM because of conflicts.

Network programmers seem to think that any show worth keeping around is going to hold its own in any time slot, but it's just not true. Fox was lucky in the early 1990s with The Simpsons. The network moved it to Thursday nights at 7PM CT against The Cosby Show, the #1 show in the land, to take it down a few pegs. Both shows survived, but that's rarely the case. A new show has almost zero chance of knocking off a top ten powerhouse in its own time slot, as ABC has found repeatedly by getting really good shows like Life As We Know It and sacrificing them to Survivor (and, before that, also Friends). If ABC had brains for next year, it would move Lost to Thursday nights at 7PM CT, forcing even people with two tuners to reject either NBC or CBS. But instead, they'll probably get another really good new show and put it there. Lost could handle that competition now - but it would have been dead on the island if it had premiered there.

Fox did the same thing with Family Guy three years ago - moving it around and putting it up against powerhouse shows so it was basically an animated sacrificial lamb to time slots the network couldn't win. The last few original episodes of Family Guy before this year aired opposite CSI and Will & Grace. Even people with TiVo had trouble following the show around the schedule. TBS and Cartoon Network put it on in a completely reliable time slot, and - what do you know! - the fans found it.

A show like Jack & Bobby cries out for easy scheduling in its early years. It should be on Monday nights at 7PM opposite Fear Factor and Nanny 911, though that would force the WB to move 7th Heaven, one of its few long-lasting hits. Even Tuesdays at 7 opposite NCIS and George Lopez would have been good. Sunday night may have seemed like a good bet until Desperate Housewives came along, but Wednesday night was never a good idea, even after Smallville.

It seems network executives are determined that any show make it wherever they place it, and that critical success is only something to use in ad campaigns. Critical success usually means "this show will make you a lot of money if you find the right time slot," but that involves more risk than most of them will take. They're willing to lose millions shooting pilots for innovative shows, but not to place them where they can thrive, or even consider it might be important.

And we pay for it with fewer shows like Jack & Bobby and more shows like According to Jim.