KEY POINTS:
TV3 has been around for nearly two decades and even made headway in the overrated news rating wars, but somehow it retains that new kid on the block feel.
As for location, location ... put it this way. Tucked away as it is on a backstreet slope in Eden Terrace, TV3 has none of the lordly airs of its state-owned rival, which sits on a city hill.
Come September and October though, TV3 will plant its flag atop mainstream New Zealand life as the lone deliverer of the rugby World Cup matches. Sky, the modern day purveyor of all things sport, and TVNZ, the deposed king of this arena, will sit impotently on the sidelines.
It may not quite have sunk into the nation's consciousness yet that there will be no Nisbo, TJ, Drakey, Smithy or Mex bringing you the games when the World Cup rolls around.
TV3 could have farmed out the delayed World Cup rights to Sky, having formed a solid rugby relationship with the subscriber giant. But Sky attached itself to TVNZ's World Cup bid and was left marooned when TV3 won the nod from the IRB, who insist the major rights go to free-to-air broadcasters.
Enter Hamish McKay, TV3's run-of-play rugby commentator. Hamish - this is your time boy. Opportunity knocks.
McKay and World Cup-winning All Blacks Grant Fox and Alan Whetton, the expert comments men, will be centrestage as TV3 carries the entire live and replay action from Europe.
Whetton, by his own description, is more the jester in the pack. That will leave the respected Fox to carry much of the load as the heavyweight analyst, although on the evidence of his newspaper columns, he is extremely reluctant to cast any criticism at his old coach Graham Henry. Time will tell if Fox faces tests on this score, and what his response will be.
It's all part of the World Cup intrigue, although TV3's rugby coup seems to have escaped most people's attention so far.
"It's officially been TV3's since December 2005 but I still don't think people have realised that," says McKay, as we sip coffee near the TV3 headquarters.
"I've got really good mates who say to me 'But you guys won't actually be doing the commentary will you?'
"I say to them 'How often do I have to friggin' tell you ... "'
When we meet, McKay - who lives in Meadowbank with his wife, Sarah, and three children aged three to seven - was still sweating from gym exertions.
But the burly 41-year-old with a ready-made anchorman's face, steadfastly refuses to break into a sweat over the looming World Cup, where his work has the potential to provoke extreme public reactions - good or bad - he has not faced before.
When I suggest that tonight's final Tri-Nations clash between the All Blacks and Wallabies represents a handing-over of the microphone, he good-naturedly concedes this brings home the enormity of his task.
Nothing will match the pressure on Graham Henry and the All Blacks of course. But the TV3 commentary team will also be under the spotlight, especially as it is fronted by a lead commentator unfamiliar in the role to much of the audience.
McKay has been in on the World Cup act from the beginning.
He was part of a five-person TV3 team, headed by MediaWorks chief executive Brent Impey, which put the station's bid to the IRB in early 2005.
From 2000 to 2005, TV3 held delayed rights to major rugby in this country. This was, for the TV3 commentators, a live experience, although the audience only heard their work up to 20 hours later.
It was also a major step in the rugby-loving McKay's broadcasting career.
He was brought up in Apiti, near Feilding, boarded at Palmerston North Boys High, and worked on his family sheep and cattle farm for five years after leaving school.
After starting a history degree, he then completed the 1990 Wellington Polytechnic's journalism course frustrated with the feeling he'd been pigeon-holed as a rural type whose early media footsteps should be heard only in provincial newspaper rooms.
McKay already had his eye elsewhere. He had fallen in love with the commentary idea as a kid when listening to Keith Quinn calling the All Blacks' 1978 Grand Slam tour.
The pivotal moment was Quinn's call of Andy Dalton's try in a dramatic win over Ireland.
"I was 11 or 12, and went to bed thinking, 'I'm not sure about playing this game, but I wouldn't mind doing that'," he says.
But after journalism school, the path to joining Quinn and co in commentary boxes appeared muddled. So McKay headed to teacher training college, only to hear shortly later that 2XS had broken Radio New Zealand's monopoly of local rugby rights. McKay, who'd played a couple of seasons as a senior club prop for the Oroua club, trundled into the office of the station boss and asked for a rugby opportunity.
"The guy looked at me and said Johnsons Park, Feilding, 2.45, Saturday. Be there. I want reports every 15 minutes. They'll be sponsored by such and such. Then he gave me a big brick cellphone," says McKay.
"Within six months I was their breakfast sports anchor. I got a teaching diploma, finished my degree and started my radio career all in the same year, which was a pretty amazing time."
His journey has included more than 100 radio match commentaries for various stations, including Auckland's ZB, about 40 delayed-coverage tests for TV3, and working as the straight guy in a zany travel show alongside the laddish Matthew Ridge and Marc Ellis. Nowadays, he is a familiar screen presence as TV3's sports presenter/reporter, but commentary always looms large.
A favourite memory came at the Hong Kong sevens, when he was selected to call the final.
The late Gordon Brown, the former Scottish and Lions lock, broke the good news.
"I heard this massive booming voice. 'Haaaamish, oh my God boy, you've got the final.' Then he gave me a big bear hug," recalls McKay.
"Gordon was there as a comments man. He adored Manawatu from his time as a Lion and I was the Manawatu boy. He was so excited for me."
As for bad commentary moments - they don't seem to exist in McKay's world.
"You've got to move on," he says, and he is about to, big time.
In short, the jumbled components of a master plan have come together for McKay.
He will call between 13 and 16 games at the World Cup, which is spread around 10 French cities plus Cardiff and Edinburgh. McKay aims to continue presenting the TV3 sports news from France on two or three nights a week during the 44-day tournament.
He says TV3 is determined to relay the French flavour of the event, including hiring a studio venue with views of the Eiffel Tower and Arc de Triomphe. His initial call will be the opener between France and Argentina. After a "quick kip" and a three-hour high-speed train trip, he will call the All Blacks' match against Italy in Marseille 14 hours later.
Studio commentaries away from the actual grounds are a no-no, he says emphatically.
He has already contemplated what to say at the magical moment should the All Blacks win the Webb Ellis Cup. The drama of the occasion, he hopes, will inspire the right response. I forget to ask if he's thought about the words to describe another sort of All Black finish.
McKay says: "Reading the 6 o'clock sports news will be an absolute doddle compared to this. The pressure is pretty big.
"All media polarises people but if you worry about that stuff, it's time to let someone else do the job.
"Maybe we were a bit more lighthearted with the delayed coverage. There might have been the odd game where we talked it up a bit even though it was rubbish, although I don't think we went over the top.
"But when we secured the World Cup rights, there was a very clear directive that this thing is gold and we'll treat it that way. The rugby public is too intelligent for anything else.
"The All Blacks can help us of course by winning. If they lose, people will say the commentary was bloody terrible. They'll be looking for something to blame. My role is to be as accurate as possible."
TV Cover
* TV3 will have a team of 30 at the World Cup
* They will cover all 48 games live
* Apart from the news coverage, TV3 will also broadcast half-hour shows at 7am and 11pm each day.
