New York Daily News The first step toward recovery, according to self-help lore, is admitting you have a problem. As a troubled network, ABC may not be ready to admit it - but it's certainly acting like it's trying to fix things, and trying almost anything in the process. Its acquisition of the USA Network detective series "Monk," which will have a four-week run on ABC starting at 9 Tuesday night, is a startling, unexpected move. Equally unexpected was ABC's other recent announcement, that it was bypassing Disney's Buena Vista TV arm to enter into a two- year agreement with HBO Independent Productions. These follow ABC's July presentation before the nation's TV critics, where the network described its new fall slate as viewer-friendly rather than groundbreaking.

ABC Entertainment executives Lloyd Braun and Susan Lyne said that it was viewers, not critics, that the network was aiming to please, as if the two camps were mutually exclusive. And yet, the USA Network's "Monk" and HBO's output - from "The Larry Sanders Show" and "The Sopranos" to "Sex and the City" and "Six Feet Under" - have been enormously popular with critics. Tony Shalhoub as Monk, the detective struggling with a grief-induced obsessive- compulsive disorder, is better than any drama on ABC's fall schedule. That would sound harsh, except "Monk," pretty much, is better than any drama on any broadcast network's fall schedule. "Monk" is that much fun to watch, and those who haven't discovered it should pounce on the opportunity to see "Monk" on ABC. A year ago, the idea of "repurposing," the TV business's term for giving network shows such as "Charmed" subsequent exposure on cable, was envisioned as a new source of revenue. It fizzled.

Now ABC is trying the same trick in reverse, acquiring reruns of "Monk" for a fraction of what the show would cost to produce, and giving viewers something new - or almost new - to watch during the summer. These days, ABC is throwing everything against the wall, hoping that something sticks. "Monk" isn't the only unusual program form getting a monthlong tryout on ABC. "Widows," an Americanized remake of a 20-year-old British miniseries, is running on Tuesdays during August, and ABC's fifth prime-time nonfiction miniseries of the summer, "ICU," began Wednesday. (The others, for the record: "The Hamptons," "Boston 24/7," "Houston Medical" and "State v.," all in June.) In late night, Jimmy Kimmel, co-host of Comedy Central's "The Man Show," may have gotten the post-"Nightline" gig in that same anything-goes spirit. Get shows from HBO and the USA Network? Why not? Hire talent from Comedy Central as the new voice of ABC? Why not? As they say in the old movies, it's crazy, but it just might work. And with Fox nipping at ABC's heels, anything beats the network's lethargic status quo.