Rogers Media on Tuesday was strategically upbeat when unveiling its fall 2009 schedule to ad buyers in an offbeat year.

Mitch Dent, EVP of TV sales at Rogers, dismissed the industry gloom that hovered over earlier upfront presentations by CTV and Canwest Global Communications as he unveiled his network’s fall 2009 offerings at the Canon Theatre in Toronto.

‘The rhetoric is overblown and is not doing anyone any good,’ Dent said as Rogers’ Citytv and OMNI stations aim squarely this fall to expand their audience base in primetime against rivals CTV and Global Television with new and returning U.S. network series.

‘We are in the big-league sandbox,’ Dent said in the face of a slumping TV ad market as he touted a City fall schedule anchored by NBC’s The Jay Leno Show and other freshman series bought at the recent Los Angeles Screenings.

Rogers will stack the laughter from Jay Leno across all five nights of the week at 10 p.m. up against CTV’s popular investigative crime dramas and Global’s female-skewing dramas in the same 10 p.m. slots this fall.

The City stations will air 46 weeks of Leno over the upcoming year, hoping to remain fresh when CTV and Global go to repeats.

City will also strip Law & Order: SVU at 7 p.m. weeknights. Then the simulcasts start. Monday nights City will schedule two CBS comedies, How I Met Your Mother at 8 p.m. and the Jenna Elfman-starrer Accidentally on Purpose at 8:30 p.m., followed by the NBC medical drama Trauma at 9 p.m.

Tuesday night features two hours of NBC’s The Biggest Loser from 8 p.m. after it was acquired from rival Canwest Global.

In all, the City stations expect to air 16 hours of U.S. simulcasts weekly this fall. The network claims to have already surpassed Global in ratings, especially among women 25-54, as it guns for market-leading CTV.

For example, an all-new Wednesday comedy night this fall will feature NBC’s Parenthood drama at 8 p.m., followed by two ABC comedies, the mockumentary Modern Family at 9 p.m. and Cougar Town at 9:30 p.m.

City will go all NBC on Thursday nights with Community at 8 p.m., Parks and Recreation at 8:30 p.m., followed by two installments of 30 Rock from 9 p.m.

Finally, City scheduled ABC’s Supernanny on Friday nights at 8 p.m., followed by the returning Ugly Betty at 9 p.m.

Rogers also retooled weekends on City with Canadian offerings: Murdoch Mysteries goes at 7 p.m. Saturday nights, followed by the Nickelodeon animated series Glenn Martin, DDS at 8 p.m., Out There at 8:30 p.m and then a Canadian movie.

And NFL Football touches down on City Sundays in primetime, followed by Extreme Makeover: Home Edition at 8 p.m. The week then ends this fall with two Canadian reality series, My Rona Home at 9 p.m. and Conviction Kitchen at 10 p.m.