Diminishing sports talk radio talent

Funny as soon as I saw that article dealt with South Florida I figured Sid Rosenberg's name would come up. Sure enough it did. I just don't see how this guy continues to get jobs in radio. He has to have pictures on the whole industry.

 

Its radio. Its full of scumbags and has beens (for the most part). Even in New York, there is a lot to be desired. 1050 is a pea-shooter signal that is basically just an outlet for ESPN to say we're in New York. I think Michael Kay maybe the best thing on that station (shudder).

On the FAN, its what? Joe and Evan? Don't think so. Tub-bo in the afternoon? Maybe for a segment. I like Steve Sommers, but his schtick gets old after a while.

 

Some great points here. With the money dwindling in radio, you don't have too many stations with the time and energy to market and build up big names -- because even if you did, they'll never get that big. I'm still amazed that someone in Chicago is willing to pay Dan McNeil half a mil. Does he really draw that much advertising traffic to pay his salary?

Figure, too, that the number of sports radio stations has exploded because it's a cheap format, if you want it to be. Used to be you had a few sports shows carved out on stations, and then the all-sports stations put a premium on airing games as well. There isn't enough talent for Indianapolis to two all-sports stations, much less three. Sheesh, Chicago only has two. (And at least they tailor for a specific audience -- the ESPN outlet as a mix of local and national, and the Score not interested in anything that happens outside the Chicagoland area.)

 

Pretty much agree. Kay is great if your are a Yankee fan. Otherwise too much sticht. Joe and Evan make me want to drive off the road. Sommers is best thing on FAN. I love his monologue and beginning of program. Call me crazy but Boomer and Carton have grown on me. Agree that Francesa is good for a segment or two.

My favorite listen is Patrick because he gets the best guests. Mad Dog is ok but callers where me out.

 

There are two things saving AM radio right now: The news/(right-wing) talk format, and sports. If you've got an AM signal, you're probably going to pick up some hybrid of those two formats.

And both formats are super-cheap -- lots of available syndicated programming out there. Of the news/talk stations in Indy (two of which are now on FM), one is mostly local and the other two have a combined one local program.

Of the three sports stations, two of the three carry satellite content 21 hours a day. One of them is locally-owned, but the other is Clear Channel. It seems their only raison d'etre is for play-by-play, and the rest of the content minus the afternoon drive shows is filler (two Div. I colleges in town, two major pro teams, minor-league baseball team, major racing circuit based in town, plus enough MLB teams nearby to pick up their games).

It's likely that is a common format elsewhere. I see a lot of small-market stations branded as "ESPN ..." and the only non-syndicated content they air is some local HS or college sports. Some don't even do that.

The trend in radio is toward nationalization -- the reason there are so few good hosts is that there are so few stations that even bother with locally-produced content anymore. It's much cheaper to buy ESPN programming or Sean Hannity than it is to hire and train a good local voice. Even music formats can be voice-tracked and don't need a live person in the studio. My broadcast partner once was the afternoon drive guy for three stations (with three different formats) at the same time. Live sports are predominately either time-buys (produced by the teams themselves) or done by freelancers.

 

Astonishing love for DLB in those comments.

Miami and Atlanta . . . the two great major-market wastelands for sports radio in this
country . . . not at all surprising, really . . .
areas which don't support consistent, top-flight local attractions at the gate when
and how they should. Oblivious.

 

Mark Patrick did a great job when he was in "the big chair" on XM Baseball this Morning with Larry Bowa and Buck Martinez.

Show has not been any good since he left.

 

Anyone from Beantown comment on the battle (?) between the sports hub and WEEI? For a major market, the talent at EEI leaves a lot to be desired.


One annoying thing about all sportstalk is the :20 updates from say 9 am through 6pm. If I want to know a late score, I already got it by the time I go to work. There is nothing during the day that I need to be informed of, say a piece of news, i.e. Tiger's car wreck.

 

The two Boston talk stations are almost identical, except that the morning hosts on the new show are veteran morning DJs, not sports guys. Doesn't hurt 'em a bit.
Both stations are too cheap to pony up for a traffic report service, so I listen until I realize what a waste of time that is -- usually around 45 seconds or so. Sometimes something really grandly insanely stupid will be going on, but not often enough.