How the New CBS Sports Radio affects Boston

[James Duffy]

I would agree with you on that point if NBC/Comcast has any way to back out
of the deal with their cindicater Dial Global.  If they cannot, it is worth
emphasizing a point I made in my original post;

Dial Global is the current national radio rights holder for The NCAA
basketball tournament, The NHL allstar game-Stanley Cup, The olympics and
most importantly, The NFL Sunday night/Monday Night football and
Playoff/Superbowl package.  I believe Dial Global has a significant
interest, or owns outright Compass Media Networks, which has individual
agreements with several NFL teams to distribute their radio broadcasts
nationally.  In the short term, this gives Dial Global the ability to twist
arms when it comes to clearacnce in markets they believe are vital.  I can
invision certain markets where affiliates are juggling at least two of the
existing sports networks like the original WEEI at 590 did with ESPN, Ron
Barr's Sports Byline and Yahoo/SNR, formerly known as One-on-One Sports and
way back when as Sports Entertainment Network.

The plan announced last week for the New NBC Sports Radio Network had them
launching two talk shows from 7pm to 1am early in 2013.  I could see a
sinario in which WEEI clears ESPN full time on 850 and clears the NBC shows
on a delayed basis over 93.7 in Boston and most likely the O and O stations
in Providence, Worcester and Springfield.

As a traffic manager once explained to me;

All a national network needs is to say they have an affiliate in a key city
in order to sell advertisers on buying spots.

From: Kevin Vahey [mailto:kvahey@gmail.com] 
Sent: Saturday, June 23, 2012 6:26 PM
To: James Duffy
Cc: Bob Nelson; boston-radio-interest@lists.bostonradio.org
Subject: Re: How the New CBS Sports Radio affects Boston

 

Once CBS starts full time service I can not see WBZ-FM keeping FOX Sports.

 

I would expect CBS to at least sniff at J.T the Brick and if so J.T. will
listen as he values Boston. 

 

Personally I think CBS will kill off what is left of Yahoo Sports (The
former Sporting News Radio) and NBC made reconsider their launch. 

 

On Sat, Jun 23, 2012 at 6:07 PM, James Duffy <jimduffy75@gmail.com> wrote:

I appreciate your insight very much.


"Some say Spanish on 101.7, some say conservative talk. Would they do
cons talk on 101.7 and Fox Sports on 1200? Or would they keep cons.
talk on both? Would they dare
run prog. talk (Ed Schultz supposedly says he will wind up on a bigger
station in Boston) on the AM maybe?"

Before these two new sports networks were announced, I thought it wouldn't
be that far fetched for CC to program a more adult leaning urban format
similar to WDAS in Philli.  WILD on 97.7 still got more of a 12+ rating than
WFNX, all be it in the diary days and 97.7 did not have the strongest signal
in WILD's target neighborhoods.  My thinking was based on the fact that the
101.7 facilities signal is a little easier to hear in WILD's original target
neighborhoods than that of 97.7's.  Harping on the premise of CC being a
cheap consollidater; They could easily get away with running Tom Joiner in
the morning, Michael Baisden in the afternoon and perhaps one local
personality in either mid day or evenings.  Throw in some additional public
affairs/news programming targeting the "urban" audience and they would be
serving the community 10 times as much as  Jam'n does now.  I believe Gwen
Blackburn still does the Minority Counter Point show for Kiss108 on Sunday
mornings so they could easily tap her as a resource.  I know the argument
will persist that advertisers will not be there, but I am not quite ready to
believe that Boston cannot sustain one full time radio outlet that provides
service to the black community.  On the other hand, CC was already burned by
failure when they tried Rumba on FM in Philli and that was with a
full-market facility.

"Would ESPN want the 1510"

They not only pulled the plug on EEI four months before 890 went on the air,
they lived with 890 for four years.  I was privileged enough to have a
conversation with an ESPN employee during that four years who told me the
network was strongly considering buying 890 outright.  In myopinion, for all
its weeknesses, the 1510 signal is extremely superior to 890 and 1400
combined.

-----Original Message-----
From: Bob Nelson [mailto:raccoonradio@gmail.com]
Sent: Saturday, June 23, 2012 5:24 PM
To: James Duffy
Cc: boston-radio-interest@lists.bostonradio.org
Subject: Re: How the New CBS Sports Radio affects Boston

As of now I would think WEEI would continue to simulcast on 850 for
ratings reasons but interesting ideas. The talk shows, etc. aren't
till January (sports updates begin in Sept.)


> That brings us to recent developments with Clear channel and a new
> possibility for speculation.  Does CC install FSR, which essentially
> is their in-house offering, on 101.7 or 1200?

Some say Spanish on 101.7, some say conservative talk. Would they do
cons talk on 101.7 and Fox Sports on 1200? Or would they keep cons.
talk on both? Would they dare
run prog. talk (Ed Schultz supposedly says he will wind up on a bigger
station in Boston) on the AM maybe?

  'EEI/Entercom could easily turn around and clear their sports
> network 24-7 in exchange for securing the play-by-play package for a
> long time to come.  Is Kraft still thinking of buying 1510 and leasing
> it to ESPN 24-7?  As much as the consollidators are desperate for
> cheap in-house programming, I just do not see how 5 national radio
> sports networks survive.

All interesting points. Would ESPN want the 1510 (they do have
93.7/850 overnights...
1510 would be a bit of a letdown from that, unless it ran on all of
them...) The World
Series on...1510 (only)??!? I can't see it.