We’ve spent a lot of time the past day or so on the WKNR/ESPN rumblings…here’s some of what else we missed:
NARDING IT: OMW hears that it’s official – “Nard” is taking the programming duties at CBS Radio Cleveland alt-rock/talk outlet WXRK/92.3 “K-Rock”. With Rover in the morning, and Opie & Anthony in afternoon drive, we thought it was time to officially add the “talk” to WXRK’s format description.
We’re reminded that Nard has been aboard at 92.3 for some five years, going back even into the station’s days in the “Jammin’ Oldies” format. Remember “Jammin’ Oldies”, kids? Nard does.
By the way, “K-Rock’s” website is advertising a future market visit from those afternoon shock talk hosts…and provides listeners with a way to sign up to get notification of the date for a local visit from “Opie and Anthony’s Traveling Virus”. No, we just write these things, we don’t come up with names…
WE REACH INTO BOARD ROOMS: OMW hears that your very own Mighty Blog of Fun(tm) was even mentioned at an “all staff” meeting at Canton’s WHBC/1480 – WHBC-FM/94.1, the NextMedia combo that has shown up here in rumors for the past few days.
And we’ve gotta give it to A) whoever asked about the sale rumors we’ve reported (we don’t know who it was…they are not even a source for us), and B) to WHBC management for even attempting to answer the question.
We’re told that station GM Rich Bossler said “we’re as much for sale today as we were the day Ted Boyd sold us to NextMedia in 2000″…but admitted that if NextMedia corporate had designs on selling either or both of the WHBC stations, the company probably would not tell even him.
The station blames the dismissal of news anchor/reporter Alan Zarek and engineer/IT guy Dan Mamone on long-time mandated budget cuts from NextMedia corporate…cuts that have been held off until now. This is consistent with what we’ve heard in recent days from other sources.
Once again, though these sale/resale rumors are pretty strong in the Canton market – we’re surprised we haven’t heard from every single person who works in that city, but it’s not far off – we have no concrete information that it’s happening. Still, when you take the national move by NextMedia to reduce its size by selling off other clusters, it sure makes sense that some sort of move would be made eventually in Canton…
MANCOW MOVE: It doesn’t directly affect Northeast Ohio. Yet.
But long-time WKQX/101.1 “Q101” Chicago morning man Erich “Mancow” Muller is officially leaving the Emmis Broadcasting alt-rock station. His last show on his current radio home in the Windy City is July 14th. The show will continue to be broadcast for affiliates of “TRN-FM”, and Mancow says he is actively seeking a new flagship in Chicago.
We seem to remember reports out of that city – sometime last year – that Mancow was supposedly negotiating with CBS Radio to replace Howard Stern on the company’s FM talker there, WCKG/105.9. If we’re remembering right, those talks fell apart. (We’re not altogether sure we remember correctly, but it seems to ring our memory bells.)
We’re not about to suggest that Mancow would be an automatic replacement for former Cleveland-based morning doggie Shane “Rover” French in Chicago – where he’s currently based as the man who DID take over for Stern on WCKG – but…we could see just how patient CBS Radio is with Rover…
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