Marriage, Dogs And Baseball

Don’t worry, you’ll figure out the connection…

SHE’S MARRIED AND STAYING: The question has been peppering our inbox for some time now.

Is Gannett NBC affiliate WKYC/3 morning meteorologist/host Hollie Strano now leaving the station after her marriage?

The question has come up not because Strano is now hitched, but because her new husband doesn’t live in Cleveland.

Hollie and Alex Giangreco got married over the weekend on the beach in Fort Lauderdale FL (Alex’s hometown).

And we do mean “on the beach”.

This is one of a number of wedding pictures the Channel 3 morning meteorologist/host posted on social media.

But relax, Hollie fans…she’s back on the air, newly married.

And according to Hollie Strano-Giangreco (as she said on the air coming back this week), she’s not going anywhere.

Her Twitter and Facebook presences have become a combination of serious weather warnings and wedding posts, and she’s assured her Cleveland viewers that she is not leaving Channel 3 News.

We don’t know if her new husband is coming to Cleveland, though we do presume he’ll become a regular on the Delta run from Fort Lauderdale to Cleveland if he does not.

Hollie Strano, as she’s still called by WKYC, is “Channel 3 News Today” morning meteorologist/co-host with John Anderson, and co-host of the station’s midday “Live on Lakeside”.

(One assumes changing her on-air name to “Hollie Strano-Giangreco” was a non-starter to the folks at 13th and Lakeside.)

She says they’ll have a “celebration in Cleveland in July”…and the actual honeymoon will be a few months away. We presume not during an important ratings period…

ROVER, ROVER, LET INDY COME OVER: Clear Channel rock/talk WMMS/100.7 morning chien Shane “Rover” French has expanded his rebuilt syndication roster again…with an unusual station.

Clear Channel sports WNDE/1260 Indianapolis has replaced Fox Sports Radio’s “Daybreak” show with “Rover’s Morning Glory”, and that’s far from the first time an FM drive time “hot talk” show has been placed in an AM station.

WJFK-FM/Washington DC-based hot talk duo “Don and Mike” had a long run on WJFK(AM) in nearby Baltimore, which was programmed in tandem with its FM “brother” station in DC…complete with then-CBS Radio syndicated morning drive star Howard Stern, now on SiriusXM.

The show, syndicated by (the original) Westwood One, showed up on a number of sports or talk AM stations over the years, including then-WERE/1300 in Cleveland and then-WANR/1570 in Warren.

The addition of WNDE brings Rover’s 3.0 syndication count to 7. 1.0 is the show’s original syndication by CBS (to stations like then-WAZU in the Columbus market), and 2.0 is the Howard Stern replacement era.

In that 2.0 era, the show gained its longest running affiliate – WZNE/94.1 “The Zone” in Rochester NY.

“The Zone” has run “Rover’s Morning Glory” longer than any station, including stations in Cleveland…as Rover and the gang started on CBS Radio then-alt rocker WXTM/92.3 “Xtreme Radio” before moving to WMMS. WZNE stuck around in the interim, even airing the show while WMMS had to wait to return it to 100.7.

But if you’re a long-time OMW reader, you know that you can find the Rover crew’s lunch menus while waiting to return to WMMS in our archives…

SPEAKING OF SPORTS: It’s definitely Tribe Time Now, at least on TV and radio.

Though it’s a bit early to call baseball’s Cleveland Indians “playoff bound”, and they’ve had some slumps, the local team has played well enough to warm the hearts of Fox Sports’ SportsTime Ohio.

The network sends along news of recent ratings successes, such as this note after a win this week vs. the Los Angeles-still-in-Anaheim Angels:

The game earned a 7.8 HH rating on SportsTime Ohio (over 115,000 households).

· The game peaked at an 9.86 HH rating.

· From 8:00pm until the end of the game, the average rating was a 9.0 HH rating.

· The game was #1 for the day.

Year-to-year, the Indians are up 14% on SportsTime Ohio.

We don’t have such detailed numbers for the Indians Radio Network, but Indians baseball raising flagship Clear Channel talk WTAM/1100’s ratings is as reliable as summer afternoon thunderstorms.

We’re curious to see if carrying all but a few games impacts FM flagship WMMS’ numbers…

EXTENDING A 250 WATT TRANSLATOR: Listeners in Canton and beyond who have trouble with 250 watt W259BW/99.7, otherwise known as Clear Channel’s “99.7, Canton’s New Country”, can now get the station without driving nearly to Whipple Avenue (or buying an HD radio).

If you’re hankering for Clear Channel’s “Premium Choice” country music format and the syndicated Nashville-based morning drive “Bobby Bones Show”, there’s another option besides the low-powered Canton translator now broadcasting from the tower that carries CC’s rock WRQK/106.9 and AC WHOF/101.7 “My 101.7”.

As promised, the company’s iHeartRadio digital platform now features the 99.7 programming worldwide, alongside pretty much any station, show or service Clear Channel produces.

The iHR placement brings 99.7 to computers, smartphones, tablets and other Internet-powered audio devices in Canton and well beyond, say, the Akron-Canton Airport.

And as we already reported, “home” for the 99.7 country format is actually WHOF’s HD2 sidechannel.

The FCC doesn’t allow translators, such as W259BW/99.7, to originate programming…so operators use HD2 sidechannels (or AM signals) to “home” the programming, even though the analog translator is promoted on-air.

It’s the same reason Clear Channel alt-rock W256BT/99.1, better known as “99X”, actually originates its programming (in the eyes of the FCC) on WMMS’ HD2 sidechannel…