WTAM 1100 Host Jimmy Malone Exits As iHeartMedia Cuts Continue
"They fired me after my show today and didn't give me a chance to say goodbye to my listeners."
barrettmedia.com
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Jimmy Malone out at WTAM
- Thread starter skiwest
- Start date
barrettmedia.com
I didn't even know he was at WTAM. Last I heard was that he had a weekend show on WMJI.WTAM 1100 Host Jimmy Malone Exits As iHeartMedia Cuts Continue
"They fired me after my show today and didn't give me a chance to say goodbye to my listeners."
Unfortunately, it's just another example of media companies cutting long time personalities in order to hire younger talent at a lower pay rate to attract younger listeners and maintain advertisers.
Jimmy deserved better. He could have been allowed to say goodbye on the air.
With the exception of 106.7 in Atlanta after the KLove announcement I have not heard of a news or talk station letting someone on the air after they fired them. When a format flip happens on a music station sometimes the air staff gets to work their last shift. If a contract doesn't get renewed maybe but called into the office and canned your lucky if they let you clean out you desk without security watching.
Agreed. Very seldom are on-air personalities given the opportunity to say goodbye, like in the case of Trapper Jack and Jim McIntyre on WDOK, as they announced on air that their contracts were not being renewed and that they will be departing in the next few days. Long time personalities are usually allowed if they are retiring or moving away. This was just mean spirited of iFar...I mean iHeart Radio.
Translation: Hire beginners who come dirt cheap and will never express an original thought. That is, if they hire people at all, and don't just plug in a network.
A couple mornings ago (literally) I heard him complain about how he wished he could take phone calls from listeners over the air but wasn't allowed to. I guess he was too "liberal" for iHeart's management? I'm betting on adding that additional hour of Beck because it's cheap dirt - although I wonder if the amount of commercial time they sell during that slot justifies keeping it local? Maybe extend the morning show one more hour?
Rob was Geraldo's producer and took over after Geraldo left. Then he became Jimmy's producer. My take is that Jimmy's views were not consistent with the other hosts. Not sure about Rob. They seem to want that hour of post-morning drive to stay local.
I think you're right about Jimmy's ideology, although it's not about management, but what the audience expects. I imagine the station got complains that Jimmy didn't fit with the other hosts. Which may also explain why they didn't want him to take calls. It's possible they sell that hour with the morning news shift. Therefore it has more spots than would be allowed with a syndicated show.
Quite frankly, management should have let him take calls. Would have been fun to hear him spar with people who disagreed with him. As - I believe - the only black talk host on a station like WTAM, management might have also been afraid of racist calls.
They would have good reason to do that:
Denver radio host gunned down by white supremacists | June 18, 1984 | HISTORY
Talk radio host Alan Berg is gunned down and killed instantly in the driveway of his home in Denver, Colorado, on June 18, 1984. The 50‑year‑old host, whose show on the station KOA gained a strong following in the early 1980s, stirred up controversy with his outspoken personality and liberal...
www.history.com
Keith Kennedy is the boss over there and he is anything but right wing conservative if you ever seen him post anything on his social media. He is a liberal. My guess it is simply it is cheaper to air Glenn Beck and as others said it is what people expect on WTAM being mostly conservative radio. He just didn't fit in. Greg Brinda is also liberal but he generally sticks to sports whereas D Man is conservative and ventures into politics at times.
Segments from the WTAM show (and earlier when the show aired on WARF) were repurposed for the WMJI Saturday show. That was dropped not long ago and Keith Kennedy has had a 10-hour Memorex shift on Saturday for awhile.
The older hosts fit the old-skewing demo WTAM now commands, and it's not like Bloomdaddy and D-Man are spring chickens themselves.
Jimmy also has [or had, don't know if he's still doing it] a very successful career in real estate that probably made him a hell of a lot more money then what he made in radio. The old Lanigan show, they were always making fun about how huge his place was. I'm not sure what they meant by "huge" but when I went by it once it did take me most of their air shift to drive from one end to the other.
I can see them eventually having one person responsible for the whole state and out west where some of the states have smaller populations, being responsible for two or three states.
This morning, Wills was on for one more hour. Not sure if that is permanent or just until they figure out what they want to do.
My take is they need to keep the hour local. They make more money with local, and likely sell the entire 6 to 10AM block together.
Starting Glen Beck one hour early means they can't run as many commercials, thus lose money.
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