True, but that is only the actual games simulcast on FM. The AM has many hours of ancillary Texans programming produced by the team itself, and the overall local sportstalk discussion on the AM leans heavily towards the Texans and the NFL.
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Does the Score finally hit fm
- Thread starter RadioRonnie285
- Start date
They should blow up KLOL. Put Sports on FM next door to the Country station.
KLOL's ratings are sinking like a stone, and Spanish language broadcasting is far from a core programming competency for Audacy.
The Sports format would be a top 3 performer in men 25 to 54 within a couple years of launching, it would cripple SportsTalk 790, and Sports on 101.1 would attract a higher income audience than current programming.
I think this is the beginning of the end for WMVP. It may take a few years, but I see most listeners (and teams) migrating to 104.3 while WMVP is abandoned for nationwide programming.
For the record: Audacy can't move "WBBM-FM" to another frequency because if they did take it off from 96.3, they will lose the right to keep the callsign. It falls under the licensing agreement from the 2017 CBS Radio/Entercom deal.
I'm not entirely sure that's the case, and even if it's what the letter of the agreement says, there's no reason the two parties couldn't revisit the arrangement.
But there's also no real reason to move the WBBM-FM calls to 105.9 this late in the game, is there?
For every practical purpose, 105.9 already *is* "WBBM" to anyone who's listening. Nobody but us cares about the quick bit of "wcfsandwcfshd1elmwoodpark" that blows by right before the top of the hour.
Nor, this late in the game, is there any real reason to return the WBMX calls to Boston. While there's some anecdotal evidence that national ad buyers didn't immediately understand that "WWBX" was the same station they'd been buying as "WBMX," by now you'd have the same issue switching Boston back.
My best guess? 104.3 becomes WSCR-FM because there's no good reason not to change the calls to match the format, just as Audacy has done over the years at KMOX-FM, WINS-FM, KNX-FM, etc.
If they think it's worth keeping the WBMX calls away from competitors, it's probably more likely they get parked out of market on some random AM than that they risk disrupting national sales by swapping out calls on 96.3 or 105.9.
And I still maintain that in 2026, we don't need callsigns at all and it's probably time for them to be deregulated out of existence.
Imagine if this was a few yrs. ago & the Chicago Bears contract with Audacy's WBBM was winding down, if The Score was on FM already, who knows, maybe they'd keep th...um DA Bears & possibly move the flagship to The Score with a FM frequency instead of going to WMVP.
You could be right, Scott.
I know we discussed this a year and a half ago when WCBS became WHSQ and we tried to offer some clarity. I may need to revisit that discussion.
The issue with all Spanish language stations in Houston is Nielsen's sample difficulties with Spanish dominants in the market. This is part of why Houston is not MRC accredited...
idk if someone here can answer this. But, wasn’t this supposed to happen last year? I remember Lance putting out an article before the 2024 football season that a Chicago FM would flip to sports or simulcast sports
One can wish Ryan Seacrest could explain what the infield fly rule is or talk any sports 🤣
Yes, he referenced it in his story today
Rumor Mill: Chicago Changes Coming This Week?
Image by Jennifer LaRueRadioInsight has learned that a pair of changes are likely to take place this week in Chicago.
radioinsight.com
I’d listen to that!
Personally, I'd wanna keep the call sign and along with any branding they have.....You're listening to 105.5 "The Platypus". It's bad enough that I still get from people: "I heard this song yesterday that went 'do diddle bop bop, dibbity dibbity poo-pah' Can you tell me the name of it?." OK, do you know what frequency/station it was on?" "It was on the radio...." "Yes, but what were the call letters...you, know WASS? KASS? the numbers that they ID themselves with?" "Oh, I don't remember, but I think the call themselves 'The Midgefly' or The 'Bullfart".....something like that" When I'm done tearing my hair out I tell them "You got a smart phone? Ask Jeeves, Siri, Alexi or Google or download Shazam or Soundhound, tap the button and hope they can ID it."
Station names are vastly more memorable than call letters.
Arbitron investigated this when they were trying to introduce their survey to Mexico. They found, with a comparison with the US 25 years ago, people in Mexico where few stations used call letters for promotion could remember twice as many stations as people in the US could. The US study differentiated between station names and call letters that could be pronounced, such as "Wixie" for WIXY.
Names are vastly more memorable, and that is why in most of the world they are not used at all on the air.
Yet in Chicago, the call letters of the heritage AMs and some FMs are ingrained in the minds of older listeners. Likely that's because they largely haven't changed. WGN, WBBM, WLS, WIND have all had those calls for over 100 years (about 96 for WIND). Even WFMT and WBBM-FM have been used for 60-plus years. This is a market very much unto itself. Such identification might not work elsewhere but it works here.
That’s what I would do if forced to make a choice.
And completely euthanize bottom feeder KFNC 97.5.
That raises the question as to whether Audacy, which is not a primarily Spanish language programmer, should continue with its Spanish language efforts in the face of such measurement issues, or leave that market segment to the likes of TelevisaUnivision, MediaCo and SBS and those companies core competencies, while returning to English on KLOL with an established SportsTalk format.
I don’t want to hijack the Chicago board any further with Audacy Houston discussion, but I will float this on the Houston board.
I think the WGR situation has been previously discussed on the Buffalo board. I don’t know much about Sacramento and KIFM.
Here's an opinion piece about the move of The Score to FM:
barrettmedia.com
670 The Score’s Move to FM Was Long Overdue but an Example for Others To Follow
"FM is not about changing content—it is about giving sports content the audience it deserves and can't find anywhere else."
barrettmedia.com
Yes, but like the one post says about older listeners....If someone mentions WGAR, the first thing that comes to mind for me is the old 1220 AM station, not the FM Country version. WHLO=Hello radio. WHK=Color Radio 14. WAKR=Wacker. WMJI=Majic-----although how they spell it drives me nuts. I guess I'm just one of those ones that remember call letters better than whatever branding name they go with. I'm sure there are others but they have slipped out of whatever's left of my mind.
And then there's the mnemonics that go along with call letters: WGAR for the founder George A. Richards and the ones that people come up with to remember them that aren't really official like, WBBM-World's Biggest Bowel Movement. WMMS-Weed Makes Me Smile. WLS-We Lick Scissors [when it really mean World's Largest Store or now World's Lost Stores]. You get the drift.......
But those stations you mention were "big" in the later 60's and 60's. The youngest listeners are around 80 now..
I'm from Cleveland a bit of a radio history buff, and I don't know that one.
Again, 70's and 70's stuff. Nobody in any sales demo would know anything about it... and nobody currently managing or programming those stations likely even knows about those identities.