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Following Our Lead

DrAkbar

DrAkbar

Barry Young confirmed the obvious Tuesday morning: TMISU trashed two perfectly good stations and the latest ratings prove it! Late last summer Nurse Jeff and I questioned why they would turn 6~Twenty into a Sports Parking lot. The obvious thing to do was simulcast it with News 92~Three, where Hip Hop used to live, THEN use 6~Twenty for play by play. Six months later the Nurse and I STILL can't figure out what the Master Blogger is doing with KT'R-FM. Sometimes it's all news, sometimes it Toaster Talk, sometimes it's kindergarten programming, sometimes it's Larry King and sometimes it's sports play by play. What a mess. The Nearly Balled One is right...it's trashed!
 
Aunt Carlos is doing the deep insightful stuff today

"What is your favorite rock song?"

Gritty edgy radio to be sure.
 
Dr. Akbar said:
Barry Young confirmed the obvious Tuesday morning: TMISU trashed two perfectly good stations and the latest ratings prove it! Late last summer Nurse Jeff and I questioned why they would turn 6~Twenty into a Sports Parking lot. The obvious thing to do was simulcast it with News 92~Three, where Hip Hop used to live, THEN use 6~Twenty for play by play. Six months later the Nurse and I STILL can't figure out what the Master Blogger is doing with KT'R-FM. Sometimes it's all news, sometimes it Toaster Talk, sometimes it's kindergarten programming, sometimes it's Larry King and sometimes it's sports play by play. What a mess. The Nearly Balled One is right...it's trashed!
Click to expand...
The "Talk" genre in any form ('hot talk', 'news/talk', etc) has never been a success on FM, but for whatever reason the research that was done by TMISU concluded that taking their heritage AM station and moving it to FM while making the heritage AM into yet another sports station in this market would be a winning forumula. I think news/talk CAN be a success on FM, even though it never has been, however it's all about the content. Dr. Akbar is right on point when he says sometimes it's news, sometimes it's toaster talk, sometimes live play by play, sometimes it's kindergarten class(Gaydos I would presume, ugh).

KT'R needs to focus, either be a news/talk station or be "all news" or "all sports" or what have you. KFYI is a straight news/talk station, they NEVER have sports play by play, they never have blocks of "all news" with no listener interaction (because that's death), they don't do as much toaster talk as KT'R. For a while in 1999-2003 or so, KTAR was on the right track, they still had some awful hosts like Ded Simons and Preston NorthSouthEastWestmorelessland, the penultimate wishy-washy host, but they had the right idea. Now they lose badly in morning drive (as I told you they would for months when the FM ratings came out), because the same news stories looped for 3.5 hours + Aunt Carlos at 8:30 is a losing proposition. They lose badly in the midday hours, again Aunt Carlos (who could possibly have a pulse in the ratings but for his own horrid style and survey radio style) followed by a momentum killer Paul Harvey and a news block, then McBland for the afternoon nap. They lose badly in the afternoon drive because it's another block of the same news stories over and over. I know, it sucks, a show from Elay is beating you, followed by a show with potential with Kid and then absolute death wormed over with Gaydos. The lineup is miserable, the ratings bare it out. Decide what you want to do, do you want the Sun City crowd with McBland, do you want a shot at the key 25-54a crowd with people like Aunt Carlos, or do you want people to tune in for 6 minutes at a time with news loops, or would you prefer no one tune in with people like the self-indulgent Gaydos? It's so sad to see what's happened to KTAR.

As for the sports parking lot (I hope Dr. Akbar doesn't mind my usage of that), I am baffled at their continued choice of airing 4 hours of canned ESPN radio programming from 9a-1p, why not air the shows LIVE? I realize Dan Patrick and the political discourse of Keith Olbermann are something of a snooze and whine fest, but at least air them live, try to compete with Jim Rome and Bickley and MJ, ditch the morning show and go with Mike and Mike (I'm not a huge fan of syndication on sports talk in the morning, but given the alternative, it's something to consider). You're going to lose to Jacobs and Moratta in the afternoon, but at least you'll beat Jeff Dean from 1-3p with Gambo and Ash. The night time programming is moderately better than Xtra (at least until ESPN radio comes back on), so why not put up a fight?

To be fair, Snewz 92-3 is still in it's early stages and the numbers haven't all settled into place. This particular sample was not favorable toward news/talk in general in this market, however if the current lineup holds, Snewz 92-3 might be jealous of FREE-FM before long.
 
I still think it was a good idea to move news/talk to 92.3 and sports to 620, but TMISU for some reason decided to keep the geezer-talk as-is on FM. Bad move. Very bad move.

I've said it before and I'll say it again: Let Captain Stupor and Paul Harrrrveyyyyy move to the Clear Channel Retirement Home on 1230. Neither belongs on an FM station. Aunt Edna in Sun City listens more to that station than anything on FM anyway.

I don't have the problem with Ann Carlo that some do, but he'll never compete with Rush if he continues to be McBland Lite. I like the news blocks as well (Ded and Heidi aren't that bad) but they'd be much better without Harvey.

As far as sports on 620 goes, I like Mike & Mike as well, but a local morning show is here to stay. Doug Franz is OK at best so far, and Ron Wolfley is, well, Ron Wolfley. 23 concussions in a 10-year NFL career do cause dain bramage. ;D They won't compete with Bickley & MJ on XTRA but I don't think TMISU will be replacing them anytime soon.
 
Dr. Akbar said:
Barry Young confirmed the obvious Tuesday morning: TMISU trashed two perfectly good stations and the latest ratings prove it! Late last summer Nurse Jeff and I questioned why they would turn 6~Twenty into a Sports Parking lot. The obvious thing to do was simulcast it with News 92~Three, where Hip Hop used to live, THEN use 6~Twenty for play by play. Six months later the Nurse and I STILL can't figure out what the Master Blogger is doing with KT'R-FM. Sometimes it's all news, sometimes it Toaster Talk, sometimes it's kindergarten programming, sometimes it's Larry King and sometimes it's sports play by play. What a mess. The Nearly Balled One is right...it's trashed!
Click to expand...

Two trends and you're already having the funeral. You are a fool. I don't know if what KT'R is doing will work or not, but I hope it does so y'all will end up looking as stupid as you sound. ;)
 
micman said:
I don't know if what KT'R is doing will work or not, but I hope it does so y'all will end up looking as stupid as you sound. ;)
Click to expand...

Sounds like something Jim Cross would say!

The braintrust in Utah is none too happy with the staff over at K'TR, including Russ. They figure if one station can switch to FM and have decent ratings, then K'TR should be able to as well. The whole idea is a ticking time-bomb... and was doomed to fail right from the start.

You N. Central folk can defend it, hype it, push it down our throats all you want on this board. Fact is, it's not working... and unless they upgrade their programming "beating dead horse", nothing can save them!!!

McBland topic: What's your favorite K'TR station? 620 or 92.3? Ouch!
 
Can't take credit for that line as I'm not MicMan or OnCentral
 
Happy said:
The braintrust in Utah is none too happy with the staff over at K'TR, including Russ. They figure if one station can switch to FM and have decent ratings, then K'TR should be able to as well. The whole idea is a ticking time-bomb... and was doomed to fail right from the start.
Click to expand...

Is that why they just gave him a promotion?
 
JIMCROSS said:
Can't take credit for that line as I'm not MicMan or OnCentral
Click to expand...

And a hearty welcome to yet another staffer from one of our three
fave local stations--

KT'R (counting 92.3, 620 and 860 "The Loop" under the KT'R umbrella)
55/FYI
Lumberyard 1440

--as a poster here on the PHX radio board!
 
Russ Hill must be telling his staff to stick up for him on the board.

Its cute! :D
 
You can't see my screen name? You have one too. Remember when you signed up and named yourself legend?

LOL
 
Just takes time for listeners to follow. So don't pronounce KTAR FM dead just yet. They've got billboards, so that should help. I thought the AZ Republic story said Aunt Carlos would be an O'Reilly type, but so far he's talk lite. Maybe management is making him do survey radio? I'll take JD over "what song keeps playing in your head?"
 
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