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LOCAL SPORTS TALK

Y

yonkstur

Guest
Last night while driving home, I heard the ESPN
WEJL/WBAX local sports show with Bob Fawcett and a
few Times reporters. They read an e mail from a guy
in Dunmore who said that during the biggest sports
week of the year, instead of running a nationally
recognized sports show dealing with the major topic
of the week (Super Bowl) the station was talking about
local high school athletes. The e mailer suggested
that the 43 people interested in local high school
sports would tune in on a Saturday morning and
suggested the station stick with national, more
professional programming during drive time. I have
to confess that when the local show is on Mondays and
Fridays, on my way home, I tune it out because I have
no interest in a local swim meet or high school football
hero. (When I subbed at Hanover and a friend's relatives
were at Vallley View, I had an interest but not now).
Putting aside the "serving the community-meeting local
needs" arguement, here's the question: what's more
appealing, a national show dealing with a hot topic or
a profile of a 16 year old cager from East Sturgis???
Any thoughts?
Yonkstur
 
> Last night while driving home, I heard the ESPN
> WEJL/WBAX local sports show with Bob Fawcett and a
> few Times reporters. They read an e mail from a guy
> in Dunmore who said that during the biggest sports
> week of the year, instead of running a nationally
> recognized sports show dealing with the major topic
> of the week (Super Bowl) the station was talking about
> local high school athletes. The e mailer suggested
> that the 43 people interested in local high school
> sports would tune in on a Saturday morning and
> suggested the station stick with national, more
> professional programming during drive time. I have
> to confess that when the local show is on Mondays and
> Fridays, on my way home, I tune it out because I have
> no interest in a local swim meet or high school football
> hero. (When I subbed at Hanover and a friend's relatives
> were at Vallley View, I had an interest but not now).
> Putting aside the "serving the community-meeting local
> needs" arguement, here's the question: what's more
> appealing, a national show dealing with a hot topic or
> a profile of a 16 year old cager from East Sturgis???
> Any thoughts?
> Yonkstur
>

I applaud the WEJL/WBAX effort to do something, anything local, but the show really lacks strong personality. WARM's Ron Allen was an easy guy to hate, and that's what made his show work. Even if you didn't care about the local topics, his personality was engaging enough to keep you listening. I thought he phoned it in during his later years, but when Ronzo was on his game, there was none better.
 
Local sports, as in high school, is a snoozefest. It interests the parents of the kids involved and the over-zealous "wish I was still in high school" crowd, the ones who show up at their alma mater's football games on Friday nights who are 48 years old and paint their faces and stand near the locker room to watch the team come out after halftime so they can scream something encouraging. And that's it. My guess is not even the kids involved care as much if their names get mentioned on the radio as their "fans" do.

Stations carrying local high school programming may think they're doing the community a service. They are doing a part of the community a service, but it's a small part. If they're carrying local high school programming because it's an easy sell, well it is, but not at a premium rate.
 
> > Even if you didn't care about the local topics,
> his personality was engaging enough to keep you listening.
> I thought he phoned it in during his later years, but when
> Ronzo was on his game, there was none better.

You are so right. I learned more about sports I didn't
care about just because of the way Ron presented them.
The bigger the sports story, the better he got. I swear
there were times he'd say something controversial about
a high school just to get a reaction. Bob Fawcett tries,
but there is only one Ron Allen.

Yonkstur

>
 
>My guess is not even the kids involved care as
> much if their names get mentioned on the radio as their
> "fans" do.
Having subbed in a high school, you are correct in
that assumption.
>
>
> If they're carrying local high school programming because it's
> an easy sell, well it is, but not at a premium rate.
>
And you can make the easy sell arguement too. Because the
market is so "local", (Hanover vs Nanticoke) or (Valley View
vs. Lakeland) you have to narrow your sales scope to one
area. Because the rate is low, you have to do this for every
high school game. Even if you try to sell a whole package, the
dollar amount isn't that impressive. The old "rah rah, be true
to your school" pitch wasn't cutting it when I was involved in
sales. It was harder than it looked due to many social and
economic factors.

Yonkstur
 
> >My guess is not even the kids involved care as
> > much if their names get mentioned on the radio as their
> > "fans" do.
> Having subbed in a high school, you are correct in
> that assumption.

I agree to a certain point. This market is different from others in that high school sports is king in some neighborhoods. Drive through Pittston on a Friday afternoon. Drive through Kingston or Plymouth. Even people who have no kids in school have Pittston Area or Wyoming Valley West colors out on their front porches. When WARM carried the Valley West/Berwick football game a few years back every single business on the West Side had that game on the radio. Granted, some of these people fall into the "high school has-been" catgory, but still-----The market is out there.
 
> > >My guess is not even the kids involved care as
> > > much if their names get mentioned on the radio as their
> > > "fans" do.
> > Having subbed in a high school, you are correct in
> > that assumption.
>
> I agree to a certain point. This market is different from
> others in that high school sports is king in some
> neighborhoods. Drive through Pittston on a Friday
> afternoon. Drive through Kingston or Plymouth. Even people
> who have no kids in school have Pittston Area or Wyoming
> Valley West colors out on their front porches. When WARM
> carried the Valley West/Berwick football game a few years
> back every single business on the West Side had that game on
> the radio. Granted, some of these people fall into the "high
> school has-been" catgory, but still-----The market is out
> there.
>
Very true, it's just that unlike years ago, these are no
longer slam dunk (forgive the sports analogy) sales and
take a lot of work and cooordination in an era of voice tracking
and revolving sales reps.
On a somewhat related note, it appears Bold Gold Media will now
air Red Barons game on WICK again and no longer on the FM.

Yonkstur
 
<<Last night while driving home, I heard the ESPN WEJL/WBAX local sports show with Bob Fawcett and a few Times reporters>>

don't you mean JOBY fawcett, wonkstirr?
 
> Last night while driving home, I heard the ESPN
> WEJL/WBAX local sports show with Bob Fawcett and a
> few Times reporters. They read an e mail from a guy
> in Dunmore who said that during the biggest sports
> week of the year, instead of running a nationally
> recognized sports show dealing with the major topic
> of the week (Super Bowl) the station was talking about
> local high school athletes. The e mailer suggested
> that the 43 people interested in local high school
> sports would tune in on a Saturday morning and
> suggested the station stick with national, more
> professional programming during drive time. I have
> to confess that when the local show is on Mondays and
> Fridays, on my way home, I tune it out because I have
> no interest in a local swim meet or high school football
> hero. (When I subbed at Hanover and a friend's relatives
> were at Vallley View, I had an interest but not now).
> Putting aside the "serving the community-meeting local
> needs" arguement, here's the question: what's more
> appealing, a national show dealing with a hot topic or
> a profile of a 16 year old cager from East Sturgis???
> Any thoughts?
> Yonkstur
>
I guess nobody can win. If they do something local they get trashed for not doing something off the satellite. If they run the satellite they get trashed for not being "live & Local". Guess I'll go read a book.
 
Where it belongs. At least they can concentrate on their FM format and not trainwreck at 7pm every night for three hours. Plus, I might get it a little better now.


> On a somewhat related note, it appears Bold Gold Media
> will now
> air Red Barons game on WICK again and no longer on the
> FM.
 
> I guess nobody can win. If they do something local they get
> trashed for not doing something off the satellite. If they
> run the satellite they get trashed for not being "live &
> Local". Guess I'll go read a book.
>
There used to be a really neat live local sports show on the former Hazleton radio station WAZL from a restaurant that featured local coaches and players in live interviews. Is this kind of show still on the air anywhere?
 
I can only speak for my own station, WPPA in Pottsville, Saturdays at 9AM... only because high school sports is as big as Texas down here.

Does Rob Neyhard still do his Saturday show on WILK, or is that just during football season?
 
> don't you mean JOBY fawcett, wonkstirr?

Yes, I stand corrected. Joby, not Bob.
Yonkstur
>
 
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