Who knows; "Hokey Wolfe" has had to face some lousy ratings before and kept his job. WEEI probably makes money; WRKO must be doing half decently enough so that they haven't dropped talk yet
(what would replace it, foreign lang.? true oldies?) Howie under contract till next fall; not sure about
Finn and Fein, etc.
Looking at the ratings, first there's the 6+ you'll find here at radio-info: Given a couple instances
of stations being tied, WEEI-FM comes in at 11th place. Cume slightly down from Nov. RKO is about 15th or so, and yes if the ratings keep dropping they may be in Talk 1200 territory! Would they bail on talk,
or at least on Wolfe?
As for men 25-54, look at this Finn column
http://www.boston.com/sports/touchi...cond_in_fall_weei.html?camp=misc:on:twit:tatb
It's mentioned ZLX #1, then 98.5, then EEI in that demo. Of course note that this is a three month
"book", Oct 15-Dec 7, not a one month period. EEI moved from 8th to 3rd in the demo. (Finn notes
that the book counts both the 850 and 93.7 signals as one). D&C didn't win their slot but did move
up. Midday show went way up, with Mut and Merloni moving from 13th to third. (Gresh and Zo
finished second BUT the rating was higher than last period). WEEI's addition of FM showed other
improvements in other slots, too.
98.5 still rules the roost but EEI has moved up --which, fans of "Mike", will explain why the station
that played "everything" had to go away. The need to shore up WEEI.
So who knows if Ent. would get rid of Wolfe.
I don't know how RKO did slot by slot or overall in 25-54s (looking to see if Herald or Globe did a breakdown on these)
btw just after the new year we sometimes hear about how much $$$ stations in town made. I'm
sure both 98.5 and EEI brought in a lot of money. Maybe enough to justify RKO keeping talk
even if ratings aren't spectacular. EEI also has network stations across New England to get more
money. 98.5 has a very solid signal but so far (other than syndicating Pats and B's games) there is
no "Sports Hub Radio Network"...
Both sports stations are prob. doing well; as far as play by play, Entercom seems stuck with
also-ran teams (but we'll hold out hopes for Bobby V's Sox and Doc's Celts) while 98.5 has the
Stanley Cup Champions and Brady & Belichick's bunch. But even if the Sox don't make the playoffs
they still have many people tuned in...