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WEPN 98.7 To Be Sold Next Year?

Nathan Obral said:
There might be a dark horse candidate with a lot of cash to burn that we don’t know about, or maybe not. But its not practical to just assume GKB is a fait accompli for 98.7.
Click to expand...

I can think of a few. The most obvious is EMF looking to take over another prime commercial signal in Market #1 to grow their NYC cluster and expand their empire.

Or another religious operator. There seem to be a few that are on buying sprees these days and that's the biggest trend in radio right now.

There's John Catsimatidis who has publicly talked about adding an FM sister station to WABC as a music outlet.

And maybe I'm dreaming, but I thought at one point there was talk of Meruelo wanting to enter NYC.
 
Theater of My Mind said:
There's John Catsimatidis who has publicly talked about adding an FM sister station to WABC as a music outlet.
Click to expand...
Good left field possibility!
Theater of My Mind said:
And maybe I'm dreaming, but I thought at one point there was talk of Meruelo wanting to enter NYC.
Click to expand...
Another good one, but Meruelo's LA stations not doing as well as anticipated, and his gaming interests just went through 3 years of terrible times.
 
How about Urban One?
Maybe they would want a sister station for WBLS, which it has been said on this board they will likely
be purchasing.
 
Loverofradio said:
It’s great that GK is handling sales and all for espn radio. But, do they have the money to buy an FM station in New York?
Click to expand...
Assuming their existing operations with 98.7 are profitable, probably. The financing cost probably would not be that much higher than the lease payments to Emmis.
 
With Good Karma now in control of ESPN Audio's broadcast and podcast sales, and already controlling WEPN-FM's programming, it would only make sense for GKB to buy 98.7 outright. They probably already have a right-of-first-refusal agreement with Emmis in that regard.

I would be more concerned about the overall future of ESPN Radio as a going concern—especially if the Mouse House does as has been rumored and sets the Worldwide Leader in Sports free to go its own way (Disney spins-off ESPN as a separate company).

WEPN-FM may be better off ditching ESPN network programming altogether and, unless they try going all-local (ain't happening), perhaps align itself with one of the other sports networks without a major presence in NYC, like Fox Sports Radio or one of the sports talk/gambling hybrids.
 
TheBigA said:
I would imagine with the deal Good Karma just signed as ad sales rep for ESPN Radio, the need for an NYC station is important.

radioink.com

Good Karma Brands Takes On All ESPN Audio Sales From Disney - Radio Ink

Good Karma Brands, led by CEO Craig Karmazin, is taking on an expanded role in sports radio operations, via an agreement with ESPN Audio.
radioink.com radioink.com
Click to expand...
If Emmis
TheBigA said:
I would imagine with the deal Good Karma just signed as ad sales rep for ESPN Radio, the need for an NYC station is important.

radioink.com

Good Karma Brands Takes On All ESPN Audio Sales From Disney - Radio Ink

Good Karma Brands, led by CEO Craig Karmazin, is taking on an expanded role in sports radio operations, via an agreement with ESPN Audio.
radioink.com radioink.com
Click to expand...
If Emmis is going to get out of the Radio Business, Does that mean WBLS & Hot 97 will be sold too ? I know they have a shared agreement
 
Always interest said:
If Emmis is going to get out of the Radio Business, Does that mean WBLS & Hot 97 will be sold too ? I know they have a shared agreement
Click to expand...

They already have in 2019:

Emmis Announces Agreement to Form New Public Company with Standard General

Newly Formed Mediaco Holding to purchase New York’s WBLS and Hot 97 from Emmis For Immediate Release Contact: Ryan Hornaday, EVP/CFO, [email protected] Indianapolis…Emmis Communications Corporation (Nasdaq: EMMS) today announced that it has signed an agreement to form a new public company...
www.emmis.com www.emmis.com

However, there are rumors that those two stations will be sold as well.

 
TheBigA said:
They already have in 2019:

Emmis Announces Agreement to Form New Public Company with Standard General

Newly Formed Mediaco Holding to purchase New York’s WBLS and Hot 97 from Emmis For Immediate Release Contact: Ryan Hornaday, EVP/CFO, [email protected] Indianapolis…Emmis Communications Corporation (Nasdaq: EMMS) today announced that it has signed an agreement to form a new public company...
www.emmis.com www.emmis.com

However, there are rumors that those two stations will be sold as well.

Click to expand...
Alright Thanks for replying
 
I wonder if ESPN would eventually just give up directly programming the network, let Good Karma take over everything and just license out the ESPN name, like how Premiere does with Fox Sports.

It’s not like they couldn’t still simulcast the programs on ESPNEWS or whatever.
 
mightynine said:
I wonder if ESPN would eventually just give up directly programming the network,
Click to expand...

My view is that Disney is a company that guards its brands and doesn't license them to other companies. That may change if Disney sells or spins off ESPN, as has been discussed. The problem all of these 24/7 formats have is that there are large parts of the day that have no advertiser interest. That includes evenings, overnights, and weekends. That's more than half of their time. That situation wouldn't change if Good Karma originated the programming. Good Karma doesn't have the deep pockets necessary to fund a service where more than half of it is unsellable, and they'll know that once they take over the ad sales for the network.
 
TheBigA said:
The problem all of these 24/7 formats have is that there are large parts of the day that have no advertiser interest. That includes evenings, overnights, and weekends. That's more than half of their time. That situation wouldn't change if Good Karma originated the programming. Good Karma doesn't have the deep pockets necessary to fund a service where more than half of it is unsellable, and they'll know that once they take over the ad sales for the network.
Click to expand...

How is that different for ESPN than for any other format? That's just the nature of radio and I'm pretty sure all the companies that get into the business understand that.
 
TheBigA said:
My view is that Disney is a company that guards its brands and doesn't license them to other companies. That may change if Disney sells or spins off ESPN, as has been discussed. The problem all of these 24/7 formats have is that there are large parts of the day that have no advertiser interest. That includes evenings, overnights, and weekends. That's more than half of their time. That situation wouldn't change if Good Karma originated the programming. Good Karma doesn't have the deep pockets necessary to fund a service where more than half of it is unsellable, and they'll know that once they take over the ad sales for the network.
Click to expand...
Do you think ESPN makes up for that with the amount of money made off live sporting events broadcast on espn radio? I wonder if Westwood One would be interested in getting radio rights to (World Series, NBA finals, etc)?
 
Loverofradio said:
Do you think ESPN makes up for that with the amount of money made off live sporting events broadcast on espn radio? I wonder if Westwood One would be interested in getting radio rights to (World Series, NBA finals, etc)?
Click to expand...

All of these companies are cutting back. It all stems from the lack of advertising support. The only companies looking to grow are religious, and they're not interested in sports play by play.

Disney sees itself in the content business. They create content: Movies, TV shows, audio, etc. They're not in the towers & transmitters business, which is why they sold radio, and why Eisner is talking about selling ABC TV. But sports audio is still in their core. They just want to cut down on the number of employees.
 
I think it won’t be sports anymore once the sale is completed and Audacy might move it to another radio station probably the station that is currently their FM or AM new station and get rid of the simulcast to do so.
 
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