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WGST

T

TheRealOtherNeil

Intrepid Radio Reporter Rodney Ho heard a rumor that WGST is about to sack syndicated morning host Michael Smerconish, who has been on the air for two Tylers* and afternoon consumer guy Dave Ramsey. Ho states that ex-Steve & Vikki producer and conservative host Rusty Humphries will be the new afternoon host.

FYI, Humphries once tried to smuggle a toy gun, knife and hand-grenade into Dallas Fort Worth Airport as a radio stunt. He was arrested for his efforts.

*A Tyler is an Atlanta radio measurement. One Tyler equals nine months. It is named for mega star Zakk Tyler (nee: Dominic Zaccagnini) in honor of his time at DAVE-FM.
 
To clarify, they're sacking both Smerconish and Ramsay?

I'd expect Ramsay to find another affiliate - his listeners are pretty loyal to the lifestyle. I've had several people speak about him as if they were trying to convert me to their belief system.
 
Good. I find his show boring and uninteresting. As much as I don't like his show I think what happened in Connecticut to his show back in 2006 sucks. His show was on Monday-Friday on two smaller AM stations. One carried the show live 3PM-5PM and the other carried his show on taped delayed 3 hours at night and 3 hours overnight. Then CBS-owned WTIC AM 1080 a 50KW day/night station decided to pick up the show, but they're only clearing it Sundays 1PM-4PM. In that time slot it is pre-empted frequently for Boston Redsox Baseball and if I'm not mistaken Westwood One's NFL Game of the week.

Going from M-F on 2 different stations to clearance just 3 hours a week on a Sunday isn't right even if the weekend clearance is on a station that is much more powerful.
 
Ramsey is tough for long term listening, because truly once you've heard one show, you've heard it all. It's a great show for weekends. However a) his audience does throw a religious fervor into their support for him and b) he brings advertising "arrangements" to his stations that make it very hard to dump him. The fact that affiliates are dropping him anyway speaks to how badly they want to.

Smerconish...I have no clue what the argument was for putting him on in the first place. There wasn't a single thing about that that was ever going to work...especially in morning drive.

Humphries is infinitely more entertaining than your average talk host, and works very, very hard. But it's going to take the greatest show of all time to get anyone sampling WGST again.
 
jaxradidio said:
Ramsey is tough for long term listening, because truly once you've heard one show, you've heard it all. It's a great show for weekends. However a) his audience does throw a religious fervor into their support for him and b) he brings advertising "arrangements" to his stations that make it very hard to dump him. The fact that affiliates are dropping him anyway speaks to how badly they want to.

Smerconish...I have no clue what the argument was for putting him on in the first place. There wasn't a single thing about that that was ever going to work...especially in morning drive.
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Agreed on Ramsey. I particularly don't like his shilling for roofers and other sponsors. There is a reason Clark Howard has steadfastly refused to do that.

Also agreed on Smerconish. He's all over the place and syndicated shows don't work when you constantly have local break-ins for news/traffic/weather/spots. I hate the first 30 minutes of Boortz for the same reason.

One thing to remember: we're back on standard time. That means:

Monthly Local Sunrise Times for WGST (does not take into account DST)
January 7:45
February 7:30
March 6:45
April 6:15
May 5:30
June 5:30
July 5:30
August 6:00
September 6:15
October 6:45
November 7:15
December 7:30

Monthly Local Sunset Times (does not take into account DST)
January 5:45
February 6:15
March 6:45
April 7:15
May 7:30
June 7:45
July 7:45
August 7:30
September 6:45
October 6:00
November 5:30
December 5:30

Ref. http://www.fcc.gov/fcc-bin/srsstime?dlat=33&mlat=45&slat=43.00&dlon=84&mlon=27&slon=29.00&tzone=A

That means WGST has to power down to 1kW at 5:30 PM now and can't power back up until 7:15 AM. And it gets worse as we get further into the season.

If nobody is listening to Smerconish or Ramsey now (especially early in AM drive or late in PM drive), it's only going to get a lot worse--for them or their replacements. CC REALLY needs to put WGST on an FM if they're serious about it.
 
I agree with you, Jabba. These moves are going to make virtually no difference in WGST's ratings for the reason you mentioned.

Marc B, at one time, Ramsey was carried by the Salem stations but was dropped over some financial disagreement. He then had to find new stations. Could those 2 small AM's be Salem outlets?
 
Would Rusty Humphries do an Atlanta only show or would the afternoon show just be a rerun of the previous night's program? Is WGST getting programming advice from that idiot Randall Bloomquist?
 
Ramsey not only paid cash for his house, his top execs all reflect his personal "no credit card debt" plan. What most don't know is radio is a small part of his operation. With 400 full time employees it can truly be said that radio doesn't pay the bills (heard that before haven't we). Radio is almost a prop for high priced speaking engagements and from the military to churches to now marriage seminars, he has tons of product flowing. Sure he doesn't want to loose a market, but he doesn't loose sleep. The amazing thing to me is here's a guy who isn't an economist or accountant. But many people put more trust in him than the experts you hear on biztalk 1190. radio programmers bore of it because they want jacked up excitement.
America still shops mostly at walmart and most of our listeners aren't all that fancy
 
X-14 said:
caller10 said:
Man, he can lie and talk up just about anything.

http://www.biblemoneymatters.com/20...id-he-follow-his-own-advice-and-pay-cash.html
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Please explain to me how the link you provided shows that Ramsey lied about anything?
According to the link, he apparently paid cash for his house.
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NOT implying Ramsey lied about the house. I was in reference to a comment I heard him make when he had just switched from 920 WGKA to 640 WGST ... that 640 WGST was a powerhouse Atlanta talker "with a tradition of winning". That's a stretch!

In response to another comment about Ramsey being dropped from Salem for financial reasons. I thought the dropping of Salem came from Ramsey in search of a new wider audience by jumping to more secular radio from Christian. I'm actually a Ramsey fan up to a point and a fan of personal finance talk in general ... but think Dave has a tendency to state to many things as "fact" when they're actually his opinion, not fact. Maybe in political talk that doesn't bother me, but in personal finance talk, it does. But he did also get dropped from TV weeknights on Fox Business Network in the last few months.
 
... that 640 WGST was a powerhouse Atlanta talker "with a tradition of winning". That's a stretch!
Click to expand...

Not a lie (technically). GST had a "tradition" of winning at one time long, long ago before it gave up on everything and left us in the dust.

So it's true, but it's still a stretch!! :D
 
[EDIT-reference to deleted content]
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They are going local in the mornins also. If they are re-tooling and offering two local drive time shows then the next question is obvios. When, not if, will we hear GST on an FM stick? They are not adding local talent during the time when they are powered down to compete with WSB on it's AM/FM simulcast? Spare me the "Ther are CC they are stupid responses?
 
Rusty Humphries is on WGST? Interesting...
Haven't been able to hear him since KXXT went "air america", failed, then religious.
Hope much hasn't changed with his show, or that its only gotten better. I miss Rusty and "Lefty Rusty".
 
I agree... this is in preperation for an FM simulcast. They are investing a lot of money in local talent for morning/afternoon drive that cannot be heard outside of I-285 during the winter months.

So, the big question is which stick(s) will switch and when?
 
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