We know that the NBA and NHL post-seasons are generating significant ratings on both the national and (most) local levels, including local viewing records set in both Boston and Chicago this month.
But many will be heavily anticipating the audience ratings for the NFL Draft later this week, with ESPN and NFL Network, as well as satellite radio, devoting hour after hour of coverage. With the NFL player lockout looming (rulings and appeals as of press time), the Draft coverage is one way to determine the interest level and perhaps the mindset of NFL fans.
Elsewhere, KMOX St. Louis had quite the predicament this past Friday (4/22) night when the severe storm and tornado damaged the St. Louis International Airport and several other locations within the metro area. After a lengthy delay, the Cardinals decided to play their home game vs. Cincinnati. KMOX wanted to stick with its local service by providing continuous coverage of the storm. As a result, they moved the Cardinals broadcast to music station KYKY 98.1. A solid decision under the circumstances.
Following up from our comments last week about the state of sports radio, we now have the March ratings for Boston and Detroit, among other key markets. Sure enough, those markets did show an overall increase in listenership to help buck the trend in some others.
While WEEI has lost more than 20% of its overall audience since January, rival WBZ-FM showed an audience increase and finished only 2 spots below WEEI this time around. This set of results even touched off a "radio war" between the two morning teams. Dennis & Callhan on WEEI and Toucher & Rich on WBZ-FM both claimed "victory" on the air. I'm not sure the listeners to either care as much as they each seemed to. They should all be pleased that Boston sports radio still has a good-sized audience compared to some other markets.
WXYT-FM The Ticket showed a slight increase from February, and if WXYT-AM didn't air different sports programming at times and both stations counted as one, The Ticket would have been 4th overall in the market. However, The Ticket finished first overall for a time last year.
A couple of other markets showed some increase, while still not making a major overall audience impact. Cincinnati's WCKY and WSAI-AM both showed increases of at least .3 in the ratings since February, but even if combined would not have made the top 10 overall. In Miami, the 3 sports stations combined to increase the overall audience since January, but combined would not have made the top 20 in the market.
San Diego and Milwaukee's sports stations battle held steady. The 3 San Diego sports stations showed no increase from January on, and combined would not make the overall top 20. Milwaukee's WAUK 540 held steady, while WSSP lost slightly. The 2 Chicago sports stations again showed up in the Milwaukee book, with both remaining the same as recent months.
While most of the comments I received from last week's column about the decline of sports radio audience this year were private, there were a handfull that disagree with me. Some of those think that football is the dominant sport to talk year-round, and that the NFL lockout is the main reason for this decline. All the more reason to watch for audience ratings for this week's draft. But it seems to me that the NFL has been talked about as much as usual for this time of the year, with the only difference being the "if there is a season" within most comments.
We'll keep watching this over the next few months, but I'm still going with the reasoning that fans are more interested in watching the games (and increasing the record TV ratings) than merely hearing too many "non-expert" opinions from other fans.
There may be "no crying" in baseball, but there was on SportsCenter. This past Friday (4/22) anchor Josh Elliot, doing his final show on ESPN before heading off to ABC-TV and Good Morning America, teared up during his farewell signoff.
MIAMI: Sad news with the announcement that Dolphins broadcaster, and former Dolphins standout Jim Mandich passed away on Tuesday (4/26) at age 62 from cancer. Mandich has been the Dolphins' radio analyst from 1992 through 2004 and had rejoined the role since 2007. His playing days may be best remembered for his role with the 1972 Dolphins that finished the season undefeated.
CHICAGO: It's much deserved praise for Comcast SportsNet Chicago for its handling of having 3 games to show on the same night and keeping its viewing audience happy. Both last Thursday (4/21) and this Tuesday (4/26), the Chicago area regional cable network carried both the NHL Blackhawks and NBA Bulls in playoff battles, as well as having White Sox baseball on the docket. Using its primary channel and "Comcast SportsNet Plus", plus adding a third channel, the network managed to have at least one channel for all 3 games. It took moving around of some of the pre and post-game shows for those viewers partial to one of the games, but this added to the thorough job they did.
The network also did an excellent job of alerting viewers with the bottom graphics as to where each game was being shown in its entirety and where post-game programming could be seen.
DALLAS: As of this writing, KDAF-TV will find itself without a sportscaster after this week for its nightly newscasts. Word is that Dave Crome, who had been with KDAF for more than 10 years, is out after this week. This follows the recent departures of Desmond Purnell and Candice Crawford. It looks like the station will significantly reduce, or possibily eliminate, a sports segment starting next week. More and more TV stations are looking to cut back their sports segments, not wanting to compete against the regional and national networks in-depth nightly shows. Yet, by not offering sports, they risk losing even more of a shrinking male audience.
SACRAMENTO: KHTK 1140 has regained the Oakland Raiders broadcasts. This announcement comes after the team has a new San Francisco deal with KRFR 1550 and Live 105 FM in the Bay Area.
A nice local touch by ESPN 1320 last Saturday (4/23). Mike Finnerty devoted some of his SureWest Sports morning show to prep sports, specifically focusing on the recent untimely death of a Davis H.S. assistant baseball coach and how the team responded with an impressive 3-game winning streak on a big road trip right after. It was one of those times when it is about more than sports, and when fan reaction takes on more meaning.
PORTLAND: KPAM 860 introduced Northwest Sports Tonight" into the early evening this week (started Monday 4/25), hosted by Ron Callan. The only local sports show within its time period is also expected to devote more coverage to Oregon State University sports, since KPAM remains OSU's flagship station.
OMAHA: KXSP ESPN Radio adds a new co-host to its 2 to 6 PM show starting May 16th. Michael Grey joins the station from a morning co-hosting gig on WBBL Grand Rapids. Grey will host along with Pete McIntyre, and the show is expected to continue its focus on Nebraska, Iowa, and Creighton University sports.
Ft. WAYNE: ESPN 1380 (and WOWO 1190) will have a new Operations Manager starting next week. Gregg Henson brings his KRLD-FM 105.3 Dallas sports talk experience to the smaller market. No word yet as to whether or not Henson will perform any hosting duties on ESPN 1380.
Showing posts with label weei. Show all posts
Showing posts with label weei. Show all posts
Wednesday, April 27, 2011
Thursday, April 14, 2011
The Broadcast Booth - April 14th Update........
We're about to go through still another April 15th of "Jackie Robinson" day for Major League Baseball. Perhaps the worst day for fans watching any of the action on TV. Sorry, but MLB and its teams have done enough over the years to honor Robinson for all he accomplished. This need to have every player wear number 42 is a significant distraction for fans watching on TV. The local stations and sports networks showing highlights lose impact when every player has the same number on. Any great plays, clutch hits, or pitching performances worthy of making highlight features for the week, month, or even the season become tarnished because the player(s) featured are not wearing their regular numbers.
Elsewhere, some cable systems continue to find even more ways of getting out of hand with expecting their customers to cough up still more dollars for sports packages. As MLB teams continue to have more and more of their games on local or regional cable networks, the teams and cable providers seem to think that adding more telecasts should translate into extra money. One system in the Minneapolis area has "negotiated" to be able to include about 20 "additional" Twins telecasts this season for the subscribers.
Now comes a story out of Asheville that Charter TV will carry 45 "additional" Atlanta Braves telecasts, bringing the package from 109 to 154 games for the current season. This because of additional negotiations with Fox Sports South, which supposedly may be charging Charter an additional fee for these additional games. Can somebody tell me (and, more importantly, us as consumers) how part of a package of games would cost even more? Sorry, but if the regional networks can't make enough money, why are they spending all of this money to get the rights to show all of these games? Why should customers, even those who don't care about sports, be "forced" to pay even more because of this?
While some baseball fans are tired of seemingly every Yankees vs. Red Sox game being shown on national TV, ESPN did very well with its Sunday Night Baseball telecast of this matchup last week (4/10). The initial ratings report showed that telecast to be ESPN's highest rated Sunday night since August of 2009, and this was just the second week of the young season. And the August '09 telecast with almost as high of a rating was - you guessed it - Yankees vs. Red Sox. As an exclusive telecast in both the Boston and New York markets, it is interesting that the audience ratings in the Boston market were more than double the audience ratings for the New York market. Keep in mind the miserable start of the Red Sox this young season.
The big bucks going to college conferences continues stronger than ever. The Pac-10 Conference figures to be next. The Conference is waiting on bids for national coverage, now with the addition of Colorado and Utah to the Conference. Word is that Fox and CBS Sports will battle it out for rights to the football and basketball games.
The Big 12 Conference has just announced a 13 year deal with Fox Sports to include about 40 football games each season. A separate arrangement with Fox will allow ESPN and ABC to show selected Big 12 football and basketball games for next season. This deal brings millions and millions more to the Conference. However, it is the thousands of cable subscribers who are socked for increased costs whether or not they follow sports at all or wish to financially support the schools in these conferences.
LOS ANGELES: Multiple local sources report that the Lakers will have a new TV play-by-play voice to work with Stu Lantz starting next season. Although all of the Lakers' radio and TV announcer contracts are set to expire at the end of the team's playoff run, it appears the team will not seek to renew Joel Meyers, who has handled the TV side since 2003.
The Lakers continue their TV deals for one more season with Fox Sports and KCAL-TV before their gazillion dollar cable deal begins in the 2012-13 season. Spero Dedes is a likely choice to move from the radio booth over to the TV side, although his work for CBS Sports on NFL football and college basketball would create several conflicts. Bill MacDonald, after 25 years with Prime Ticket and Fox Sports, is also considered a candidate for either the radio or TV play-by-play spot.
PITTSBURGH: Congrats to Billy Hillgrove from "Billy Hillgrove Day" in Pittsburgh last Friday (4/8). The legendary play-by-play voice was honored in ceremonies. Hillgrove was chosen by the Rooney family to replace the then retired Jack Fleming in 1994 to become the voice of the Steelers, and has not missed even one game since.
In addition, the 70-year old Hillgrove has been the voice of University of Pittsburgh football for 37 seasons (during which he has missed only 2 games, with those being due to Steelers conflicts) and Pitt basketball for 42 years.
A prime example of his dedication came in January 2009 when the Steelers hosted San Diego in a 4:00 PM playoff game. Of course, he did the broadcast, but did so without his usual pre-game preparation routine. The reason? He called the Pitt basketball home game which started at Noon that day before heading over to the football game.
CHICAGO: Mike Murphy, who was on WSCR The Score for its first 17 years, has joined WMVP ESPN 1000 to co-host a Sunday morning basebal oriented show starting this Sunday (4/17) from 9 AM to 1 PM.
BOSTON: The Red Sox aren't the only team generating significant local TV ratings. The Bruins' ratings on NESN were reportedly up more than 40% from last season to the just concluded regular season. Both pre-game and post-game programming also showed double digit increases in viewers. NESN has already expanded its pre-game shows for the first round playoff series vs. Montreal to a full hour.
On the radio side, WEEI has moved Mike Adams to "The Big Show" in the afternoon along with Glenn Ordway and Michael Holley as of this week. The move coincides with Adams' evening show having fewer hours due to Red Sox broadcasts.
DALLAS: It's always good when a sports talk station gets a major guest, and SportsRadio 1310 The Ticket scored an excellent live segment with Rangers Manager Ron Washington last Friday (4/8). Washington was on live with Norm Hitzges.
RALEIGH/DURHAM: The Buzz 620 has added The Dan Patrick Show, airing it live from 9 AM to Noon, as of this week.
TORONTO: TSN Radio 1050 has added Bryan Hayes as a weekday host from 10 AM to Noon as of this week. Hayes comes over from 640 AM. The station, meanwhile, has begun streaming on TSN.ca.
Down the dial, The Score Radio has brought back local personality Stormin' Norman Rumack to host late nights.
ENGLAND: BBC 5 is again airing a live MLB broadcast of a Sunday afternoon game. This past Sunday, the weekly broadcast was the Braves vs. Phillies game. Due to the time difference, the broadcasts are heard during evening prime time in the UK.
Elsewhere, some cable systems continue to find even more ways of getting out of hand with expecting their customers to cough up still more dollars for sports packages. As MLB teams continue to have more and more of their games on local or regional cable networks, the teams and cable providers seem to think that adding more telecasts should translate into extra money. One system in the Minneapolis area has "negotiated" to be able to include about 20 "additional" Twins telecasts this season for the subscribers.
Now comes a story out of Asheville that Charter TV will carry 45 "additional" Atlanta Braves telecasts, bringing the package from 109 to 154 games for the current season. This because of additional negotiations with Fox Sports South, which supposedly may be charging Charter an additional fee for these additional games. Can somebody tell me (and, more importantly, us as consumers) how part of a package of games would cost even more? Sorry, but if the regional networks can't make enough money, why are they spending all of this money to get the rights to show all of these games? Why should customers, even those who don't care about sports, be "forced" to pay even more because of this?
While some baseball fans are tired of seemingly every Yankees vs. Red Sox game being shown on national TV, ESPN did very well with its Sunday Night Baseball telecast of this matchup last week (4/10). The initial ratings report showed that telecast to be ESPN's highest rated Sunday night since August of 2009, and this was just the second week of the young season. And the August '09 telecast with almost as high of a rating was - you guessed it - Yankees vs. Red Sox. As an exclusive telecast in both the Boston and New York markets, it is interesting that the audience ratings in the Boston market were more than double the audience ratings for the New York market. Keep in mind the miserable start of the Red Sox this young season.
The big bucks going to college conferences continues stronger than ever. The Pac-10 Conference figures to be next. The Conference is waiting on bids for national coverage, now with the addition of Colorado and Utah to the Conference. Word is that Fox and CBS Sports will battle it out for rights to the football and basketball games.
The Big 12 Conference has just announced a 13 year deal with Fox Sports to include about 40 football games each season. A separate arrangement with Fox will allow ESPN and ABC to show selected Big 12 football and basketball games for next season. This deal brings millions and millions more to the Conference. However, it is the thousands of cable subscribers who are socked for increased costs whether or not they follow sports at all or wish to financially support the schools in these conferences.
LOS ANGELES: Multiple local sources report that the Lakers will have a new TV play-by-play voice to work with Stu Lantz starting next season. Although all of the Lakers' radio and TV announcer contracts are set to expire at the end of the team's playoff run, it appears the team will not seek to renew Joel Meyers, who has handled the TV side since 2003.
The Lakers continue their TV deals for one more season with Fox Sports and KCAL-TV before their gazillion dollar cable deal begins in the 2012-13 season. Spero Dedes is a likely choice to move from the radio booth over to the TV side, although his work for CBS Sports on NFL football and college basketball would create several conflicts. Bill MacDonald, after 25 years with Prime Ticket and Fox Sports, is also considered a candidate for either the radio or TV play-by-play spot.
PITTSBURGH: Congrats to Billy Hillgrove from "Billy Hillgrove Day" in Pittsburgh last Friday (4/8). The legendary play-by-play voice was honored in ceremonies. Hillgrove was chosen by the Rooney family to replace the then retired Jack Fleming in 1994 to become the voice of the Steelers, and has not missed even one game since.
In addition, the 70-year old Hillgrove has been the voice of University of Pittsburgh football for 37 seasons (during which he has missed only 2 games, with those being due to Steelers conflicts) and Pitt basketball for 42 years.
A prime example of his dedication came in January 2009 when the Steelers hosted San Diego in a 4:00 PM playoff game. Of course, he did the broadcast, but did so without his usual pre-game preparation routine. The reason? He called the Pitt basketball home game which started at Noon that day before heading over to the football game.
CHICAGO: Mike Murphy, who was on WSCR The Score for its first 17 years, has joined WMVP ESPN 1000 to co-host a Sunday morning basebal oriented show starting this Sunday (4/17) from 9 AM to 1 PM.
BOSTON: The Red Sox aren't the only team generating significant local TV ratings. The Bruins' ratings on NESN were reportedly up more than 40% from last season to the just concluded regular season. Both pre-game and post-game programming also showed double digit increases in viewers. NESN has already expanded its pre-game shows for the first round playoff series vs. Montreal to a full hour.
On the radio side, WEEI has moved Mike Adams to "The Big Show" in the afternoon along with Glenn Ordway and Michael Holley as of this week. The move coincides with Adams' evening show having fewer hours due to Red Sox broadcasts.
DALLAS: It's always good when a sports talk station gets a major guest, and SportsRadio 1310 The Ticket scored an excellent live segment with Rangers Manager Ron Washington last Friday (4/8). Washington was on live with Norm Hitzges.
RALEIGH/DURHAM: The Buzz 620 has added The Dan Patrick Show, airing it live from 9 AM to Noon, as of this week.
TORONTO: TSN Radio 1050 has added Bryan Hayes as a weekday host from 10 AM to Noon as of this week. Hayes comes over from 640 AM. The station, meanwhile, has begun streaming on TSN.ca.
Down the dial, The Score Radio has brought back local personality Stormin' Norman Rumack to host late nights.
ENGLAND: BBC 5 is again airing a live MLB broadcast of a Sunday afternoon game. This past Sunday, the weekly broadcast was the Braves vs. Phillies game. Due to the time difference, the broadcasts are heard during evening prime time in the UK.
Wednesday, March 10, 2010
Sports Media Report - March 10 update.........
The NFL is making as much or more news in the media and marketing areas this week as its teams are with personnel moves. These news items reflect the growth of demand for NFL games around the country.
First, the NFL has announced a 4-year deal with a wireless provider that will result in Sunday and Thursday night games being streamed on certain mobile devices from the NBC-TV or NFL Network feeds. Incredible as it may seem, this deal is estimated to be valued at more than $100,000,000. In addition, this deal reportedly includes the NFL Network's Red Zone during the Sunday games.
This is another positive for the obviously football hungry fans, providing another means to have easy live progress of the NFL games. Yet, I have to believe that the TV networks may be strongly divided on their reaction to this news.
NBC-TV should be ecstatic about this. Their Sunday Night Football feed will now be available to thousands of subscribers to the participating wireless service who, if not able to watch on NBC-TV, can watch wherever they happen to be, needing only a mobile phone signal. Advertisers benefit with another means to penetrate their target audience.
However, Fox-TV and CBS-TV could suffer over this. Fans in markets not partial to an NFL team, along with fans in NFL markets when the "home" team isn't playing, may very well opt for the Red Zone feed on their phones over a CBS or Fox regional game which doesn't interest them as much. Now, instead of watching those games to keep tabs on the other games, it is quite possible that thousands of fans will opt for the Red Zone on their phones, and CBS and Fox could lose viewers over this. While fans may not care, I have to think that this will come up during the next TV rights negotiation. Yet, ESPN is, as of now, not effected either way by this new wireless contract.
That is what makes this such a potentially important media story. I don't remember the NFL doing a deal in the past which openly favors one network ahead of others which are participating.
The NFL brass also got more good news when Arbitron Sports released a report revealing specific listening trends based on PPM measurement for NFL games over the course of the recently concluded season. Based on estimates of "in-game listening" from 23 radio markets involving 25 of the NFL's teams, the report shows each NFL team averaging better than 100,000 listeners per local radio broadcast. The Chicago Bears have topped the team list showing an average game audience of more than 620,000 listeners.
Radio rights in Chicago have always been a hot issue. In the past 30 years, the Bears broadcasts have jumped between WGN Radio, WBBM Radio, and the former WMAQ Radio (now WSCR - The Score sports radio, a sister station to WBBM). These audience totals further justify the huge rights fees and extended negotiations which have gone on in Chicago. Even more incredible is that the Bears failed to make the playoffs for the 3rd straight season and were all but eliminated with 7 games to go - yet still managed strong radio ratings.
The N.Y. Giants were next with just over 450,000 listeners, followed by the Philadelphia Eagles. In the 25-54 males category, some of the NFL broadcasts drew 40+ shares, according to this report.
The ratings leader is expected to release a baseball audience report during the second quarter.
BOSTON: A lot of credit goes to WEEI Radio for its interview with Patriots owner Robert Kraft on Tuesday. Mr. Kraft, who usually does an interview with the station around Super Bowl time, waited until this week to be interviewed by Glenn Ordway, Steve DeOssie and Fred Smerlas.
To their credit, this was not a powder-puff chat. Kraft talked about very specific players and contract issues. He also defended the team's decision not to pursue free agents by stating that the team feels its talent "is the best available". Whether you agree with him or not, the fact that he openly addressed the fans' concerns in this manner is refreshing from a pro sports executive. WEEI added to the mix by involving more than one of its program hosts in order to show the priority of this interview. That's more like it.
BRISTOL: Glad to see the news that Chuck Wilson is returning to ESPN Radio, and it happens as of this coming weekend. Wilson was one of the original hosts when ESPN Raedio first started in January 1992, and went on to co-host "Game Night" from 1995 into 2005, when he went over to XM.
He will host the NCAA Tournament Selection Special (5:30 to 9 PM ET) this Sunday (March 14) evening, and will soon move to the radio version of "Baseball Tonight".
Chuck Wilson first made his mark on WEAN Providence when he began a sports talk show on the station in the early 80's, years before the birth of WFAN and full-time sports radio stations. This show brought out his excellent interview styles.
Good move by ESPN to bring him back.
BALTIMORE: MASN has decided to go with a pair of analysts to split the assignment working with play-by-play voice Gary Thorne. Jim Palmer will continue to be lead analyst, but former Oriole pitcher Mike Flanagan has been named to the broadcast team. His first telecast will be against Oakland on April 15th. This will be Mike's third TV stint with the O's.
BOSTON: Boston College football broadcasts will remain on WEEI through the 2015 season as a result of a 5-year contract extension arranged by Fenway Sports Group. (Yes, Fenway Sports Group is owned by the Red Sox parent company.)
First, the NFL has announced a 4-year deal with a wireless provider that will result in Sunday and Thursday night games being streamed on certain mobile devices from the NBC-TV or NFL Network feeds. Incredible as it may seem, this deal is estimated to be valued at more than $100,000,000. In addition, this deal reportedly includes the NFL Network's Red Zone during the Sunday games.
This is another positive for the obviously football hungry fans, providing another means to have easy live progress of the NFL games. Yet, I have to believe that the TV networks may be strongly divided on their reaction to this news.
NBC-TV should be ecstatic about this. Their Sunday Night Football feed will now be available to thousands of subscribers to the participating wireless service who, if not able to watch on NBC-TV, can watch wherever they happen to be, needing only a mobile phone signal. Advertisers benefit with another means to penetrate their target audience.
However, Fox-TV and CBS-TV could suffer over this. Fans in markets not partial to an NFL team, along with fans in NFL markets when the "home" team isn't playing, may very well opt for the Red Zone feed on their phones over a CBS or Fox regional game which doesn't interest them as much. Now, instead of watching those games to keep tabs on the other games, it is quite possible that thousands of fans will opt for the Red Zone on their phones, and CBS and Fox could lose viewers over this. While fans may not care, I have to think that this will come up during the next TV rights negotiation. Yet, ESPN is, as of now, not effected either way by this new wireless contract.
That is what makes this such a potentially important media story. I don't remember the NFL doing a deal in the past which openly favors one network ahead of others which are participating.
The NFL brass also got more good news when Arbitron Sports released a report revealing specific listening trends based on PPM measurement for NFL games over the course of the recently concluded season. Based on estimates of "in-game listening" from 23 radio markets involving 25 of the NFL's teams, the report shows each NFL team averaging better than 100,000 listeners per local radio broadcast. The Chicago Bears have topped the team list showing an average game audience of more than 620,000 listeners.
Radio rights in Chicago have always been a hot issue. In the past 30 years, the Bears broadcasts have jumped between WGN Radio, WBBM Radio, and the former WMAQ Radio (now WSCR - The Score sports radio, a sister station to WBBM). These audience totals further justify the huge rights fees and extended negotiations which have gone on in Chicago. Even more incredible is that the Bears failed to make the playoffs for the 3rd straight season and were all but eliminated with 7 games to go - yet still managed strong radio ratings.
The N.Y. Giants were next with just over 450,000 listeners, followed by the Philadelphia Eagles. In the 25-54 males category, some of the NFL broadcasts drew 40+ shares, according to this report.
The ratings leader is expected to release a baseball audience report during the second quarter.
BOSTON: A lot of credit goes to WEEI Radio for its interview with Patriots owner Robert Kraft on Tuesday. Mr. Kraft, who usually does an interview with the station around Super Bowl time, waited until this week to be interviewed by Glenn Ordway, Steve DeOssie and Fred Smerlas.
To their credit, this was not a powder-puff chat. Kraft talked about very specific players and contract issues. He also defended the team's decision not to pursue free agents by stating that the team feels its talent "is the best available". Whether you agree with him or not, the fact that he openly addressed the fans' concerns in this manner is refreshing from a pro sports executive. WEEI added to the mix by involving more than one of its program hosts in order to show the priority of this interview. That's more like it.
BRISTOL: Glad to see the news that Chuck Wilson is returning to ESPN Radio, and it happens as of this coming weekend. Wilson was one of the original hosts when ESPN Raedio first started in January 1992, and went on to co-host "Game Night" from 1995 into 2005, when he went over to XM.
He will host the NCAA Tournament Selection Special (5:30 to 9 PM ET) this Sunday (March 14) evening, and will soon move to the radio version of "Baseball Tonight".
Chuck Wilson first made his mark on WEAN Providence when he began a sports talk show on the station in the early 80's, years before the birth of WFAN and full-time sports radio stations. This show brought out his excellent interview styles.
Good move by ESPN to bring him back.
BALTIMORE: MASN has decided to go with a pair of analysts to split the assignment working with play-by-play voice Gary Thorne. Jim Palmer will continue to be lead analyst, but former Oriole pitcher Mike Flanagan has been named to the broadcast team. His first telecast will be against Oakland on April 15th. This will be Mike's third TV stint with the O's.
BOSTON: Boston College football broadcasts will remain on WEEI through the 2015 season as a result of a 5-year contract extension arranged by Fenway Sports Group. (Yes, Fenway Sports Group is owned by the Red Sox parent company.)
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