Why Force Talk Stations To Carry Unpopular Teams?
by Brian Maloney, January 31st, 2007 at 01:29pm
For news-talk fans, it has long been a major annoyance: the tendency by corporate owners to force play-by-play coverage onto local stations, whether or not it’s a good fit for the established audience.
Yes, the Red Sox do generate big ratings, there’s simply no doubt about that. WEEI was built on its game coverage, but more recently, has successfully kept the Celtics, college and third-tier professional teams off of its airwaves. That prevents WEEI’s sports talkers from losing precious airtime.
Getting the short end of the stick is WRKO, which has been saddled with a steadily-increasing amount of audience-killing sports content. And they’re not alone: WBZ has a contract to carry evening Bruins games.
If any of these teams (beyond the Red Sox and Patriots) had a chance in the world of winning a few games, it might not be such an issue. But the Celtics have just blown 12 in a row and only one more consecutive loss will tie a team record.
Meanwhile, the Bruins seem eager to follow their basketball counterparts into the Hall Of Sporting Shame.
News-talk stations are forced to carry these teams because it’s what sales departments demand. Unfamiliar with the challenges of selling controversial political programming, some push for the easy way out. But with these teams performing so poorly, it’s hard to imagine much interest from potential clients.
Given their dismal performance, it could very well now be easier to sell Michael Savage than the Celtics to local business owners.
Entry Filed under: Celtics
9 Comments
1. raccoonradio | January 31st, 2007 at 4:43 pm
The Red Sox will help WRKO’s bottom line, but I’ve heard that WRKO is “taking a bath” on the Celtics
games. Not only a lousy team getting lousy
ratings, but on occasion Howie Carr has been
partially pre-empted in favor of Celtics pre-game
coverage. (Thankfully WCRN is around for listeners
to tune to…) Here’s the flagship station of
the Howie network, now down to 7 stations,
pre-empting their own show for dribble-dribble.
And this team is not like the Green Team of old. Rick Pitino: “Larry Bird’s not coming
through that door, fans.”
2. SickofWRKO | January 31st, 2007 at 10:29 pm
When it was announced that WRKO would be broadcasting Celtics games, I sent an email to WRKO management to voice my disgust. I said if the Celtics are not popular enough to be broadcast on WEEI(a sports station), then why should the listeners of WRKO be subjected to this garbage?
Pre-empting Savage, moving Savage to 10PM and now moving Savage to 7PM when the celtics are not playing and moving him back to 10PM when they are playing was the last straw for me. I now listen to WCRN.
3. Andrea | February 1st, 2007 at 12:58 am
Every night I have to ask my husband if there’s a game on. What a dismal thing to foist on talk show lovers.
4. The Mole | February 1st, 2007 at 9:24 am
A few quick Celtics facts:
1. WRKO does not “take a bath” since it is a revenue sharing deal that does not carry cost. That said, all parties involved wish there was more revenue to share than there is right now. Perhaps if they get a top pick next year, it will be more lucrative.
2. Celtics games, even if low rated, bring in different dollars to WRKO. The advertisers that buy Celtics are not typical WRKO advertisers and there is enough other inventory on WRKO to satisfy the current crop of regular WRKO advertisers, so the result is a net gain.
3. The end of Howie is rarely affected by the Celtics pre-game (total of four times in 06-07 season). Management insisted on 7:30 start time for home games for just this reason. Red Sox this year will be a much bigger disruption though.
4. “Good enough” is relative. Celtics on WEEI takes revenue backwards, Celtics on WRKO is an improvement. I look forward to the day when WRKO’s lineup is so strong that the Celtics aren’t good enough for WRKO.
5. --- bjd --- | February 1st, 2007 at 12:02 pm
Why doesn’t The Mole just admit who she is? Julie, did you give sloto his “jar” back?
WRKO’s lineup will never be so strong that things like the Celtics aren’t good enough for it based on the soon to start ex-hack morning show host.
6. BigBish | February 1st, 2007 at 12:59 pm
Dude- They aren’t good enough now. How happy can RKO management be that Howie openly promotes changingthe station to follow him?
There’s more to a healthy bottom line than rev share pal. Like selling advertizing. If you advertizing revenue drops as does your profit per commercial, in the real world thats a loss. Perhaps you don’t truly understand the economics of rev share by the way. Why don’t yiou define what tyoe of revenue the deal directs sharing?
7. The Mole | February 1st, 2007 at 2:45 pm
Happy to define rev share…roughly, WRKO sells spots, production cost is subtracted from total revenue and WRKO and Celtics split the remainder. If this amount is greater than the incremental revenue we could deliver with our next best option, it’s a good deal. Right now it is.
Bish, I’ve read enough of your posts to know that I know more about advertising than you do. To start with, I can spell the word “advertising”. I also know how it is bought and sold. Sorry to be disrespectful, but you started it.
Seriously, other than amusement, my purpose here is to lend some real world perspective to your discussion. I think it is great that you all care so much about the station, whether or not we agree on the direction of it.
Have a good day.
8. raccoonradio | February 1st, 2007 at 2:57 pm
>>next year,
Groan… so they’ll be back. Oh well, at least I’ll hear the Sox games on ‘RKO but come Celtics season I’ll tune out (at night).
9. BigBish | February 2nd, 2007 at 9:28 am
Mole, I didn’t ask you to define rev share. Its waht I manage for a living. What I asked you is , since you purport to be so all knowing is what is the rev share made up of? Advertising dollars?, Merchandising? Ticket prices? If you are so entrenched in the business, and if you took the time to read the question, thats what I was asking. So? Whats the answer Mole Woman?