Entercom waited too long...

[LA_Guy]

Entercom waited too long to move WEEI to FM-and now they are gonna get their clock cleaned!

[Peter Q. George (K1XRB)]

Entercom waited too long to move WEEI to FM-and now they are gonna get their clock cleaned!

You know something? You may be right!

[aaronread]

That's true, he may be right.

He may also be totally wrong.  WEEI has thrived nicely while being on "substandard" AM, and on an AM signal with horrible coverage over one of the more lucrative markets (Metrowest).  I believe the NET revenue (not gross) in 2005 was over $35 million, just from WEEI!  The reason they thrived was content: they had the Sox, and they had a lot of successful sports & talk shows the rest of the day.

98.5 is far and away a superior signal...but if they put lousy content on it, the signal quality won't matter worth a damn.  Even with the Patriots and Bruins games; those just aren't on the air enough to compete with 162+ nights and days of Sox games and advertising opportunities.

The real rub, of course, is that the new 98.5 could be good enough to take a bite out of WEEI's audience and revenues.  It's widely rumored that WEEI heavily subsidizes the rest of the Entercom Boston stations.  How true that is is highly suspect, but even a moderate hit on WEEI could mean a lot of pain on Guest Street in Brighton.

[BRNout]

As there's almost a month until the trigger is pulled, Entercom can still upstage CBS by popping WEEI on FM.  Despite the comments on Mike's revenue, we're talking about saving the cash cow here.  Don't be shocked if we see WEEI-FM 93.7 before August 13. 

It's also time for Entercom to rethink this ridiculous business of running the Red Sox on WRKO.  Put 'em back on WEEI next year. 

[raccoonradio]

I wouldn't want that. At work, WRKO comes in much better for me. It stinks the nights they're on WEEI. And in some parts of my building even WRKO has problems. But generally it's better. (A big postal sorting facility in N Reading, a few miles from the RKO sticks)

[raccoonradio]

informal poll, or just a question: does Entercom start simulcasting WEEI on one of their FMs before
the debut of WBZ-FM?

My vote:

...yes.

[aaronread]

It's also time for Entercom to rethink this ridiculous business of running the Red Sox on WRKO.  Put 'em back on WEEI next year.

I'm not going to pretend to know the actual reason for that, but I believe it was the result of two things:

• An expansion of the WEEI brand to create additional ad inventory.  Which, considering the train wreck WRKO was at the time (and arguably still is) seemed no more crazy an idea than most.
• Significant pressure from the Sox to "separate" the game carriage from the substantial negative commentary about the team during the sports-talk shows on WEEI.

The former is one of those things that looks incredibly stupid on the face of it, and it actives antagonizes the consumer...but it also happens to work well for the company, so they're going to keep doing it.   Hate it all you want, but it makes Entercom money so they ain't gonna stop.  Not unless WRKO magically starts doing better as a talk radio station overall, and I don't think anyone sees that happening.  

As for the latter, it does seem shocking that a radio station would even acknowledge such a request, much less acquiesce to it.  If it's true, then I imagine what happened was the Sox threatened to put the squeeze on sponsors that do business with WEEI.  That could mean a lot of pain in short order; Entercom Boston is highly dependent on the Sox games for a lot of their revenue/success.

[raccoonradio]

>>Not unless WRKO magically starts doing better as a talk radio station overall

As Howie would say, "We're going off the air in Boston at 6:23 pm so we can bring you the very
exciting Red Sox pregame show, but you can still catch us at AM 830, WCRN..."

[promotherobot]

As there's almost a month until the trigger is pulled, Entercom can still upstage CBS by popping WEEI on FM.  Despite the comments on Mike's revenue, we're talking about saving the cash cow here.  Don't be shocked if we see WEEI-FM 93.7 before August 13. 

It's also time for Entercom to rethink this ridiculous business of running the Red Sox on WRKO.  Put 'em back on WEEI next year. 

What about WEEI on 99.5?  Don't they own a piece of WCRB that they bought from Nassau?

PTR

[BRNout]

No, I do not believe that they do.  There was some deal that they were making with Nassau to install WEEI on that frequency, but the thing fell through.  Certainly someone knows more detail than I.

The WRKO/WEEI Red Sox thing is absurd.  Yeah, I've read all of the justifications and they come off about as well as someone's explanation as to why it's okay for them to screw around with their second cousin!   

Legal? yes. A good idea?  No

If it was so brilliant, you'd see such arrangements all over the country and you don't.  With Entercom finally getting some competition in the business of sports radio (and let's face it, CBS is about the most capable one out there to take them on), they'll have to quit fiddling around with the Sundays here, Wednesdays there scheduling of Red Sox games on the radio. 

IF they take WEEI to FM in Boston, the Red Sox will need to be on it.