The flagship station and local disasters

[salemjedi54]

Speaking of flaghship stations, how many Urban or Urban AC are flagship stations of sports teams?

D.C.'s WHUR-FM is the university owned flagship for Howard University football, and UAB Blazers football and basketball is cleared locally in Birmingham on WUHT "Hot 107-7". 

What about professional sports teams?

[liradioisbad]

During the great Northeast blackout of 2003 normally all-news WCBS moved a Yankee game to sister station WFAN so they could report on what was going on. Even though CBS also has sister station WINS carrying an all-news format, this is the kind of emergency where you would expect people to flock to their radios, thus the change for one night.

[EvWill]

Speaking of flaghship stations, how many Urban or Urban AC are flagship stations of sports teams?

D.C.'s WHUR-FM is the university owned flagship for Howard University football, and UAB Blazers football and basketball is cleared locally in Birmingham on WUHT "Hot 107-7". 

Despite being university owned, WHUR doesn't carry any Howard Bison sports events.

[Nathan Obral]

Speaking of flaghship stations, how many Urban or Urban AC are flagship stations of sports teams?

D.C.'s WHUR-FM is the university owned flagship for Howard University football, and UAB Blazers football and basketball is cleared locally in Birmingham on WUHT "Hot 107-7". 

What about professional sports teams?

The closest I've seen so far was WMIB-FM in Miami. When it was still an urban AC station, WMIB simulcast one Miami Heat game per month, while the flagship rights remained otherwise with sister station WINZ-AM.

Of course, that's not the case anymore. WMIB flipped to Spanish AC a few months back, and CC literally fumbled away the Heat rights -- just after this season started!!! -- over to Jefferson-Pilot's WAXY-AM.

[schmave]

Almost all major sports networks do parallel feeds that are not affected by the breaks, bulletins, weather warnings or other potential interruptions by the "flagship" stations. During local break time, the net will maintain either effect mike audio for stadium/arena natural ambient sound, rejoin music, or silence.

I've board operated for many a game, and back in the days when the net feed was the flagship station's audio, dozens of board ops along the line would play "cat and mouse" with the net trying to keep unwanted flagship station ID's and the like off the air.

When I board-opped in college in Toledo, our sports station (WLQR) used a "dirty" feed for the John Cooper and Jim O'Brien call-in shows and a clean feed for OSU football and basketball games. These were the feeds provided by the Ohio News Network and flagship WBNS. All local breaks were silent during the games, but for the call-in shows you had to be careful to not let Columbus commercials or WBNS ID's out over the air. WBNS' ID got out a few times but no one ever said anything.

[nutballgazette]

Almost all major sports networks do parallel feeds that are not affected by the breaks, bulletins, weather warnings or other potential interruptions by the "flagship" stations. During local break time, the net will maintain either effect mike audio for stadium/arena natural ambient sound, rejoin music, or silence.

I've board operated for many a game, and back in the days when the net feed was the flagship station's audio, dozens of board ops along the line would play "cat and mouse" with the net trying to keep unwanted flagship station ID's and the like off the air.

When I board-opped in college in Toledo, our sports station (WLQR) used a "dirty" feed for the John Cooper and Jim O'Brien call-in shows and a clean feed for OSU football and basketball games. These were the feeds provided by the Ohio News Network and flagship WBNS. All local breaks were silent during the games, but for the call-in shows you had to be careful to not let Columbus commercials or WBNS ID's out over the air. WBNS' ID got out a few times but no one ever said anything.

One time while I was in Miami the local station carried the Yankees feed of a game, but who ever was the board op never switched back to their regular programs and WCBS 880 all night,

[jcs]

When The Hawks were in the playoffs, The schedule conflicted many times with The Cubs
On WGN 720, bumping the Hawks to 560 WIND. WGN has to give priority to the Cubs, due
to their arrangement with the team. The Cubs eventually agreed to move to WIND, so the
final playoff games could be on the stronger flagship WGN.

That's stupid.  Since when did Chicago have any hockey fans?  The Cubs and WGN should have stood their ground and honored their contract, not let that other team bully them and steal their radio home.

[MattParker]

During the great Northeast blackout of 2003 normally all-news WCBS moved a Yankee game to sister station WFAN so they could report on what was going on. Even though CBS also has sister station WINS carrying an all-news format, this is the kind of emergency where you would expect people to flock to their radios, thus the change for one night.

On the other hand, the Yankees were playing a post-season game when the Staten Island Ferry crashed into the dock and WCBS did not interrupt the game or cover the disaster immediately.  The CBS Radio Network was forced to go to CBS2 TV reporters to get voice reports and sound for the network.  WCBS later said they were contractually required to stay with the game.

[Scott Fybush]

That wouldn't be the case now - "Newsradio 880" keeps going for streaming listeners (and 101.1-HD3?) while there's a game on the AM signal.