All News In Cincinnati..Why Not try it on 97.3?

[microbob]

As Hubbard owns WTOP it could draw on the resources of that station for any national story along with the expertise of the those involved in programming. TOP is the highest billing station in the country although it is expensive to run.


Bonneville knew they were going to sell 97.3 to Hubbard and decided not to act on that CP. There was some speculation that the tower and power increase would have not made much of a difference in improvement in signal.

[major]

This would work well, especially when the rights to the Bengals come up.

Hubbard does sports well (MSP and STL for instance).

Anything to get rid of Lapham,and I'm for it.  Also, include my wife and two brothers.

[MikeStandardsFromIndiana]

Even if Hubbard got the rights to Broadcast the Bengals. the Bengals still Control the Broadcasts its self not the station. so Lapham wont go no where if Hubbard stole the rights from Clear channel. Lapham works for Mike Brown and mike brown has had the bengals broadcast team in house for a very long time now. so even of 97.3 or any other Hubbard station got the bengals. Mike brown still controls who is part of the broadcast team and one of those is sadly Dave Lapham

[almaniac27]

Even if Hubbard got the rights to Broadcast the Bengals. the Bengals still Control the Broadcasts its self not the station. so Lapham wont go no where if Hubbard stole the rights from Clear channel. Lapham works for Mike Brown and mike brown has had the bengals broadcast team in house for a very long time now. so even of 97.3 or any other Hubbard station got the bengals. Mike brown still controls who is part of the broadcast team and one of those is sadly Dave Lapham

Even sadder, we're stuck with Alan Cutler too. Not only is Mike Brown woefully incompetent at running an NFL franchise, he's bad at recognizing broadcasting ability as well. And people still ask me why I stopped caring about the Bengals years ago.

[Cincinnati Kid]

Mike Brown does not want anyone on the air who will criticize the Bengals, its players or its coach.  As such, listeners to Benglas radio broadcasts must endure Dave Lapham's continued rooting and his interuptions of the play-by-play announcer and Alan Cutler talking on and on and on with no airing of telephone calls.  I assume the thought is if you say only good things, some people may actually start believing them.     

[TANKSBACK]

Hubbard does own WTOP in Washington, D.C. but you can't expect anything even close to the ratings and revenue of that station here in Cincy.  The WTOP signals come from 3 stations total, a class B licensed to D.C. itself, a class A in northern Virginia, and another class B in Maryland, north of D.C., plus a translator in northern Virgina in Leesburg.  (103.5, 107.7 and 103.9 to be precise).  I lived in D.C. for 10 years, and believe me that's a lot of coverage.

[grey_dan]

I don't see any future for all news on 97.3 either.  To make all-news work, you need a strong signal, strong personalities, and a strong local presence (both on air and in the community).  And as we've seen with several all-news tryouts lately, sometimes that still isn't enough.  It takes a lot of money and patience to invest into an all-news startup, and I don't think 97.3 is the kind of signal they'd want to make that kind of investment into.  As for Columbus, I agree with what Del_griffith said: I applaud NABCO's effort, but I have serious doubts about their ability to stay in it for the long haul.

About the only way I could see anyone trying FM news or news/talk in Cincy right now is if CC flips WEBN to a WLW simulcast*.  Most of the other big signals in town are doing well enough that the owners probably aren't going to want to kill off their current formats any time soon--though perhaps if all forms of Oldies, Country or Top 40 cycle down in a few years, that discussion might be worth revisiting. 

(*Caveat: I could conceivably see CC putting WLW on an FM HD/translator combo.  But I think that would be the means to test interest in a full-power WLW FM, not the end itself.)

All sports was also mentioned in this thread.  While I think that could work on a slightly weaker signal, the station would need a few things:
1) to wrestle the ESPN and/or Fox Sports rights away from CC (Yahoo! Sports as your primary network isn't going to cut it, and FSR is unlikely since that is essentially a CC property);
2) to grab the Reds and/or Bengals rights away from CC (some college rights would be nice too, but in a pro-sports market you need a pro team to carry the station); and
3) at least one strong local drive-time host (Mo/Lance?  Would either of them be strong enough to carry the station?  Ken Broo possibly could, but unless he had some financial stake in the station I wouldn't see him leaving Ch. 5 for a M-F shift.  Fuhrman's been out-of-sight, out-of-mind for too long in this market to make an impact, IMO.)

If Hubbard had their hearts set on doing all-sports in this market, I think they'd have deep enough pockets to fund it.  But would the potential payoff be great enough for them to want to try?  (I personally think they'd try something else first... Alternative ("The Sound") perhaps... but you never know.)