Brother Wease?

[yugoidar]

Our friend, Mr. Radknowski, mentioned Brother Wease in another post.  Not much said about him lately on these boards.  Just curious, how's the Brother's sales career going?  Anybody heard?

[umtrr-author]

Can't answer the sales career question, however...

At a concert this past week, a Fox person (on air talent?  I don't know) publically announced that we would be hearing Wease again "before the Bills season is over."  Although he hastened to add "before the season is over, not before they are mathematically eliminated".

[the maildude]

"The Fox" website, on http://www.fox951.com/pages/bwupdate.html  quotes JP Hastings' announcement that Brother Wease would return to the airwaves "95 days from today". That would be on November 17th.

[Bob1370]

Word now is that the November 17 date is an outside date...it could conceivably come a little sooner, I've heard the previous week (the week of the 10th) though things can always change.

Fox is already putting on quickie promos featuring snippets of phone calls talking about Wease and how much the caller misses him.

From a purely legal standpoint he could conceivably walk in and start on the air tomorrow morning now that Paterson signed the law against non-competes that stretch beyond the length of an employee contract. But that's not going to happen.

Right now the two biggest issues are assembling the on-air team that's going to work with him (a process that started recently) and recommissioning the studio.

The former will take some time, since it's not likely that many of Wease's old crew who stayed behind at 'CMF this winter thinking he'd return, and wound up assigned to handle a morning show without him, will be free to walk across town (unless Entercom didn't lock them in contractually). The ads for new talent are still running in the national trades. No one's saying much about how that's going--but they'll want to take their time, since a show like Wease's relies a lot on the chemistry of the people working with him.

The latter may not take so long. Word is, when the old CBS cluster sold off and closed down at HSBC, and CMF and PXY moved to Mill Street, Wease's old studio was never disassembled. The furniture and reportedly most or all of the equipment stayed in place. Clear Channel's moving into the old CBS studio suite at HSBC this fall when 207 Midtown closes down in preparation for the wrecking ball, and it's just a matter of firing up the equipment again and setting up the STLs out to the Baker Hill transmitter site.

[luvcoors]

Amazing...more incorrect info being given.

He cannot start tomorrow if he wanted since the newly signed bill doesn't grandfather in previous deals that were signed w/noncompetes.  The studio thing and adding a team aren't the 2 main hurdles...they're 2nd and 3rd after waiting for his noncompete to go bye bye.  Why do you think the announcement was made this morning?

If he was to walk on the air tomorrow...the Entercom lawyers would go to work.  I'd be shocked if any of the current CMF crew joined him.  Besides, their current deals and non-competes I'm sure would prevent that from happening for another 18 months at least.

Besides...if Wease was legally able to go on the air tomorrow...they'd launch him solo while lining up enough guests to balance out the amount of talk on the show anyway.

[Bob1370]

"He cannot start tomorrow if he wanted since the newly signed bill doesn't grandfather in previous deals that were signed w/noncompetes."

Actually, I don't think that's true.

If you've seen the language of the bill (as I have--you can go to the State Assembly site to see for yourself), and if I'm reading it correctly and haven't missed something, it appears clearly to render ALL non-competes in EXPIRED contracts unenforceable, regardless of when those contracts were first signed--no qualifications or exceptions whatsoever for contracts written before the effective date of the law, which was immediately on gubernatorial signature. There is a clause which addresses, and recognizes, the ability of a company to enforce a valid contract when a performer tries to jump it BEFORE its expiration date, and it's only right to have it there, but that's a whole other matter.

This bill was clearly designed to blow away all non-competes in expired contracts involving talent not currently working, as well as prevent them from ever being included in future talent contracts signed in New York State. I don't see any other way to read it.

That leaves, of course, the question of how long it takes to build an ensemble show (like this one's going to be) from scratch now that the way is clear.

First there's the selection of the ensemble cast around Wease, and that's not going to be done in a day or a week or probably even a month.

Second, they'll need time to do a lot of pre-production of show elements to nail down everything from formatics to bumper music to creation and selection of regular feature elements, all of which has to start well in advance of the premiere day.

Then there's the question of getting everyone who's been hired for the show to mesh as personalities. That is definitely going to take some time and more than a few off-air rehearsal shows even after the studio's built and the team's been assembled and signed and production elements like bumpers and liners in the can, if they want to do it right.

Finally, there's going to be the promotional buildup to Wease's relaunch, which ought to begin at least 3 or 4 weeks before the debut date.

Bottom line, it's still going to take two or three months to build this show from scratch if they're going to do it right, and it looks like they intend to do it right.

[luvcoors]

This is starting to become a recurring theme between us since I seem to be the one using rational/current thought & common sense while having 1st hand knowledge of the discussion topics.

Yes, the old contract expired in Nov. 2007 containing a 1 yr. non compete.  Talks continued but in mid-Dec., it was announced they couldn't agree on a new deal.  More talks about the non-compete, ruled it had to be enforced.  But, it allowed Wease to begin working for CC as he did months ago in an off-air capacity (building his show off-air, meeting with clients, etc.)  They've been looking for morning show co-hosts for months. 

All of this was set in motion so that in the event of this bill passing (depending on it's language)...he could start immediately or a lot sooner than November.  This bill has been in motion since Jan. 2007 and underwent 3 revisions.  I can safely assume that the possibility of this bill passing has been discussed along the way and it was decided that fighting for an immediate return to the air was impossible to win and not worth it's associated costs on the CC side.  I can also safely assume that Entercom would have filed to have the non-compete clause upheld at this point after the bill passed for a variety of reasons since it does behoove them to protect their interests based on everything involved.  There's been numerous examples of CC also fighting non-competes in other markets without success...which has also caused them to enter into agreements with Citadel and other companies about no longer pursuing their desire to have non-competes lifted in these situations.

The language of the bill is somewhat vague about expired contracts...I've read it and that's my interpretation.  If someone chose to fight it now since they have 9 months left in their non-compete...probably would be a successful result.  But for someone with 90 days, it would take that long to fight and grab a ruling now.

As I said before...they've been looking to fill his show with co-hosts for weeks now.  I'm sure they could have a show in pace and ready for launch in 2-3 weeks if they were legally allowed to have him on the air.  Your reasoning about needing time for bumpers, production elements, etc....guarantee that's already mostly or completely done already since they'd want to launch ASAP if they legally could.  Your point about having a few rehearsal show...LOL.  That takes place during the launch...this is a local morning show, not a prep to luanch a national show.  You can't pre-plan how a talk show like this is gonna happen...c'mon...think about it!

Yes...you're right about having promotional build-up...why do think they made the announcement today about it being 95 days away?  Why would they do that, if there wasn't a better than 50/50 shot of him coming sooner?  Because it was already decided he can't come back legally before then!

[bobn]

1.  His contract expired Dec 31, 2007.  Know it for a fact.   That's why he worked for ETM for a month.
2.  He will not be back until the date they announced.  There must be a legal reason for this.  All of the other "bob 1370" speculation is wrong.  The new law will not change this.  That's why they had an announcement.
3. Wease's studio is not 'in tact."   Entercom did not buy CBS station, and abandon all the equipment.  Either they took it with them (Wease's studio board is in a production studio on Mill Street) or it belongs to Stephans.  NO ONE buys equipment that works and leaves it behind.   CCU would probably want to buy new stuff.  They did leave the furniture since it was smelly.  I worked at the building (I don'tanymore).  I smelled it.
4.  You guys need hobbies.  Real hobbies.  Read to the blind, volunteer at the salvation army.  Seriously.  You argue about stuff you know nothing about, like you have facts.  Bob, this is especially scary coming from you.  If I am not mistaken, you are on the radio.  Perhaps a little more show prep.

[luvcoors]

bobn....

Hmmm curious to know who you are.  But I still say his deal expired in Nov. 2007.  If his deal expired 12/31/07...he wouldn't be allowed on the air until then instead of 95 days from now.  I don't think anyone shaved off a month of his non-compete. 

I also think what's been mentioned about his studio still being intact, is that it's useable to a degree.  The soundproofing, most of the wiring, etc.  The only real equipment in there was mics, phone hybrid, and furniture.  Board was in main studio that went to High Falls from what I know.

We can chat further via PM if you wish.

[The Voice of Reason]

FYI
On Channel 10's website the station is reporting that Wease will back on the air November 17th.