ESPN’s Sage Steele was under fire in September 2021 after she appeared on Uncut with Jay Cutler and expressed her thoughts on The Walt Disney Company’s mandate for employees to receive the COVID-19 vaccine. She stated that she did not want to receive the vaccine but did so in order to keep her job. Despite making other comments that raised debate, her comments pertaining to the vaccine reportedly perturbed ESPN leadership.
The company coerced Steele to apologize in a statement and duly suspended her thereafter. Upon her return, she was removed from various coveted assignments, such as the Rose Parade and New York City Marathon.
Steele filed a lawsuit against ESPN and The Walt Disney Company last April, and the legal battle is beginning to intensify in the Connecticut Superior Court. Her lawyer’s argument is that Connecticut does not allow private employers to discipline their employees when they engage in speech protected by the U.S. Constitution, the location of that speech notwithstanding. She ascertains that since the comments were stated “on her own time and on matters of significant public interest,” they are protected under the law.
ESPN anchor Sage Steele told Jay Cutler it was “fascinating” Obama indicated he was Black on his census form “considering his Black dad was nowhere to be found.” pic.twitter.com/dfrnDydFd8
— Resist Programming ???? (@RzstProgramming) October 3, 2021
Additionally, it is noted how the company neglected to discipline co-workers who criticized and/or harassed Steele for her viewpoints. Steele initially filed a human resources complaint with the company last February, and she was quickly offered the chance to co-host The Masters Tournament. Her attorneys call the move “a blatant admission of liability,” and compelled Steele to file a lawsuit two months later.
“If you’re an anchor for a network, you are the face of that network,” Devin McRae, a partner at Early Sullivan Wright Gizer & McRae, told Variety. “And anytime somebody is the public face of the company, and they start talking about the company, they might be opening themselves up to some kind of discipline from the company, including termination. But Connecticut has this interesting law that protects her.”
ESPN’s executive editor and head of event and studio production Norby Williamson told Steele during her suspension that she had “whacked the company” and checked in to see if she was okay. Former senior vice president of production and content strategy Jill Frederickson told Steele of colleagues who were hurt by the comments, but purportedly was looking to get a response by asking others directly for their thoughts.
The Walt Disney Company is currently in the midst of a lawsuit against Florida governor Ron DeSantis, alleging it was punished after publicly criticizing the Parental Rights in Education Act. The legislation, colloquially referred to as the “Don’t Say Gay” law, prohibits instruction pertaining to sexual orientation and gender identity to students ranging from kindergarten to the third grade.
After its public statements, DeSantis signed a bill that revoked the company’s control of the Reedy Creek Improvement District, instead being subject to oversight by Orange County. Following arguments by Disney that it could not happen after the state paid $1 billion of outstanding bond debt, DeSantis called for a special legislative session to finalize the decision. In the end, Disney was granted the ability to retain its special tax district; however, DeSantis was bestowed the ability to appoint a board governing it, which he subsequently stacked in his favor. Little did DeSantis know that the outgoing board completed an agreement that transferred a preponderance of control back to The Walt Disney Company, rendering the new board somewhat impotent. Once the new board approved a resolution nullifying the secret deal, Disney sued DeSantis.
“I wholeheartedly agree with Disney’s position that in America, the government cannot punish you for speaking your mind,” Steele said in a statement. “In my opinion, it begins and ends with diversity of thought. We must fight to preserve that fundamental constitutional right.”
Just how Steele’s lawsuit ends up unfolding could guide the progression of the case involving DeSantis, who is now vying for the Republican nomination for president of the United States.
“This case is about one thing and one thing only, and that’s retaliating against Sage Steele for exercising her right to free speech under Connecticut law,” said attorney Bryan Freedman, who has been in private meditation with the company. “Disney’s legal position concerning the actions that led to this lawsuit with Sage Steele is a significant legal inconsistency that could cause Disney self-inflicted harm in the Florida courts. Disney should be very careful here.”
FOX News has had its share of struggles with conservative pundits this year. Plenty of voices that used to only praise the network turned on it following the firing of Tucker Carlson. On Wednesday morning though, Tony Katz, a prominent conservative voice in Indiana, was defending one of FOX’s high profile talents.
Donald Trump took to Truth Social on Tuesday night to complain that FOX’s Kayleigh McEnany deliberately shared poll numbers that made his lead over Florida Governor Ron DeSantis amongst Republicans look smaller than it actually is.
“Kayleigh McEnany was his press secretary. Kayleigh McEnany was on CNN defending him back in the day,” Katz said Wednesday on WIBC in Indianapolis. “This post is stupid.”
Although he has been a supporter of the former president in the past, Katz said that Trump’s attack on a former staffer that was charged with defending him and his policy is proof that he has no loyalty to anyone but himself.
McEnany served as the White House Press Secretary for the final year of Donald Trump’s term in office. She left the post following the inauguration of Joe Biden in January of 2021. She has been on FOX News since March of that year.
“This is a pathetic move from Trump. Unnecessary,” Katz said. “This is the lashing out of an angry old man who can’t seem to find his pudding cup. And that’s not the way I want to think of him and that’s not the message he wants to move forward! If he wants to get elected, this is ridiculous. I hate the unforced error. I hate it. But he’s so good at it. He can’t figure out how not to do it.”
The Walt Disney Company recently announced its acquisition of Pat McAfee and his signature eponymous digital show on a multiyear, multi-million dollar contract at its Upfront event earlier this month. The value of that agreement is now being reported as five years and approximately $85 million, according to Andrew Marchand of the New York Post.
In a direct message exchange with the writer, McAfee only divulged the the value of the contract was an “interesting number.”
The agreement is reportedly similar to that of Peyton Manning and Omaha Productions, as The Pat McAfee Show will remain a presentation of Pat McAfee, Inc. and will give him full creative control over his show. This includes welcoming guests from other reporting outlets, such as Ian Rapoport of NFL Network and Shams Charania of The Athletic and Stadium among others.
ESPN will assist McAfee and his team with behind-the-scenes work, believing that it will achieve higher ratings and attract greater advertising revenue than the programs currently airing in the time slot – SportsCenter and This Just In, hosted by Max Kellerman. McAfee’s show will air for two hours a day, presumably on ESPN’s primary linear cable channel, while also streaming on ESPN+ and YouTube.
“Their production assets, league rights capabilities and access to everything in the sports world makes us incredibly pumped about the possibilities and can’t wait to get started this fall,” McAfee said. “Jimmy and I had a lot of great [conversations] through this whole process… some Zooms, calls (WHADD), texts (WHADD), emails (WHADD). It was a cool couple of months negotiation phase involving a lot of different factors.”
McAfee will be walking away from his contract with FanDuel – reportedly worth four years and $120 million – a business matter on which the company declined comment. In his direct message exchange, McAfee stated he could still do business with the company down the road and that the company will always experience success. Meanwhile, the company has yet to publicly recognize that McAfee is even exiting the contract.
“I’m thinking there’s a chance we’ll have an effect on sports media as a whole,” McAfee said. “That’s cool to think about for a dude who wasn’t accepted into the NFL’s Broadcast Bootcamp on a few different occasions.”
Diamond Sports Group, a subsidiary of Sinclair Broadcast Group, operates the Bally Sports regional networks, and, up until Wednesday, had broadcast rights for 14 of the 30 Major League Baseball teams. After broadcasting Tuesday night’s San Diego Padres game, the company relinquished the team’s local broadcast rights and returned them to Major League Baseball.
That prematurely ends a 20-year, $1.2 billion deal that was set to run through 2032, and just how the Padres will recoup the $60 million per year from these rights is unknown. The landmark decision not to pay the team by the end of the grace period threatens the future of the Bally’s-branded regional sports networks as the entity navigates Chapter 11 bankruptcy. The news was first reported by John Ourand of Sports Business Journal before being confirmed by both parties.
Major League Baseball will stream the team’s games for free through Sunday, and will also make the contests available to watch on a variety of linear broadcast channels. It will utilize the same announcers since they are employed by the team, and by and large, the same directors, producers and camera people, as they are freelancers. After Sunday, fans in the team’s home market can subscribe to MLB.TV for $19.99 a month or $74.99 for the remainder of the regular season. They will also be able to view games on several linear TV providers such as DirecTV and Spectrum.
Because the rights will no longer be held by Diamond Sports Group, Padres games will not be subject to blackouts, a frequent topic of debate among sports fans and one of concern for sports leagues. The league also divulged that the reach is expected to increase by 189% from 1.13 million to nearly 3.27 million, an increase of 2.13 million homes.
“We have been preparing for this groundbreaking moment,” said Padres CEO Erik Greupner in a statement. “The Padres are excited to be the first team to partner with Major League Baseball to offer a direct-to-consumer streaming option through MLB.TV without blackouts while preserving our in-market distribution through traditional cable and satellite television providers. Our fans will now have unprecedented access to Padres games through both digital and traditional platforms throughout San Diego and beyond.”
“Through the power of Major League Baseball and the Padres, we are working to elevate the game broadcast experience for all Padres fans,” added Billy Chambers, MLB Executive Vice President, Local Media. “New technology, better picture quality and increased access are just a few of the items we are working on to better tell the story each and every night.”
The league filed an emergency court motion against Diamond Sports Group after it defaulted on five rights payments to Major League Baseball teams – the Arizona Diamondbacks; Cincinnati Reds; Cleveland Guardians; Minnesota Twins and Texas Rangers. It believes the entity is profiting off of deals it is not paying their rights fees for, and stated it would be ready to take over broadcasts for teams if necessary. MLB will be doing just that with the Padres, and there is a chance it could be the first of many dominoes to fall. A federal bankruptcy judge will hear the case today, and is expected to make a ruling sometime in the next two days regarding Diamond Sports Group’s obligation to pay the teams.
KFAN is a unique brand in the sports radio world. Sure, there are plenty of stations that approach sports as part of pop culture, but as Greg Alexander points out in our conversation: How many of those stations have had the same air staff in place for virtually two decades?
It’s a legendary brand, and yet it still flies under the radar nationally. Let’s change that.
Alexander is the market manager of iHeart Minneapolis. He is also the subject of today’s Meet the Market Managers column, presented by Point-To-Point Marketing.
In our conversation, he talks about this unpredictable economy, how the prioritization of on demand content effects radio advertisers, and what the barrier is to adding more play-by-play content on his station. Enjoy!
Demetri Ravanos: You have a really diverse cluster in terms of formats and audiences. I would imagine, given the way that KFAN talks about sports, it sets itself up really well for joint buys, whether that is with one other station or the entire cluster. Is there good opportunity for audience crossover?
Greg Alexander: Yes, for sure. KFAN’s audience is diverse because of the personalities that we have and the topics they go after every day. It’s not hardcore sports and that’s where we have the success with KFAN that we’ve had. So that attracts people from our country stations and our classic hits station and our CHR station. There is real cross-pollination between the stations in our cluster.
DR: I know as a market manager, your focus is always going to be on how the station and the personalities are perceived by the market. Nationally though, I do wonder if you guys feel like you get enough credit for the kind of brand KFAN is. It’s a powerhouse in terms of ratings, influence and revenue. Sometimes our format gets laser-focused on New York, Philadelphia and Boston. We don’t always give everybody outside of I-95 the credit they deserve, and your station may be at the very top of that list.
GA: Yeah, KFAN is incredibly healthy. You probably have the history on that. It’s built through many years. We just celebrated Eric Nordquist’s tenth year with the station, and he’s our youngest tenured personality and producer on the air. The next closest one is like 19 years, I think.
It’s just an established brand with established personalities who are very creative and they’re very entertaining. With that formula, people in Minnesota grow up on the station. People want to find out the takes or the how someone’s going to handle something. They tune in on a daily, weekly, monthly basis for that. This is where I give credit to (KFAN PD) Chad Abbott and (iHeart Minneapolis VP of Programming) Gregg Swedberg. They’ve created four different shows and Chad will tell you, we’ve got four morning shows. That’s how powerful these different dayparts are. In the morning it’s, ‘Hey, what are these guys doing? I want to be part of that club to P.A. from 9 to noon,’ which is ‘What will his take be with the Vikings today?’ Then we go to Common’s bits and then a hard hitting show with Barreiro. Listeners want to know what is his take on some major news story that may be taking place in the market or nationally and that’s the scope that he has.
DR: How do you sort of convey that to advertisers, be it new partners or long established? I mean, to your point, you have had people on that station for decades and you have had listeners experience life events with them from dealing with their own illnesses to spouses’ illnesses. You had a member of your morning show come out on air recently. How do you even begin to convey to a business what the value is of the fact that the audience cares about the people they hear on KFAN in this way?
GA: Well, I think it truly goes back to our personalities, the engagement that they can create and the realness of who they are. Making big announcements, personal announcements like that; that just makes them human beings as well as entertainers. Listeners are engaged in that. They feel as they’re driving into work, there’s someone next to them that’s their partner and that’s their friend, and they want to find out what their friend is up to – good, bad or indifferent. When they’re driving home or listening at work, they want to know what these these personalities are up to because they’re part of their friend group.
These people are entertaining and they’re engaging and you want to know more about them because they’re human beings. You follow them on Twitter, so you find out what they’re doing on weekends. Social media has been a huge part of their success because you can continue that conversation outside of the three or three-and-a-half hours that they may be on.
DR: Your company was kind of at the forefront, at least among the national brands, of recognizing that radio stations should be investing in digital content as well. So tell me about the changes you’ve seen in how – again, I’ll ask about the clients – because I would imagine going from when KFAN first started recognizing the value of digital to now you are talking with advertisers that are much more savvy about the value of that space.
GA: I just was on a panel and I talked about this. It’s really the thirst that the audience has for our station and our personalities. It’s just bellowing out, and so that leads into social media. So, you know, what we saw first initially was our streaming numbers being massive, and that’s because people wanted to know what our personalities were doing with the shows we’re doing when they left the market or just were outside of our market in terms of Minneapolis. Then the thirst for the personalities led to podcasting and, ‘Let’s do an extra show and just sit there and BS for a little bit longer.’ Well, those numbers are massive. The Power Trip, our morning show, is the 33rd-ranked podcast within iHeart. I mean, that’s massive. That doesn’t happen in a market this size.
Obviously, Twitter grew up and that’s where it really exploded. These guys jumped on Twitter. Our station jumped on Twitter over some of the other social media and that has blown up. You can see what these numbers are: over 200,000 followers.
It’s just for that thirst of, ‘What is P.A. going to say and who’s he going to talk about and what’s his take on something?’ You can get that for three hours each day from 9 to noon, but then, ‘Hey, I see he’s at the horse track on Friday nights or Saturdays’ in the off-season or, ‘What rumors is he talking about?’ In social media and different media platforms, we just continue to extend the brand and what our guys are.
DR: You’ve been in the iHeart system for a long time. I think you predate the name iHeart. So, tell me a little bit about how you have seen that shift in terms of the importance of the broadcast product. Is it still what the company puts out front when discussing itself or pitching to advertisers? How has that shifted over the time you’ve been there?
GA: The broadcast is still the foundation of who we are. I always look at it as how you’re obtaining the content. So I tell people I used to go on a run and I’d have a Walkman and I’d be listening to KFAN. Well, nowadays I go on a run and I put my phone on and I’m still capturing the same show; I’m just doing it through a stream. Technological advances allow us to do that, but it’s still the entertainment and that engagement that I have with the shows. Our listeners do the same thing. It’s just a technological change and access.
Again, this panel I was on – I told 200 people just last week that social media is the greatest thing that’s happened to our personalities because you couldn’t interact with a personality other than maybe getting through on a phone call, which we don’t even do a ton of phone calls anymore. Now I know what he’s doing on a Friday night. I know what Barreiro is doing on a Saturday. Chris Hawkey – I know what band he’s performing with and what location on a Saturday night. And so now I’m closer and can be more engaged with our personalities than ever before, so social media has been a fantastic thing for our personalities.
DR: Forget the the hierarchy of broadcast versus digital for a second. For so long we wondered what the best way to go about monetizing our digital products was. Now, I wonder if you’ve ever encountered a situation where you have an advertiser that sees more value in being on those on-demand products over the live feed – over-the-air; the stream; whatever the case that may be. As a society, we kind of crave on-demand more than working on any network’s or station’s schedule these days.
GA: I think clients will look at the extension products, a rebroadcast of a podcast or an additional podcast. They may look at that as a new audience for them. We talk to clients all the time about, ‘Hey, you want to be on the broadcast, advertise there live,’ but then also the rebroadcast because people aren’t listening to the broadcast and then they’re going to go back and listen to the rebroadcast. So you’ve got to capture that entire audience. They know the best way to do that is advertise on both mediums.
DR: Yeah, that that makes a lot of sense. Tell me a little bit about your play-by-play goals and strategy for KFAN, because you had the Vikings, the Gophers and the Wild and in my mind, obviously as a lifelong Southerner, so I might be stereotyping here, but you have the Vikings and you have hockey in Minnesota. You’re pretty well covered, right? Is there a desire to add more if the opportunity became available or given what you have, is the bar set so high that maybe you don’t need more right now?
GA: It comes down to time, honestly. You know, we love to be the sports leader. We’d love to have a lot of sports teams. We’re really happy with the Vikings, Wild and Gophers. We also have the St. Paul Saints. We play a couple of their games on the weekends. It’s on FAN Plus the rest of the time, but if we can get creative and we can have more of that sports audience and ability to work with the franchises, that would be fantastic. We just have to work through the amount of time that stuff is on the air and conflicts that could arise from that.
DR: We are trying to forecast the economy right now and it is tricky, but are there any sectors that you look at as sort of a microcosm for the big picture? Is there any sector you can look at and say, ‘If that’s okay, we’re okay,’ or, ‘If that’s off, that could spell trouble down the road’?
GA: It’s a good question. The uncertainty is is everywhere. You talk to one company, and they’re struggling. You talk to another company; they’re doing great. That’s what’s so weird about what we’re dealing with from an economic standpoint.
You’ve been around. We’ve both seen economic uncertainty in the market before. I was in New York when 9/11 happened. I was there in Miami when the housing bubble burst and Miami was just destroyed. I was obviously here for the pandemic. Every one of those is a little bit different, but this one is probably the most different because we are getting a positive and a negative on the same day and it counteracts. I mean, we raise our our interest to 7% and boom, unemployment goes down. How is that supposed to happen?
DR: I heard an economics professor speak after he put out a paper basically saying, ‘Hey, by definition, we’re not in a recession. People are spending like we’re not in a recession.’ So on and so forth. The rebuttal actually, I thought was very poignant, which was, ‘Okay, if we’re not technically in a recession, but we believe we’re in a recession or the the general feeling is we’re in a recession, is that any different than being in a recession?’ I guess it goes to your point, like we don’t know what information we’re getting right now.
GA: You’ve got housing that’s still going up and you got interest rates that just went up today or yesterday. It’s wild.
We’ve got car dealers that are doing well, but then you’ve got car dealers who aren’t getting cars because of the the slowdown there. So, I mean, every day; every client we talk to, it’s one thing or the other. It’s just it’s so wild because everyone’s like, ‘It’s going to change,’ you know? But we’ve been saying that for probably 12 months now.
For just the second time in the team’s history, the Florida Panthers are advancing to the Stanley Cup Final – and in large part due to the play of goaltender Sergei Bobrovsky. He was having an excellent start to the year; that is, until he appeared on Tobin & Leroy on 560 WQAM, the flagship radio home of the Panthers.
Brendan Tobin, one of the show’s hosts, has a good relationship with Bobrovsky and booked him as a guest, but the interview can be traced back as a harbinger of strife and misfortune. It led Bobrovsky to lose playing time to journeyman goalie Alex Lyon, and caused fans of the midday radio program to speculate as to the legitimacy of considering Tobin to be a bonafide jinx.
Ever since that time, Tobin has conveyed his desire to have Bobrovsky on the show again, and does not believe interviewing him is a potential jinx. Yet his co-host, former NFL running back Leroy Hoard, along with many listeners have exhorted Tobin to keep him off the air until the team hoists the Stanley Cup.
“The audience is getting really, really mad at me because I want to go interview him,” Tobin said. “I don’t plan on interviewing him just as the bit of the show, but just teasing them that I’m going to do it and then being mad at me has been kind of a funny side story and our own little thing with the Panthers run.”
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Sports in the Miami area have drawn worldwide attention over the last two months, accentuated by the championship-caliber play of the Panthers and excitement surrounding the upcoming Stanley Cup Final. Virtually no one in the hockey landscape expected the team to be there, especially competing as the Eastern Conference’s eighth seed. The Panthers ended up delivering the upset of the playoffs by knocking out the record-setting Boston Bruins, and have continued to shock the world in the games thereafter.
When the Panthers clinched a Stanley Cup Final berth on the strength of a last-second game-winning goal by forward Matthew Tkachuk, the Miami Heat were up three games to one in the Eastern Conference Finals against the Boston Celtics. There was conversation among basketball pundits as to whether the eighth-seeded Heat, led by Jimmy Butler and Bam Adebayo, would be able to close out the series. While the Heat would generally dominate the parlance of conversation on Tobin’s sports radio show (80% Heat; 20% Panthers, as he puts it), his team decided to spend a majority of its time discussing the Panthers’ success that day.
“People always say that sports radio is driven by negativity. Maybe, but in my experience, I think most people want to come in to celebrate,” Tobin said. “I think most people like to come in and they want to be part of the party.”
For the first 18 years of his career, Tobin brought energy to 790 The Ticket in Miami, a station where he landed an internship by pestering its program director and showcasing his eager alacrity to take the mic. Tobin had an infatuation with sports radio from a young age, especially through watching his uncle, John Tobin, work in the industry.
John Tobin had been a host on WPDH and PYX 106, rock radio stations in upstate New York, and ultimately chose to switch formats and co-hosted an afternoon sports talk show with Freddie Coleman.
“I was kind of like a pseudo-intern if you will and [I] just laughed every day,” Brendan Tobin said of watching his uncle. “It just seemed like an amazing, fun way to make a living.”
Tobin attended Barry University and immediately joined WBRY, the campus radio station. The exposure to industry-standard equipment and invaluable repetitions prepared him well by the time he landed his coveted internship with 790 The Ticket, during which he assisted its morning drive host Sid Rosenberg.
“It was such a wild experience because he’s such a big personality, and you kind of could just see how a big ensemble show could work because he likes involving everybody in the show,” Tobin said of Rosenberg. “He [liked] talking to the intern and [gave] me hell my first days. He liked talking to his producer. He liked having interesting guests on, so that was a real eye-opening experience.”
For a stretch spanning over a decade, Tobin was producing morning shows and had the chance to work with Jonathan Zaslow on 790 The Ticket. Over the years, Zaslow had a variety of co-hosts – including Joy Taylor, Marc Hochman and Amber Wilson – and always brought his energy and creativity to the airwaves with input from Tobin and others from the station. When Hochman served as program director of 790 The Ticket, he recognized Tobin’s talent and gave him an opportunity to fill in as a host.
“It was back in the day where I’d have to send some samples to the program director,” Tobin said. “I remember the first thing that he told me after my first show was, ‘You’ve got some game.’ And so that was better than, ‘You suck.’”
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Tobin eventually found a home in morning drive with Hoard on 790 The Ticket beginning in 2016. The duo discovered it had instant chemistry and duly gained a foothold on the local airwaves. Through their partnership, Tobin established a distinctive hosting style centered around exuding passion. Hoard brings his playing acumen, along with an ample network including celebrities, athletes, billionaires and other prominent figures. Tobin says Hoard is “the life of the party” when he is off the air, a stark contrast to what happens when the show starts.
Indeed, it is Tobin who takes center stage and personifies what being a zealous sports fan sounds like. His personality is rich with idiosyncrasies and hallmarks that captivate consumers and play a part in ensuring the longevity of the show.
“Think about the lunatic fan with his wild theories, and he always has to hone that in,” Tobin said. “I think that’s what the audience likes about us. We’re an odd couple. We’ve got a little bit of a gap in age and experience. We come from different walks of life, and I just think it’s made magic for us since we’ve been put together.”
Being able to develop a conspicuous, interesting and vibrant sound in today’s saturated media ecosystem is a challenge unto itself, and Tobin knows how difficult it is to appeal to different generations of listeners. There is a faction of consumers that listens for the entirety of the show each day even as it has gone through monumental changes – most notably being aired on a new station at a new time of day.
In the fall of 2022, Audacy flipped the format of 790 The Ticket, leaving the local area with five teams and three sports radio stations. Because of this, Tobin and Hoard’s show was moved to 560 WQAM. They were in the midday time slot on their new station, a move that proved beneficial for Tobin. He is now part of his childrens’ morning routines and helps send them off to school, and in turn, avoids considerable traffic on his way to work.
Since moving to 560 WQAM, Tobin has communicated with morning drive host Joe Rose on a daily basis, and he has heard his perspectives on the market and changing state of sports media. Even though he had listened to the station in his youth, the move felt somewhat unusual. After all, Tobin had been with 790 The Game for his entire career, and he admits that he was a bit apprehensive about the transition.
“You’ve got a bit of a hermit life when you’re doing morning drive,” Tobin said. “You don’t interact with people as much, and I do think that with being in the middle of the day over at 560, it’s been a nice, healthier change.”
An additional positive aspect of the move is in the evolution of audience engagement. Whether it is through reviewing a text line, watching chat rooms on the program’s YouTube and Twitch video simulcasts, viewing social media platforms or answering phone calls, the group of people contacting Tobin have promptly come to understand the nature of the show. Moreover, they are aware of how to make contributions to guide or conceive pertinent discussion.
“They almost build their own personalities,” Tobin said. “We know who the guys are who are going to roast us, make fat jokes about me [or] make dumb jokes about me. All that stuff is very, very interesting, and a lot of the time, they’ve got news before I do because they’re on their computers and hitting us up with stuff.”
Yet the surfeit of methods for audiences to communicate with hosts creates somewhat of a content vortex. Largely in part from the success of the Panthers and Heat, Tobin finds he has constantly been tapped into local sports with little ability to step away and take a break.
“My wife was joking with me the other day; she’s like, ‘I can’t wait for the Heat to… win the championship so I can get you back’ because it’s been nonstop [between] the Panthers and Heat,” Tobin expressed. “I’ve been just interacting with fans, it feels like more than family over the last two weeks.”
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While a preponderance of listeners come from the local marketplace, they remain tuned into national outlets to watch live game broadcasts and shoulder programming. When ESPN’s analytics department gave the Miami Heat a 3% chance to reach the NBA Finals against the Celtics, fans pushed back on social media. Tobin is never shy to criticize the “Worldwide Leader” on the radio, nor does he abstain from calling out other media outlets for various reasons throughout the course of the year.
In the Eastern Conference Semifinals, Tobin recalls hearing that the weather was affecting the New York Knicks against the Heat, a statement he viewed as incomprehensible since the games are played at indoor venues.
“I think Miami gets a bad reputation nationally [and] doesn’t really get a good voice from some of the big networks,” Tobin said. “I think the audience appreciates [the criticism] because I don’t necessarily think that they have that feeling of respect nationally, [and] I think that kind of goes back to the old Canes days. People in Miami love the ‘us against the world’ mentality.”
Tobin believes coverage of the Panthers and Heat at the national level “really sucks,” so he takes matters into his own hands. He’s in the Miami Heat locker room after every home game talking to the players and gathering their thoughts to implement into his show. Tobin also has created digital series on Instagram centered around documenting his experiences at games – on which he proffers and demonstrates his self-professed disproportionality towards decrypting vague messaging.
“That stuff I love diving into,” Tobin said, “especially when I have Leroy because I’ll overreact to everything and he’ll call me an idiot and say, ‘It’s stupid and nothing,’ but that’s just the vibe we go on with things.”
In March, Ford announced it would be removing AM radio in its internal combustion engines in 2024 after it found electric vehicles caused electromagnetic interference with the signal’s reception. Following pressure from lawmakers and the introduction of the bipartisan “AM for Every Vehicle Act,” Ford decided to reverse course.
Even so, the threat of its elimination in motor vehicles is surely concerning. Tobin believes AM radio is habitual in and of itself, as it gives people a fast and free option to hear news, entertainment, sports and other content. Both the Panthers and the Heat call 560 WQAM their flagship station, and it is the place where many Miami sports fans heard their teams clinch championship berths.
“I do think the importance of it is that everybody has access to it,” Tobin said. “Even in this on-demand age where everybody can get access to everything, locally you’re happy to just kind of be in tune with, ‘Hey, this is going on in the market right now.’ That’s kind of the beauty of it, and I think that it has been cool that it’s been a run where we’ve had both teams on our station.”
Recognizing just what encompasses success as a radio host can be a difficult task since there are a wide array of determinants and external factors involved. Tobin recognizes how fortunate he has been to have the chance to disseminate his opinions to an audience and speak with prominent sports figures, including Pat Riley, Dwayne Wade and Dana White.
He is not focused on making bombastic opinions that instantly appeal and gratify consumers at one glance, recognizing the usual levity of the subject matter at hand.
“We’re talking about sports,” Tobin articulated. “It’s not life and death. It’s not politics. It’s not this maddening life-and-death battle that everybody tries to make everything these days. We are in kind of a silly sauce department of life, and that’s kind of how I define it.”
As the Panthers and Heat both sit four wins away from achieving the ultimate glory, Tobin is remaining focused on bringing Miami sports fans the local coverage of the teams they desire while keeping them entertained and enamored with the content.
“One of the things that I love about [the industry] is I do think that there are a lot of good people; a lot of talented people,” Tobin said. “I love the fact that now in today’s day and age, you don’t necessarily need a radio station to start building your audience and get good at this.”
For those looking to get into the industry, Tobin urges them to take advantage of technological advances and create their own opportunities with the intent to stand out and show prospective employers what they can bring to their organization. After all, he produced morning radio for over a decade and received a chance simply by being in the building and demonstrating his skills in other areas, including as an update anchor.
Now, Tobin has been hosting for the last seven years, and is just eager for that elusive championship. He and other Miami sports fans just might have double the fun if both teams can pull off what was initially regarded as a nearly impossible outcome.
“I’ve actually been really happy with the growth that we’ve had during these runs because I do think that winning does bring audience, and I do think that it brings people just discovering you,” Tobin expressed. “I’ve had so many people over these last four weeks just say, ‘I’ve never heard of you guys. I’m so happy that I have a place where I can go get some coverage of my favorite teams,’ because they don’t feel like they have that outlet necessarily.”
Like many of my age group, I’ve worked in every medium – print, digital, magazines, radio and TV.
Unlike most, I began on the cutting edge of new media in 1998 (yikes!), and 25 years later, I’ve found myself on the other end of the spectrum, namely AM radio.
Shouldn’t that be in reverse?
Well, it’s not, and that’s the point of this column. I find myself immersed in a medium everyone seems to be writing off, yet somehow, I am as professionally motivated and satisfied as ever.
Before unpacking that, a brief history. After freelancing for various newspapers and niche magazines while in graduate school, I received a big break late in the winter of ‘98 (yikes again!).
While a stringer for the Worcester Telegram & Gazette, I met David Albright at the NCAA Frozen Four. Who’s he? I have no idea what he’s up to these days, but back then, he was an early east coast employee of Starwave.
Starwave? You mean Star Lord from Guardians of the Galaxy? No, I mean Starwave.
You see, back then, the major sports entities – from the major pro leagues to ESPN – outsourced their nascent web operations. Websites like ESPN – it was called ESPN SportsZone back in the day – and the NFL were initially run by one company out of Seattle.
Starwave.
By ’98, someone at the top of the ESPN food chain must have realized what was to come because just before I went to Bristol, CT, they began to move editorial operations eastward. They also began the process of buying the business entirely.
You would think that anyone would jump at the chance to work at the Worldwide Leader, but it turns out, some folks liked the Starbucks coffee better in Seattle than the Dunkin’ in Bristol, Connecticut.
That meant openings in Bristol, and David Albright was my opening.
From our conversation in the hot dog line in the media space at the Garden (The Fleet Center back then?), I ended up with a job and quit graduate school to be an entry level editor ESPN.com. The site was so well regarded in Bristol that they literally put us in a basement (Building #3!), and almost none of the on-air talent would speak to us. I remember Danny O’Neil taping analysts off our TVs onto a run-of-the-mill audio recorder, transcribing the tape and then posting the copy on ESPN.com. That was a large part of his job.
Flash forward a few years, after John Walsh transformed the site, bringing on the likes of Bill Simmons and Hunter Thompson — and the internet became king — ESPN.com got more eyeballs than any ESPN show. Analysts begged for columns and real estate on the site. The culture of acceptance changed right before all of our eyes.
I wasn’t there for long, but I was there as things started to skyrocket.
Flash forward 25 years.
I work in AM radio.
Yes, that AM radio, the one they’re trying to keep out of new cars. The medium your parents and grandparents listened to, and you (me) remember crawling into your parents’ bed on snow days to wait for “S” in the alphabet to know that schools in Swampscott, MA were shut for the day.
FANG stocks (Facebook, Amazon, Netflix, Google) are where the growth is now, and radio is ANANG (All nostalgia and no growth).
But two things are true. I am totally happy. And I’ve totally changed how I operate.
First, the former. I am off script. I have direct input with booking. I can mix in everything I love – politics, business, sports, movies. Smaller staffs mean less opportunity for social media and public outreach, but it also means more editorial freedom.
That freedom has been positively cathartic, and the shows are awesome.
But as many of you know, terrestrial radio is a tough business right now. Life in AM radio is that much tougher. That’s where the operational shift comes into play.
Whereas just five years ago, I was a TV anchor who refused to even read promos. “I’m a journalist!” (said in a ‘pass the Grey Poupon’ type of voice). Now, I am actively talking with sales all the time, sharing ideas, even bringing people to them. I interact with businesses all the time, and some perfectly align with our values – and have owners who love the show.
Five years ago, I would have needed an exfoliating shower to deal with the grime, whereas now, I embrace it. Because I have to if I want the show to succeed – and keep doing the work I am enjoying so much.
I could never be in sales full time as that type of dialogue needed would probably wear me down over time. But if someone owns a business and says they listen every day, I might say, “Then come on board!”
I cultivate relationships because I truly enjoy people, and I believe audiences are built one listener at a time, and instead of scoffing at taking the next step, I just take it.
Who knows what will happen with a show like mine – succeed in AM, simulcast, syndicate … whatever. But it can still thrive if hosts help the business side. It should never impact the product – I always say I reserve the right to ask and say what I want – but it certainly can help keep the product on the airwaves a lot longer.
John LaBarca, a beloved figure in radio known for his enthusiasm and pride in his Italian roots, has sadly passed away at the age of 76, as confirmed by messages on his Facebook page. According to Only in Bridgeport, LaBarca, affectionately referred to as the “jovial giant,” captivated audiences with his flagship Sunday program, Italian House Party, which aired on various local radio stations, most notably WICC.
Hailing from Brooklyn, New York, LaBarca embarked on his career at Radio City Music Hall in Manhattan, where he quickly rose to the position of captain. This opportunity allowed him to cultivate his storytelling skills, captivating listeners with his engaging anecdotes and a knack for connecting with people. His tales revolved around relatable themes from his childhood, such as food, holidays, family, and music.
He also displayed remarkable generosity towards community organizations, utilizing his influential platform to support numerous charitable institutions.
LaBarca’s charisma was accompanied by a genuine sensitivity that allowed him to express tears and contagious laughter effortlessly. Embracing his bear-like stature, receiving a hug from him was a delightful experience filled with joy. Additionally, for a span of two decades, he served as the morning drive host on WICC from Monday to Friday, collaborating with esteemed individuals such as news director Tim Quinn and “Captain Traffic” Morgan Kaolian.
His immense popularity was evident when, following his departure from WICC in 2007, the station received an overwhelming influx of outraged phone calls from Connecticut and Long Island. LaBarca’s resonant voice and the station’s extensive reach had attracted a loyal following, extending as far as Long Island, a mere 20 miles away from WICC’s transmitter on Pleasure Beach.
The landscape of AM radio, reminiscent of LaBarca’s formative years, was undergoing significant changes, which LaBarca observed outside the broadcast booth.
“At one point, people grew up listening to me until corporate influence took over and lost sight of the true essence of AM radio,” he commented. “Instead of connecting with the audience, they opted for shows featuring confrontational arguments or rapid-fire conversations. AM radio has become excessively regimented.”
LaBarca witnessed the ups and downs of the industry, transitioning from one station to another in the years following his departure from WICC. However, recently, he discovered a new home at radio station WHLI, where he continued to share his Italian House Party with familiar and fresh listeners.
On “Fox & Friends First” Tuesday, Tomi Lahren of OutKick strongly criticized The New York Times for publishing a review of “The Little Mermaid” that denounced its absence of fun, boldness, and “unconventional elements.” Lahren expressed her strong disdain for the review, referring to it as “repugnant,” and warned companies about the importance of acknowledging the concerns of conservative parents.
“It’s completely disgusting that they would associate this with a children’s movie. But when these writers, these institutions, these publications tell you who they are, believe them. And again, this is just another notch in the belt with these leftist organizations sexualizing, exploiting children,” she said.
The review of The Times’s new live-action children’s film has sparked online backlash due to its critique suggesting the absence of “kink.”
According to movie critic Wesley Morris, who penned the review for The Times, “The new, live-action ‘The Little Mermaid’ embodies everything that nobody should desire in a movie: obedient and guarded, yet yearning for validation.”
“They have found the hill that conservatives and decent folks are willing to die on, protecting children. And we will do it every single time, ask Target, ask Bud Light, ask Kohl’s,” Lahren said. “We will protect children. We will keep them from being exploited. We will do it every time. Do not mess with us. We are done playing with this.”
Online attention was drawn to the reference to “kink” in The New York Times movie review, as highlighted by Fox News Digital. In the context of pop culture, “kink” can sometimes refer to someone’s unconventional sexual preference.
This sparked a debate among online film enthusiasts, particularly considering that “The Little Mermaid” holds a PG rating and is primarily targeted at children and families. Many individuals have questioned the necessity of including the word in the review and expressed divided opinions on its intended meaning.
Generative AI’s most significant effect on prominent content producers and distributors lies not in disrupting the media creation process but in empowering their strongest rivals: YouTube and TikTok content creators. These platforms now have access to additional tools that enable them to penetrate further the daily video consumption that the media industry fiercely competes for.
In a newly released report titled “AI and Competitive Advantage in Media” from the studio-funded think tank ETC, generative AI is identified as a potential disruptor of the already challenging economics within the media industry. The report highlights the stable demand (limited to 24 hours a day) and the exponential growth in supply as critical factors.
Yves Bergquist, ETC’s resident data scientist, and AI expert, draws a parallel between the current developments in the media industry and the automation of manufacturing, emphasizing the shift towards making the production process computable, similar to what occurred in the manufacturing sector.
The concept of content being “computable” refers to its production in large volumes and its ability to be processed by machines. This entails every aspect of content creation, distribution, and audience feedback is transformed into data that can be analyzed and dissected.
Unlike traditional media companies, which produce content linearly and as individual entities, they are not inherently “computable.” Their content is often scarce, whole, long-form, and lacks the structured format required for easy manipulation by online audiences or machine analysis.
However, studios and streaming platforms will need to adapt and embrace this computable approach to remain relevant in the future.
ETC breaks down the creative process into three components. Yves Bergquist refers to the initial phase of generating ideas and understanding audience preferences as “zeitgeist intelligence.”
Next, we have the central aspect of the creative process, wherein creators establish their unique voices and make crucial strategic choices regarding the product they intend to develop.
Subsequently, the actual production of the product takes place.
Generative AI primarily affects this final phase of production. However, automating the production process enhances the significance of zeitgeist-sensing and creative decision-making and provides creative decision-makers with tools for rapid, cost-effective tinkering, experimentation, and prototyping.
