When ESPN radio announced last week that they were going to move ESPN NY radio to 98.7 on the FM dial you could feel the excitement in the on air voices as they described the events which they claimed would be the biggest story in sports-radio since the breakup of Fatso and Fruitloops. The blogosphere immediately jumped to the conclusion that the Yankee radio rights were well on their way to Bristol South. From Michael Kay to Mike and Mike to the Godfather to Stephen A, the place was bouncing off the walls as they felt that with the more powerful signal they could finally take on WFAN in a fair fight and take their shot at dethroning the Fat man. Along with the new station and promised improved signal they also rearranged the on-air 'talent' by adding Patrick McEnroe who is one of the least funny people ever, flipping a few hosts around and pairing Stephen A with either Ruocco or Lundberg which is like trying to enjoy a baloney and cream-cheese sandwich. I was excited because I love the mind numbing effect of sports-talk but my euphoria was short lived when I turned on the radio on Monday morning at 12:01AM to hear Stephen A commemorate the new ESPN. Most people might thing that the thought of Stephen A was the downfall but in this case that wasn't the case, the problem was has to do with being on 98.7. Not only does the FM format just not work for talk, there is almost too much you hear but more importantly the signal was terrible in Brooklyn, I got dribs of talk mixed in with drabs of static especially if I wasn't holding my walkman at a certain angle.
Maybe this is a 'Brooklyn' problem but really if you are going to lease these airways for a decade at a cost in the mega millions, wouldn't it behoove you to at least drive around the city with your radio turned on to make sure that your listeners in Coney Island or Bensonhurst can get the signal?
The company line was that with this new 98.7 signal, ESPN radio would finally be able to reach a bigger audience but there was one thing that always bothered me about that, your reach is so much further with the low-frequency of an AM station. I've been able to listen to WFAN as far north as the Killington Vermont, caught it as far West as Akron Ohio and a buddy used to listen to Captain Midnight on his balcony in DC but when you get out from a 40 mile radius of the tower you completely lose the FM band which is the reason you can't get Z100 or 104.3 anywhere outside of the immediate NY area. So although ESPN might have improved their signal in Morristown NJ or Belerose Long Island you lose your audience anywhere north of New Canaan or south of Sunset Park.
So they either didn't do enough research or this wasn't about reaching a broader audience, this was about converting the 1050 signal to ESPN deportes which I'm all for but sadly not at the expense of my own listening pleasure. There is just no way that the entire Yankee empire is going to allow their radio signal to be carried on a bandwidth that doesn't reach to the bleachers.. if their radio broadcasts sucks they want it to be because of Sterling not in spite of him
No comments:
Post a Comment