Sonics Say Goodbye to KJR Radio Broadcast Partner
Posted on Tuesday, January 24th, 2006 at 10:55 pm by Mr. Baker (thinking good thoughts for George Karl))
KJR Sports Radio 950am host Mike “The Gas Man” Gastineau announced during this evening’s broadcast that the 21 year relationship between the Seattle Supersonics and KJR-AM Radio (a Clear Channel station) will come to an end when the current NBA season ends this summer. The Gasman was bittersweet about the end of the relationship stating that the Sonics didn’t make much of an effort lately with the station. I have to agree with The Gasman on that item, and will miss his lead into the game and David Locke post game. But, I would like to take an open shot at Steve Sandmeyer, he is openly dismissive of the Sonics and NBA basketball in general. Here’s your update Steve, it was the Flagship Station.
The Sonics have come to an agreement with KTTH 770am (an Entercom station) to begin broadcasts next season. But wait, there’s more, as reported in the Seattle Times, there will be an end to the simulcast, and they will create two seperate broadcasts. Kevin Calabro will continue to handle the television play-by-play duties with Sonics partner FSN Northwest. No more TV over the radio.
Let’s understand something about the next part of the story, from the KTTH news release: Under the new agreement, the elements of the radio broadcasts will be Sonics-produced. The Sonics will continue to own the radio-broadcast rights and will sell the game-broadcast inventory. The Sonics are owning the radio broadcaster and the broadcast. The move from KJR to KTTH was a move to a particular demographic and gaining complete control of that content. The Truth is that KTTH is willing to sublet the KTTH airwaves to the Sonics and I’m not so sure KJR was willing to do so. Next year I’ll likely still listen to KJR most of the time, but when the Sonics are on you might as well shut that station down as far as I am concerned.
This Flagship has sailed.
January 24th, 2006 at 11:24 pm
That’s disappointing for me (and other international Sonics fans). KJR plays over the web, so we could at least listen to the games live. KTTH doesn’t seem to have that.
Also, does it seem weird to anyone else that a political radio station is going to broadcast the games ?
January 25th, 2006 at 1:04 am
It’s actually a great move by the Sonics. The Sonics will have more free reign to extend coverage. The only thing I don’t like is that Calabro will not be the radio play-by-play man any longer. No more simulcasts.
KC will do radio-only broadcasts, but when the games are on local TV, the team and 770AM will use a separate team to handle radio broadcasts.
If they can Ehlo, they’d make many happy. He’s terrible and he was FSN’s choice, not the Sonics. That was the deal. FSN got to pick KC’s partner. Yuck.
KJR is losing out bigtime here, but they will survive.
At some point they will probably extend their schedule to the midnight hour, particularly on Fridays and Saturdays. They’ll live.
January 25th, 2006 at 6:03 am
Totally agree with Scinos. It was a great bonus to be able to listen from the net. I’m a crazy sonics fan living in Australia. Will miss that if not available…
January 25th, 2006 at 7:48 am
I’ll guess that the Sonics will want to make sure that they can send you the big show since you either can afford a computer, or are skilled enough with a computer to get a job. They own the “game-broadcast inventory”. KTTH might not want to pay to pipe the Sonics to you since they would not get the return on that investment and are not sending out what they do right now. They are distributing network shows available in other markets. It will be up to the Sonics to produce that content.
January 25th, 2006 at 7:59 am
NBA Audio League Pass will most likely carry the broadcast and is not all that expensive for a full season of all NBA games (USD$19.95).
The NBA now allows subscribers of the Cable/Sattellite television version of NBA League Pass to download televised games via NBA League Pass Broadband AFTER the games have played, which could be a boon to overseas fans who have to listen to/watch the games at odd times.
Audio https://secure.broadband.nba.com/cc/viewshoppingcart.php?action=add&type=channel&id=119
Broadband http://www.nba.com/broadband/league_pass.jsp
January 25th, 2006 at 8:34 am
“The only thing I don’t like is that Calabro will not be the radio play-by-play man any longer. No more simulcasts.”
I actually think this is a positive, although not for the radio only listeners.
In the last three years we became the only team left to simulcast the broadcasts and it was not something that KC overly enjoyed doing. If it keeps him as the broadcaster for a longer period of time on the TV side, I’ve go no complaints.
I feel for those that live out of market and can’t get the league pass games. After listening to a bunch of the broadcasters around the league, you really enjoy what Kevin does.
“If they can Ehlo, they’d make many happy.”
Here, here! He’s in the last year of his deal, please don’t let FSN sign him back up.
January 25th, 2006 at 8:57 am
Any chance of getting Marques Johnson back? I think KC and Marques were a great team together. Last time I saw Marques Johnson do anything, he was doing color commentary on FSN for a college hoops game (I want to say it was a Huskies game, but I forget).
January 25th, 2006 at 9:49 am
Now I never have to listen to KJR, great news for me.
January 25th, 2006 at 9:57 am
Good move for Calabro … KTTH is a strange choice to say the least … Rush Limbaugh followed by a Supes game???? It’s interesting that KING or KIRO didn’t step up.
KJR has been moving towards being the Dipstick Husky Homer station for a while now. Congrats KJR, you have just moved over the line into total irrelevance after this season is over.
Agreed, Ehlo’s terrible. It’ll be tough to pry Marques out of LA.
January 25th, 2006 at 10:33 am
“The Gasman was bittersweet about the end of the relationship stating that the Sonics didn’t make much of an effort lately with the station. ”
I just want to comment on this real quick … that cuts both ways KJR. Every time I tune into the station I hear Softy ranting about the 5th string backup nickel corner on a last place Husky football team that doesn’t start walkthroughs for another two months. Or Mitch doing golf coverage. David Locke is the only KJR host that introduces Sonic related topics on his broadcasts, the Sonics stopped being interested in KJR when KJR stopped being interested in the Supes. Yesterday I’ll bet Kobe’s 81 point game got more airtime than the Sonics did.
KJR’s kind of a mirror of Seattle fandom. Seattle’s a frontrunning sports town. If the teams are doing good the fans come out of the woodwork. When the teams are mediocre or bad, they stay away in droves.
January 25th, 2006 at 10:47 am
KTTH????? what??? where??? the beginning of the end….soon to leave seattle sonics…..no more KC play by play!!! enjoy the rest of the season.. maybe one of the last…what next, sonics on public access tv….
January 25th, 2006 at 12:21 pm
Steve said:”KJR’s kind of a mirror of Seattle fandom. Seattle’s a frontrunning sports town. If the teams are doing good the fans come out of the woodwork. When the teams are mediocre or bad, they stay away in droves. ”
Yes, and no. Market segmentation is everywhere and if you target a demographic that spends money like football fans then you market something to them, tell them that they will like it over and over again. Market to them and they will come. I’ll say it’s a frontrunner sportsradio town.
January 25th, 2006 at 12:54 pm
Correction: the sonics have always owned the rights to the broadcasts. KJR never owned or produced the shows - the sonics did and will continue to do so.
KJR didn’t want to continue with the relationship so the supes had to look elsewhere and there are only so many options.
KC will be missed on radio - he’s the best in that category. TV is not the same. they try to reel him in too much.
As for Marques - he never lived in Seattle before so he could definitely do it. i would contact FSN with your thoughts. the more emails, the better.
Sidenote: steve sandemeyer is such a tool. can you say rich frat boy from mercer island? he badmouthed the sonics every time they were mentioned. such a moron. he was just bitter that he wasn’t involved in the broadcasts. he was the husky homer chick broadcaster. ohhhh go team.
January 25th, 2006 at 1:05 pm
I agree, Steve. KJR rarely talks about the Supes. Even when the Sonics were so successful last year, there was a maybe a 30-40% chance that someone would be talking about them. You’d have almost as much chance of hearing them talk about the 90 loss Mariners as you would the Sonics. Hopefully, the new station will provide better attention and support to the team, even though they’re not a sports radio station.
January 25th, 2006 at 2:00 pm
I don’t like it all mostly because I’ve never once tuned in to AM770. Whether they devoted enough time or not, KJR, along with KIRO and KOMO are the most recognizable and highest rated stations on AM radio. Not being on one of those stations and losing the fan who has three AM stations programmed in his/her car seems like a bad marketing/business decision. Yes, fans who follow the team closely (like the sort that read a Sonics blog!) will migrate over to the new station but I’d imagine they’ll lose some of the casual fans who don’t necessarily know when they play until it’s on.
That being said, it’s only radio, they already sold their soul in the TV deal they made last year so how they’re received to the wider public over the airwaves doesn’t seem to be of primary concern.
January 25th, 2006 at 2:23 pm
I just wanted to ammend my last comment and say that I actually looked up the arbitron ratings and KTTH beat the ratings of KJR* by 1/10 of 1 ratings point. I still don’t think the Limbaugh audience will tune in for the Sonics but I wanted to get my facts straight.
* KVI, the other conservative station beats KJR as well. I got the information directly from the arbitron website @ http://www.arbitron.com
January 25th, 2006 at 3:26 pm
Even amidst last years crazy run, the coverage on KJR was at best mediocre. The husky coverage is so over the top sometimes it just forces you to turn the station. I’m all for guys in this area being die-hards, but it was supposed to be the Sonics flagship too. Imagine the uproar if the Dawgs had just won a game, and Softy decided to dedicate a 3 hour segment to updating us on the whereabouts of Peter Fehse - adding at the end for good measure, “oh, and by the way, the Huskies won on Saturday…”
I will miss the segments Gas/Groz had with Calabro from time to time. They would talk about alot of different sports from around the area, but would always focus mainly on Sonics stuff - plus Kevin is just entertaining.
January 25th, 2006 at 4:59 pm
Yeah….KTTH isn’t going to provide anymore coverage than KJR did. All they are doing is broadcasting games. Lets not get the wrong idea here.
February 13th, 2006 at 9:03 pm
How can less KC be a good thing? That’s just inane.
Less David Locke? Fine. Less Mitch? Great. Overblown know it nots anyway.
Less KJR is a good thing IMO. They are way too full of themselves.