Was Rush Missed?

[joesbucks]

Some of the major markets have reported ratings this past week. New York, Philly, Detroit, LA, Boston, Chicago, San Diego. Here are the results for the total day Rush stations by market comparing Fall 02, Summer 03 and Fall 03. While it's difficult to say that Rush was or wasn't a factor since I don't have daypart information, the stations overall didn't suffer and in 7 out of 8 stations, they had higher ratings than this time last year and 6 of 8 were better this fall than last summer when Rush was on.

Below are the numbers from All Access:

Lsited in this orderNew York, LA, Philly, Chicago, Detroit, San Diego, Allentown and Boston.

WABC Fa02 3.2 Su03 3.5 Fa03 3.3

KFI 3.6 4.2 4.7

WPHT 2.9 2.8 3.0

WLS 4.5 4.0 4.8

WJR 6.1 5.8 5.8

KOGO 4.3 4.8 6.5

WAEB 3.8 3.5 4.9

WRKO 4.2 4.5 5.3

The question is, why were these stations not realing from Rush being gone and are the minor league hosts able to draw as large an audience as the great one? Some stations pay big $$ for Rush, yet the minor league guys seemed to not hurt anyone, and in fact most stations reporting to date have improved.

[okie01]

Two factors at work, possibly:

1. Rush's audience is a loyal one. Not only to him, but to his show.

2. The substitute hosts, as a group, are damn good. There's no reason to turn off Roger Hedgecock.

[Support Free Republic]

Rank	Location	Receipts	Donors/Avg		Freepers/Avg		Monthlies
40	Oklahoma	141.00	7	20.14	199	0.71	126.00	9

Thanks for donating to Free Republic!

Move your locale up the leaderboard!

[cyborg]

I agree. If they took off his show completely, I think we'd all see a different picture.

[Marylander]

Very big conclusions from little data. Rush was gone one month, not one season. I listened to the others to see who Rush thought would be good replacements, and they were good, but they were not Rush. He's got all their good points and adds his own complexity, which is great entertainment.

[joesbucks]

I think I pointed that out, that the data is limited. Yet those same stations saw dramatic increase when Rush began on them, yet when he's gone during a significant amount of time during the rating period, virtually all stations saw increased ratings.

[Andy from Beaverton]

Given the choice between Roger and Rush, I would choose Roger. Rush has lost what had made him great over the past few years.

[jim35]

Personally, I prefer Rush. I usually listen to his guest hosts, but they're just not the same. Give me the all-knowing, all-seeing Maha Rushie every time.

[Nick Danger]

Given the choice between Roger and Rush, I would choose Roger.

Are you aware of a certain messiness in Roger Hedgecock's past?

[Bommer]

Nope! Spill the beans Nick!

[Nick Danger]

From sandiego-online.com:

To anyone who would listen, Hedgecock claimed he was the victim of a vendetta by Miller and the press. He sued The San Diego Union. He hired a San Diego lawyer specializing in drug cases for his first trial and then a Las Vegas lawyer who represented organized-crime figures for his second. When the second jury convicted him of conspiracy and perjury, he claimed a bailiff’s comments to jurors constituted tampering, although the trial judge disagreed.

As he imposed sentence, Judge William L. Todd Jr. said he had no doubt of Hedgecock’s guilt and that he had “violated the public trust in an onerous, onerous way... Your conduct ... is reprehensible in every sense of the word because you violated the public trust, completely, over and over again.” Facing automatic ouster under state law, Hedgecock had resigned at 3 p.m., December 5, 1985, just minutes before being sentenced.

The whole story

[Andy from Beaverton]

Are you aware of a certain messiness in Roger Hedgecock's past?
Are you aware of a certain messiness in Rush Limbaugh's past? Touché!!!

[Enterprise]

I suspect that had there been a much longer absence, the audience numbers may have declined. It is not something I wish to see happen however. I want Rush to stay as long as he can.

[duckln]

Mark Belling was better by a mile!

[Bommer]

Interesting Nick, but I found this at http://www.edwardhumes.com/articles/mean_toll.shtml Not sure what the truth is.

1990: The headline-grabbing corruption prosecution and conviction of former San Diego Mayor Roger Hedgecock is thrown out when it is revealed that the bailiff in his trial had assured jurors Hedgecock was guilty, plied them with liquor during deliberations, talked over the evidence with them, partied with them during and after deliberations, and told them that a previous hung jury had failed to do its job by focusing on meaningless details raised by the defense. The bailiff and jurors admitted this gross misconduct to state law enforcement officials shortly after Hedgecock’s conviction. There is no question this sort of misbehavior tainted the case and automatically entitled Hedgecock to a new trial, but prosecutors in San Diego kept this information secret for five years. When the improprieties finally came to light — only after the California Supreme Court compelled prosecutors to divulge the information they had guarded so long — Hedgecock was exonerated. In exchange for his plea to a single misdemeanor, numerous felonies were dismissed. He is now a radio talk show host.

[ATOMIC_PUNK]

BINGO ! BUMPS

[DJ Frisat]

Nice try, nimrods.

The ratings remained high as a show of support to the man and an ideology, which was succesfully upheld (for the most part) by his guest hosts.

We believe in this stuff, and we prefer Maja Rushie as the prime exoponent; to tune out in droves during his absence would have served no purpose.

[jrawk]

3 Words:

Walter E. Williams!

-- lates
-- jrawk

[litany_of_lies]

Find it very hard to believe that Hedgecock was guilty in light of what I see from both articles and his current popularity in SD.

Ponzi scheme victims come in all stripes, but just because you take contributions or help from them doesn't mean you're a criminal, unless you know the nature of the scheme at the time you're taking the money or the help. Doesn't appear that Hedgecock knew.

He would appear to be the Ollie North of SD, based on what I see.

[flowerplough]

Rush ain't what he used to be; Hedgecock, Hannity, Beck, etc. all lecture less and entertain more.

[litany_of_lies]

Y'know what I miss about Rush?

The music. I can't remember the last new tune Paul Shanklin did for him. Given the cochlear implant, which I believe has taken away his ability to hear music, tt's understandable that he doesn't think about it much, but someone on his staff ought to let him know that we MISS the music, and that there's plenty of material in the 9 dwarves for great satire.

Some of my past faves were:
- Al Gore's paradise (imitating Wierd Al imitating Stevie Wonder).
- All your money (imitatting Beatles All my lovin')
- The Philanderer (Ted Kennedy imitating a 50s artist doing "The Wanderer", I think)

When Glenn Beck is on, he's great. He's got some really good people putting musical and other parodies together. He's got to ditch the Moron Trivia, though.

[kingu]

KFI and KOGO can be attributed to the recall campaign. Both stations were a hotbed for discussion, and Rush had nothing to do with it.

As for other areas, who knows. To really tell, however, one would need to isolate the ratings for his time slot, rather than the daytime numbers.

[Tall_Texan]

Ratings often suffer in the summertime when more people take vacations and there are more activities outdoors. That's why television traditionally waits until September to pick up the new shows.

Further, whatever dropoff there might have been during his absence might have been offset both by an increased audience during the McNabb flack, reaction to when the housekeeper story broke and certainly during his return from rehab.

I don't doubt that the day Rush came back from rehab was probably his single greatest audience in the history of his show. Supporters and foes alike were tuning in to hear whether Rush had changed.

Also note that the spike in the California stations probably reflects interest in the Davis recall election too.

[Aeronaut]

Rush was gone five weeks. There ratings period is for three months. Rush's first week back had to vastly offset any dips in the previous five, because nearly everyone tuned in to "The Return of Rush."

[Dane]

Actually the day Rush came back, that was a huge day. That is probably part of the reason why there were upsurges in the ratings. Also he was gone for 5 weeks in the fall, not the whole fall.

[L.N. Smithee]

The question is, why were these stations not realing from Rush being gone and are the minor league hosts able to draw as large an audience as the great one?

It's simple. The guest hosts were filling in on the Rush Limbaugh Show.

Some stations pay big $$ for Rush, yet the minor league guys seemed to not hurt anyone, and in fact most stations reporting to date have improved.

Many years ago, Tonight Show host Johnny Carson negotiated a three-day weekly schedule with NBC; there would be a guest host on Monday night, a Best of Carson repeat would play Tuesday night, and Johnny would preside live over the Wednesday-Friday shows. After years of dozens of different celebrities of varying talent being given that Monday night fill-in gig (John Davidson, Bill Cosby, Martin Mull, Richard Dawson, Kermit the Frog, Steve Martin, etc.), comedienne Joan Rivers was named the permanent Monday night guest host in 1983.

In 1985, when 20th Century Fox Television formed the loose alliance of independent stations that would eventually become the Fox Broadcasting Company network, its first idea was to launch a late-night show to go up against Carson. Citing her strong Nielsen numbers as Monday-night regular, FBC threw millions at Rivers, and not only did she ditch her Monday night Carson job, she publicly suggested that she left NBC and Tonight Show because no one would acknowledge that in some measure, she had become as popular as Carson.

The Late Show with Joan Rivers was Fox's first TV series. Shortly and sweetly, it laid an egg. The American public would tune in to see her when she was on The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson, but when the chair she sat in was her own, America tuned out. Now, if you want to see Rivers more often then in her tedious red-carpet reports at the Academy Awards, you have to watch QVC.

I don't know if you are doing this out of real desire for input or professional jealousy of Rush (hello, Ken Hamblin), but whatever the reason, it's frivolous. Rush is like Carson -- he didn't invent the type of show he does/did, but the way he did it caught the fancy of the American public like nothing before and nothing since. They are both living legends. As long as Rush Limbaugh is able to talk, the Rush Limbaugh Show will rule the airwaves.

[joesbucks]

But you see, big stations pay large sums of $$ to buy exclusivity to Rush. You see, for them, it's the power of Rush, and not so much the message. That loyality will now be seen as habit?

[Nick Danger]

Are you aware of a certain messiness in Rush Limbaugh's past? Touché!!!

What? You interpret this as some sort of contest between Rush Limbaugh and Roger Hedgecock? You are on the pro-Hedgecock team and you think I'm on the pro-Limbaugh team? I can't imagine how you got there from here.

I have spent many hours in this forum throwing spears at Clinton for being a perjurer. I refuse to make excuses for Roger Hedgecock just because he's on my side of the Big Ditch. It royally pisses me off when Democrats do that for Clinton, and I refuse to join them in looking the other way when it's my guy in the dock. I lived in San Diego during all of this; Hedgecock was Mayor when I moved there. I watched all this unfold over a couple of years.

He may be a fine talk-show host. I don't know. But he was a crooked politician.

[joesbucks]

Yes, his return show was probably listened to by tons of folks. But the while this is a composite of the three months you mentioned, the trends during the same period were relfected largely the same results. Explain that.

Now I've also only seen the top 8 or ten markets. As the results begin to pile in from the red states and some stations will show dips, how then will you explain those?

[Aeronaut]

...how then will you explain those?

I don't feel any need to explain anything. I just don't think you can make any major trend when he's missing for five weeks out of thirteen, which (I think) was easily offset by the "Return of Rush" week.

[joesbucks]

The ratings here reflect 3 months. This is the official book. However during the rating period, they issue trends which would cover the specifically the period of absense and return. The trends show the same thing, prior to McNabb/Drugs, the flap and rehab and the return.

[roostercogburn]

I didn't miss Rush at all. I hate to say it but he is weak when challenged. He constantly stammers and stutters when challenged by callers who are not morons and present articulate arguments. In a debate O'Reilly would destroy him.

[veronica]

The show is NEVER as good when Rush is gone. He is the KING. Roger is good, but Rush is brilliant. Always.

[joesbucks]

No, your analysis was to explain the up trend. In some markets, fly over county, there was a fall in some of the trends that haven't been tallied into the final rating period as the first 8 markets were. But if they do go down, then your analysis will not hold water. I'm only bringing the small pieces of data I have and looking for some input, especially from those who may be in the business. However, if I was a programmer and paying a large sum of $$ to clear his show, I would have to from a business perspective look at how I'm spending my budget. My biggest fear would have been the numbers would have dropped or at best remained very close to where they were the year before. But growth? As someone who follows stats and trends, that would be cause for a second look.

[Vision]

We are creatures of habit. When my local station WBAL made big news by dropping Rush, I turned them off. Then turned them back on when they put the show back.

[Rightly Biased]

over here.

[The Mayor]

Rush's audience is a loyal one. Not only to him, but to his show.

Bingo, we made a statement too! We stand behind someone that asks for help!

[joesbucks]

Niether are critical thinkers, but Rush is the best communicator. Being able to shout someone down, especially when they are in control of the show and have the last word ala O'Rielly is not about being the best debator.

I agree with you, when someone can mix it up with conviction and thought, liberal or conservative, Rush quiety dumps them. When the heat gets going, the caller is gone. If they are the amen chorus and can somewhat echo that coherently, they have a large amount of audience time. The same happens if it's a liberal caller who is speaking from an emotional perspective instead of with conviction and thought. Yes, he does take liberal calls, but the one's I'd really like to hear are the ones he dumps quickly and moves on. (Sometimes I listen just for the debate, not because I want my viewpoint approved or echoed.)

[DoctorMichael]

Bump.

[TankerKC]

A better set of data would be Rush's numbers against those who are on the air during his time slot. Here we get Neal Boortz during Rush. I'd guess that Rush beats him consistently.

[joesbucks]

So you didn't sample other shows while he was gone? See what else was out there that maybe was more to your liking?

[joesbucks]

While I don't have daypart numbers, I know for a fact 750 is much higher in the ratings that 640.

[The Mayor]

The only choice here in Buffalo is sports or NPR.... Of course we can get Canadian radio.

Rush is the only choice.

[joesbucks]

Thus, to a point, your loyality. No other choice except liberal NPR and liberal or frankly boring Canadian talk radio.

[ConservativeMan55]

Rush Ping!

Freepmail me if you would like on/off the Rush Pinglist! Search for the latest Rush Limbaugh news on Free Republic. McNabb hardly overrated (More Rush bashing)(NEW) Rev. Al: Clinton Demolished Democrat Party.(NEW) Limbaugh wins more time! Limbaugh takes off the gloves! Limbaugh medical records ordered resealed! Rush says W showing leadership. Rush addresses illegal immigration issues.(NEW) David Limbaugh talks about Howard Dean.(NEW) Rush Limbaugh.com

[The Mayor]

Don't put words in my mouth, my loyalty is still with Rush. I could listen to music..

When I drove across the state (NY) there was all sorts of talk radio. I like Rush and have been listening for 10+ years.

In Virginia I listened to Boortz, Hannity, Savage, Glen Beck, & Rush..

[joesbucks]

Accoutability? That's only for whiney liberals. They need to be held accountable.

Frankly, I was amazed yesterday. The other day I saw someone ( a heavy user and regular) ask how they could structure their business to bulletproof themselves from a law suit in case they screw up. Not a frivalous suit, but a suit because they screwed up. Accoutablity?

[joesbucks]

Not my intention. Only to point out that your choice of preferred listening (show type) is largely limited to the Rush station. And largely, most of the hosts you named do not go directly head to head with Rush.

[roostercogburn]

I did love O'Reilly telling Franken to shut up.