Yup, just responded to your post on the other site
(radio-info), too! Who knows.
From Boston Radio Watch by Mark Schyder:
Carr is stuck in neutral…again
Boston’s talk radio personality Howie Carr will have to remain off the air until further notice. His much-anticipated morning drive debut on WTKK 96.9FM has been delayed again. For the second time in less than a month, Carr and his attorneys were in Suffolk Superior Court this morning trying to resolve a sticky contract dispute between his old station, WRKO AM 680 and his new station WTKK 96.9FM.
In a motion, Carr and his legal team asked Judge Allan van Gestel to reconsider the September 19th decision when he ruled that the talk show host never officially terminated his expiring WRKO deal thus triggering a clause in the old contract which automatically extended it by five more years when WTKK’s now-infamous $7 million offer sheet was signed by Carr and immediately matched by WRKO. (BRW 9/19)
In this morning’s decision, the judge once again sided with WRKO AM 680 by ruling that the contract extension was valid and is enforceable.
In the meantime, WRKO hasn’t acknowledged publicly that Carr has quit and doesn’t want to be back on its airwaves. Although midday personality Todd Feinburg has been filling in for Carr for the past month, the station still refers to the 3-7pm program as the “Howie Carr Show” in on-air promos and on its website.
Logic dictates that it’s not likely WRKO will make any kind of permanent programming change to replace Carr until the Red Sox postseason ends which may happen as early as this week or as late as Halloween. As far as the defection by advertisers goes, it may not have much immediate impact on the revenue side as many have anticipated when Carr ended his afternoon run on WRKO last month. As one veteran radio advertising exec told BRW last week, many advertisers are often sold on package deals anyway. Corporate radio’s package buy typically sells around the cluster’s top performing dog(s) – in this case that would be Entercom’s big moneyprinting machine known as WEEI AM 850. The stations with smaller ratings and revenue in the same cluster are usually thrown into the package.
As long as WEEI remains in the mix, and from the looks of Boston’s rejuvenated sports scene things will stay that way for the foreseeable future, it’s really insignificant for WRKO whether Carr stays or goes. For the past few years WRKO has been treated as an afterthought by Entercom from the programming end with cuts in the news and diminishing talk talent pool. All this makes sense. WRKO is a victim of WEEI’s huge success. As long as both stations remain co-owned, it will always be about WEEI’s strong identity, massive target audience and market brand.
Well, whatever happens, apparently the listeners get the shaft. It’s amazing the negativity out there, I would guess that Howie may have lost quite a few listeners. If he doesn’t end up in the AM slot, will he be able to make them up after this fiasco?
It would be neat if this was big enough news to be played on the news bumps on WRKO today, and that it would have to be discussed on Todd’s program. The radio silence with respect to this stuff is very annoying.
I have to wonder about a move to Florida, as many have suggested. It would be rough on his family to have to switch schools, especially during the school year (plus school quality in MA is somewhat better than FL - probably even private school). Only they know though.