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WZGC Now Running CBS Sports Radio Overnight

G

Gregg.

Star Participant
This may have happened a few months ago. But I just noticed on the program line up for WZGC 92.9 The Game, that it no longer has local all-night hosts. CBS Sports Radio host Amy Lawrence is now on WZGC from 3am to 6am. (Her network show actually begins at 2am.) The WZGC program guide doesn't say what is running from 11pm to 3am. It simply says "Overnight" on the program schedule. Where the host's face should be, it shows the turf from a football field. Local hosts are listed and pictured from 6am to 11pm.

From its inception till recently, WZGC had the distinction of being one of VERY few radio stations to have local overnight hosts. In the sports world, only WZGC and WFAN-AM-FM New York did not run a network show overnight. In the Talk Radio world, there are only two stations I know of that have local hosts, WGN Chicago and WBZ Boston.

The reason WZGC was all-local around the clock was because it did not have access to the CBS Sports Radio network, even though it was owned by CBS. WCNN 680/93.7 was already a CBS affiliate when WZGC was founded. I suppose WZGC could have yanked affiliation from WCNN or maybe just repeated some daytime shows. But it decided to have a live overnight host, seven days a week.

I'm not sure what WCNN runs now overnight and weekends. 1230/106.3 is ESPN and 1340/103.7 is Fox. So is WCNN running NBC Sports or another network?
 
Gregg. said:
This may have happened a few months ago. But I just noticed on the program line up for WZGC 92.9 The Game, that it no longer has local all-night hosts. CBS Sports Radio host Amy Lawrence is now on WZGC from 3am to 6am. (Her network show actually begins at 2am.) The WZGC program guide doesn't say what is running from 11pm to 3am. It simply says "Overnight" on the program schedule. Where the host's face should be, it shows the turf from a football field. Local hosts are listed and pictured from 6am to 11pm.

From its inception till recently, WZGC had the distinction of being one of VERY few radio stations to have local overnight hosts. In the sports world, only WZGC and WFAN-AM-FM New York did not run a network show overnight. In the Talk Radio world, there are only two stations I know of that have local hosts, WGN Chicago and WBZ Boston.

The reason WZGC was all-local around the clock was because it did not have access to the CBS Sports Radio network, even though it was owned by CBS. WCNN 680/93.7 was already a CBS affiliate when WZGC was founded. I suppose WZGC could have yanked affiliation from WCNN or maybe just repeated some daytime shows. But it decided to have a live overnight host, seven days a week.

I'm not sure what WCNN runs now overnight and weekends. 1230/106.3 is ESPN and 1340/103.7 is Fox. So is WCNN running NBC Sports or another network?
Click to expand...

WZGC has been running the CBS Sports Minute for as long I can remember, probably since it became a Sports station. When I listen to WCNN in the non-CBS hours, I hear ESPN Radio. The exceptions are Mark Chernoff's NBC Sports Radio show on Saturday morning and John Kincade's CBS Sports Radio show on Sunday morning. Perhaps someone who is more of a regular WCNN listener can fill in any blanks.
 
I always thought that any station, talk, sports, music, etc, should consider an overnight host. It's training ground for newer people. Remember WFOX? Mitch Elliott was the overnight guy for years. They used him to fill in for other jocks when they were on vacation. He even did an all request hour. There was energy and it was local, something no one has anymore overnight. He's been doing afternoons mornings at stations in Portland now for years. I don't think that could have happened without his WFOX experience and the support of management.

http://kink.fm/shows/mitch-corey/
 
AMRocks said:
I always thought that any station, talk, sports, music, etc, should consider an overnight host. It's training ground for newer people. Remember WFOX? Mitch Elliott was the overnight guy for years. They used him to fill in for other jocks when they were on vacation. He even did an all request hour. There was energy and it was local, something no one has anymore overnight. He's been doing afternoons mornings at stations in Portland now for years. I don't think that could have happened without his WFOX experience and the support of management.

http://kink.fm/shows/mitch-corey/
Click to expand...

It's a matter of economics. Revenue during overnights is next to nothing. Years ago the technology wasn't there to voice track, nor was syndication so readily available.
 
RoddyFreeman said:
It's a matter of economics. Revenue during overnights is next to nothing. Years ago the technology wasn't there to voice track, nor was syndication so readily available.
Click to expand...

Back when WGST had the FM side, they would do a re-play of the day's Rush show overnight. Many of those spots went unsold, so you got to hear the EIB Network filler like Weird Al Yankovic's "Spatula City" and various Paul Shanklin tunes and bits during commercial breaks.
 
Ive regularly heard Amy Lawrence in the 2am hour also on 92.9fm so i assume they carry her whole show
 
AMRocks said:
I always thought that any station, talk, sports, music, etc, should consider an overnight host. It's training ground for newer people. Remember WFOX? Mitch Elliott was the overnight guy for years. They used him to fill in for other jocks when they were on vacation. He even did an all request hour. There was energy and it was local, something no one has anymore overnight. He's been doing afternoons mornings at stations in Portland now for years. I don't think that could have happened without his WFOX experience and the support of management.

http://kink.fm/shows/mitch-corey/
Click to expand...

A lot of stations use to sign off at midnight. I worked at WPTN in the mid 1970’s and we signed off at 10PM. I remember getting home in time to watch the Carson monolog. WPTN signed on at 5 AM. The salesman sold those commercials at full rate because we were so close to the eastern time zone which was 6 AM for those folks.

Before affordable PC’s there were some stations that had tape based automation systems with loud silence detectors and an “operator” that occasionally slept in the station overnights. IIRC the story correctly, Gerry McKee “woke” up “Willis the Guard” who was watching the 94.1 automation Gary’s first day at WQXI. In the early to mid-1980’s there was a “night time America?” satellite show that IMHO was pretty good.

I question some stations that stay on 24-7. Are they even making enough to pay the power bill between midnight and morning drive? Then there is the engineering viewpoint that equipment is more dependable without the power surges associated with sign on and off. I remember at WBRM when I was the fill in engineer, I had to go out to the transmitter site several times in the morning because there was issues with the backup transmitter not switching power. At that time they had 500 watts PSA and 1KW daytime. In the early 1980’s WBRM signed off at 6PM except during the winter months when sunset was before 6pm. They did that for "constancy of programming". It made economic sense too. They were the only station in town.
 
secondchoice said:
A lot of stations use to sign off at midnight. I worked at WPTN in the mid 1970’s and we signed off at 10PM. I remember getting home in time to watch the Carson monolog. WPTN signed on at 5 AM. The salesman sold those commercials at full rate because we were so close to the eastern time zone which was 6 AM for those folks.

Before affordable PC’s there were some stations that had tape based automation systems with loud silence detectors and an “operator” that occasionally slept in the station overnights. IIRC the story correctly, Gerry McKee “woke” up “Willis the Guard” who was watching the 94.1 automation Gary’s first day at WQXI. In the early to mid-1980’s there was a “night time America?” satellite show that IMHO was pretty good.

I question some stations that stay on 24-7. Are they even making enough to pay the power bill between midnight and morning drive? Then there is the engineering viewpoint that equipment is more dependable without the power surges associated with sign on and off. I remember at WBRM when I was the fill in engineer, I had to go out to the transmitter site several times in the morning because there was issues with the backup transmitter not switching power. At that time they had 500 watts PSA and 1KW daytime. In the early 1980’s WBRM signed off at 6PM except during the winter months when sunset was before 6pm. They did that for "constancy of programming". It made economic sense too. They were the only station in town.
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FM WLKQ Lake 102 (now La Raza 102.3) used to sign off between midnight and 2 AM each night, "to let the transmitter cool down" as their signoff message stated, at least as recently as the early 2000s.
 
AMRocks said:
I always thought that any station, talk, sports, music, etc, should consider an overnight host. It's training ground for newer people.
Click to expand...

Thirty years ago, you might be able to snow some kid into working overnights with that idea. Today, the payoff doesn't match the sacrifice. I worked overnights for a month and quit. It was just to rough on the body and the lifestyle. And it didn't affect my radio career one bit. Quitting the graveyard opened up a much better situation that had a better long term future.
 
secondchoice said:
I question some stations that stay on 24-7. Are they even making enough to pay the power bill between midnight and morning drive?
Click to expand...

They probably do bill enough, if they try to sell nights, but it's not like it matters in the grand scheme of budgeting for the station. I'd estimate the electric cost for a class D AM station at $25 a month, perhaps a bit more, to operate mid-6. More like $50 a night for a class A AM like WSB.

In yesteryear, stations signed off at midnight because of staffing costs, not electricity. Now that automation works without a babysitter, and no operator is required by the FCC to be on duty around the clock, there is almost zero ooverhead to operating 24/7.
 
PTBoardOp94 said:
They probably do bill enough, if they try to sell nights, but it's not like it matters in the grand scheme of budgeting for the station. I'd estimate the electric cost for a class D AM station at $25 a month, perhaps a bit more, to operate mid-6. More like $50 a night for a class A AM like WSB.
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The national average price for electricity is 12 cents a kWh. 50kW * 6 hours is $36.

To run a 1kW tx mid-6 would cost 72 cents a night, just shy of $25 a month like you said. A class D having to power down to lightbulb power would be MUCH less. A 1kW class C local AM would cost less than $100 a month for electricity to run 24/7.

Of course, you do have to pay for the lights in the studio, etc. But we're not talking any major money in the area of variable expenses, except maybe for personnel.
 
jabba17 said:
The national average price for electricity is 12 cents a kWh. 50kW * 6 hours is $36.
Click to expand...

Transmitters are not 100% efficient. To produce 50 kw of RF you need about 80 kw or so (using MDCL will reduce this to about 58 to 60 kw). You also need to run AC in the building much of the year due to heat dissipated by the transmitter and rack equipment.

All the other stuff, like tower lights, runs if you are on or off the air.

So figure a 50 kw transmitter to cost around $1,500 a month for the overnight period. A 1 kw will cost about $50 to keep on.

All assumes solid state transmitters. Older high level plate modulated transmitters can cost two to three times as much to run. Plus the depletion of the final tubes.
 
PTBoardOp94 said:
They probably do bill enough, if they try to sell nights,
Click to expand...

In all my career I've never seen any significant revenue from overnights. "Trying" to sell the time period is really difficult. Except for a few cases of high-power stations serving trucking audiences, and isolated shows like Dolly Holiday in the 60's, there's not much that has been sponsored, nationally or locally in overnights.
 
TheBigA said:
Thirty years ago, you might be able to snow some kid into working overnights with that idea. Today, the payoff doesn't match the sacrifice. I worked overnights for a month and quit. It was just to rough on the body and the lifestyle. And it didn't affect my radio career one bit. Quitting the graveyard opened up a much better situation that had a better long term future.
Click to expand...

And today, most PDs handle multiple stations and don't have the time to train overnight jocks as the daypart produces not revenue.
 
DavidEduardo said:


In all my career I've never seen any significant revenue from overnights. "Trying" to sell the time period is really difficult. Except for a few cases of high-power stations serving trucking audiences, and isolated shows like Dolly Holiday in the 60's, there's not much that has been sponsored, nationally or locally in overnights.
Click to expand...

WLAC had a huge per inquiry business in the 1960's and early 70's with John R. I heard him sell records, hair care stuff, even baby chicks.
 
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