All-Sports Radio Weathers the Media Storm

Beginning with WFAN in New York, 24 hour sports talk radio has been a fixture on airways across America for over 30 years. Since its inception, all-sports talk stations have captured modest ratings, but the main listener demographic is coveted by advertisers, making sports radio a profitable venture. All-sports stations exist in most major media markets, with the most popular ones located in cities with numerous teams across more than one major sport. Sports radio has been ahead of its time since its inception. The nature of the shows lends itself to the immediate gratification of currently popular services like Twitter and the interactivity of call-ins reflect online writing and commenting. As the newspaper industry becomes less influential among the public, the talk radio medium has not fallen prey to newer technology or methods of communication. Talk radio has actually used technology to broaden its scope and allowed for a better listening experience. Advancements have only helped the product grow as the proliferation of satellite radio has given listeners even more venues to tune in to without hurting the overall popularity of the brand.

No other form of sports entertainment allows the user to have such control over the content than talk radio. While hosts may steer the ship, the caller controls the flow of information with their emotion. Jody McDonald, a talk show veteran who currently hosts shows on 1050 ESPN Radio in New York and nationally on Sirius XM’s MLB Home Plate, says, “It’s direct contact. You can’t duplicate the immediacy and back and forth nature of sports talk radio.”

It is this back and forth that drives the discussion for hours, days, and sometimes weeks. Evan Roberts co-hosts the Midday Show with Joe Benigno on WFAN. He says, “We let the callers dictate the show to a certain extent. We have a good feel for what the big story is and we can manipulate what we talk about to get the callers to follow.”

Listener-host interaction is the meat and potatoes of the sports radio show. Just as internet readers can comment on a story, use Twitter to chat with an author or athlete, or blog about their own opinions, callers are able to express their point of view with an “expert” on the topic. Callers can be the first to make a salient point or reveal a strategic flaw. A caller can spark a debate or put it to rest with a well placed stat or insight. The interaction between caller and host is essential for the survival of a local sports show, and the hosts are fully aware of the impact listeners can have.

Some stations are unable to fill the needs of all of their listeners because there just isn’t a large enough fan base of a particular sport to cover it. Many New York listeners have been unhappy with WFAN’s coverage of sports such as hockey and basketball. Roberts said, “I know with WFAN the reason we don’t delve into less mainstream sports is the same reason a music station doesn’t play a deep track from a Britney Spears album…because the hits work! The hits for WFAN are the NFL and MLB. There may be passionate NHL, X Games, and UFC fans, but there aren’t enough to warrant turning off the majority by giving them too much time.”

With the growth of sports radio, listeners have more places to discuss their favorite teams and often have niche stations to accommodate their true passion. McDonald’s role on Home Plate is different than Roberts’ role as local radio host. McDonald says, “With the growth of sports talk on a national level, due in part to satellite radio’s growth, shows like mine on XM’s baseball talk channel give individual sports a 365 day a year home and an outlet for that specific sports’ devotee.”

Devoting specific segments or channels to one sport allows the listener to have access and insight on a more personal level than through reading about it online or seeing it on television. Hosts are able to capture the tenor of the town through the callers and use that knowledge to prod and probe executives, coaches, or station insiders whose job is to follow only one team. Often a host will pose a question brought up by a caller during an earlier segment to satisfy the needs of the listeners.

Sports radio hosts have adapted to the new technological environment by integrating social networking and email programs into their shows. “I think [hosting is] easier for any host who is computer literate because of the access to instant information such as stats or breaking news,” Roberts said. McDonald agrees, saying “Information is key and there is a ton of it on the internet if you know where to look. It’s important to know the difference between blog opinion and journalistic reporting.”

The large amount of options available to listeners drives stations to find new ways to entertain their listeners. Benigno and Roberts will often broadcast live from the site of an important game to give listeners a truer sense of the moment and to get guests that can provide insight. “If you want to have “inside” sources or “inside” knowledge… it is essential to get out to games and know executives and players,” Roberts said. “Our show did a remote live from Qualcomm right after the Jets/Chargers game, which is a huge remote, because of the instant reaction as fans that we can give.”

The role of national talk show host becomes a bit more complicated as you have to be prepared to discuss more teams and scenarios than if you were only covering the metro area. “On a national show, you need to balance your time,” said McDonald. “Since you need to know about all teams, being in front of a satellite dish to watch multiple games on any given night is a must.”

Good ratings for all-sports radio are usually dependant on having successful teams in the market with a passionate fan base to listen regularly. Below are five of the ten biggest media markets in the country and the ratings for their all-sports stations for October of 2009. October is the perfect month for an all-sports station to be measured because their baseball team is either beginning a playoff run or lamenting a lost season, and the football season is entering its second month. Any market with a diehard fan base and two sports to root for will see good ratings in October.

Sports radio comprises only one top five ranked station in one market, but sports radio stations are still money makers for their parent companies. Upwardly mobile, educated, adult males dominate the listenership of these stations, making their audiences the most sought after group in radio. Because of this, sports radio has not felt the pinch of loss of revenue as other radio stations and forms of media have. When asked if their working experience has been affected by a lack of revenue, Roberts replied, “It hasn’t affected us at all.” McDonald, working on a subscriber based platform said, “There’s been some effect, but not drastic. Talk radio has not taken the hit that music driven formats have.”

One reason many sports stations have thrived in difficult times is because they have embraced the internet as a source of feedback and content. Many stations use a form of instant access to supplement calls, and some have used their website to document interviews and segments that garner attention from those who did not hear it live. Roberts explains the importance of WFAN.com by saying, “There are many New Yorkers living outside of the area that still want to be clued in on NY sports, plus people at work that want to listen with no radio access. WFAN.com also has many features, articles, and video blogs that feature many different radio personalities. Also the interviews we did throughout the week are very useful.”

With a multitude of options, sports fans are able to seek out the stations that fit their interests best. The stations that do it well are rewarded with a large fan base, big revenue streams, and access to the most important athletes and figures from the area. As some media see their influence dissipate, sports radio has been able to adjust to new forms of communication and technology and branch out to better serve their listeners.

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