TVNewsLover

So Christie Ileto has subbed for Sarah Bloomquist on various Fridays over the past two months. Sarah, co-anchor of the weekday noon newscast (as well as Sunday evening co-anchor), has had off on Fridays noon broadcast since 2014, and outside of recent subs, Rick has usually anchored solo. Christie subbed this week on Thursday for Sarah, and low and behold, Sarah is in for the first time on a Friday in over 5 years. They even made an indirect reference to it in the preview right after The View as they kept emphasizing the word Friday in the preview. Update: Now we know why. Both Sharie & Monica are off today, and Alicia is also off (feel like I haven’t seen her in a while), so Sarah is filling in at 4pm & 5pm.

All the good ones keep jumping ship. I feel like Jim’s the main problem on the morning show. He should go back to the consumer beat where he excelled.

Rosemary was on with Jackie at 4pm, while Erin was in at 5pm. Seems like they’re playing with pairings again.

So I guess they plan on sticking with the solo anchor format for all their evening shows.

Rick usually anchors solo at noon on Fridays as Sarah is off. Not today, Christie Ileto sat alongside him!

Isn’t Rosemary Conners the 11am anchor? Today Erin was anchoring alone while Rosemary was out in the field.

Watched the beginning of Action News at Noon today with Alicia filling in (solo) for Rick and Sarah. I walked away for a bit, and when I returned at 12:30 Ali Gorman was anchoring. Wonder if it was planned that way, or if Alicia had to step away for something.

All five are still on website: Huff, Price, Cimino, Miranda, and Grow. I wonder if they’re following WCAU’s lead and double teaming in the morning.

Doesn’t have to be a journalist on staff, does it? It could be celebraties (like Live does when one person’s off).

Seems like it was a personal decision. Plenty of in-house candidates to replace her. I hope we get another Tuss/Culver pairing at least once in the interim. They should ship one of those guys up to Philly to anchor weekend evenings with Denise.

So every Friday Melissa Magee “fills in” for David Murphy doing weather at noon, but today Cecily filled in at noon, and now Melissa Magee is filling in for her at 11pm. I haven’t seen Cecily on the noon since she got promoted to evenings. Speaking of the noon newscast on Fridays, why don’t they just change the opening to drop Sarah and David, keep Rick, and add Melissa? Ever since Sarah was added to Sunday evenings, Sarah has been off Fridays, and Melissa has filled in for David.

Is there a reason this guy is allowed to keep trolling this thread and the Fox29 thread? I mean, I disagreed with someone in another thread once and was sanctioned immediately for being argumentative (which I was not and the sanction was later overturned). He was the same way over on the yahoo group for Philadelphia TV news pre-TVNewsTalk, with the same user name and all.

Money. Plain and simple. If you are gonna go with variety why not go with a different pair for 6pm and 11pm too. Variety is great, but it doesn’t come cheap either. Seems like they’ve settled on new weekday pairs: Early Morning: Lucy & Tracy Late Morning: Vai & Tracy 11am: Vai & Rosemary 4pm: Jackie & Erin 5pm: Keith & Erin 6pm/11pm: Jim & Jackie Seems like they’ve switched some of Tammie and Glenn’s time slots too.

Jim Gardner did a preview at 10:29 and 10:49 tonight for the 11pm news, but the 10:59 tease and actual news were handled/anchored by Monica Malpass. Do they prerecord previews after the 6pm news? Otherwise sounds like Jim might have had an emergency to tend to.

Do they really need a separate anchor team for just the 11am show? Couldn't they just have had Keith and Erin anchor it? It seems like they're playing around with the 4pm show too. Jackie has anchored with both Erin and Rosemary this week while Jim is clearly in the building as he was in the sat center at 5pm and anchored at 6pm and 11pm.

I thought they were in 3rd place, but I get your point. Same difference. Yes, the WCCO experiment is not working. Doing things such as switching where the weather and sports people sit will not do the trick (weather person has to walk in front of desk to get to their seat). The same anchor team at 5/6/10/11 while also contributing to the 4pm doesn’t work. And while I like Alexandria and Natasha, I don’t think they make a good team at 4pm. Send one of them to weekends with Joe and give the other a young male co-anchor, and they should add either the 10pm (or 6pm) to their duties. Sports: Don Bell was an upgrade from Beasley Reece so all ok there. Weather: I love Kate Biko but she seems better suited for mornings. They should have never booted Kathy. And I’m not sure what purpose adding Lauren served. She is definitely not for evenings.

I think Jessica is a good addition. Here’s hoping Rick Ritter replaces her at the WJZ anchor desk.

Are they changing the pairings up, or does this have to do with the move?

So Lucy anchored with Tracy in the morning, Vai with Rosemary at 11am, Erin with Jackie at 4pm, and I see Jim is in the newsroom at 5pm. My head’s spinning.

WCAU is on their new set with their A team tonight.

I really doubt that Jose would seriously be considered. Doesn’t he front Noticiero Telemundo at the same time? And he rarely fills in, even on Sundays if Kate is off. Primary weekday fill-ins seem to be Savannah and Kate.

How do you propose they bring the format up to date? GMA and Today have modernized their format and you’ve criticized them for it!

Natasha’s okay. I wouldn’t call her lead anchor material though. There’s a reason she was on weekends forever.

If so, I hope this was her decision. She is one of few there that actually does a good job. Jessica is in for Alexandra at 4pm today and Natasha is in for Ukee at 5pm.

They had the same setup today, with Sade only doing the 5pm half hour and Bill doing the 5:30pm half hour.