Greggo

Not that long ago, most stations would prevent on-air talent from taking any time off during sweeps months, such as May. The stakes were too high. Now, it seems many bosses are OK with letting anchors take off days or even a week or more. I’m seeing it in multiple markets. Kind of surprising turn of events. An indicator that ratings aren’t as important as they once were? An attempt to keep talent in a tight labor market? Or …

17 minutes ago, ScottSchell said:

If that’s the case why is cbs O&O’s and some Hearst stations still using it?

You can pay to license it. 

A couple changes from Texas to report …

Former Fox 26 Houston chief met Jim Siebert, who abruptly left earlier this year, has resurfaced at WeatherNation as a VP. 

https://mikemcguff.blogspot.com/2022/04/dr-jim-siebert-joins-weathernation.html

In Bryan/College Station, several changes at top-rated KBTX. Evening co-anchor Karla Castillo has shifted to mornings, citing a desire to spend more time with her family. She fills one of the two seats vacated recently by husband-wife anchor team of Josh and Kathleen Ninke, who both went to WAVE in Louisville to report. 
 

The other morning anchor seat is posted online, with reporter Fallon Appleton filling in on an interim basis. Castillo’s evening co-anchor seat is also posted. The station said various reporters will fill in for her on the evening shift for now. 
 
The station has also revealed it will be replacing Ellen at 3p this fall with an hourlong local lifestyle show that will be called The Three. (Not only will it air at 3p, but they are also Channel 3.) Jobs are posted for a host and a producer. 
 

All four KBTX jobs are listed on Gray’s career website, along with several others. 

Gut-wrenching. They had just announced she had gone to hospice hours earlier. This was a horribly aggressive cancer. At least we know she is at peace now. 

On 4/6/2022 at 5:46 PM, Greggo said:

Looks like it is the same package KPLC in Lake Charles (and others) have. Not very impressive, sadly. Considering how dominant WVUE is, you’d think they’d get something special. 

I believe this was initially known as the WMC package. I couldn’t initially remember which station debuted them. It has been bastardized heavily since then. WBTV has the same opens as KPLC but different L3s. WBRC has different opens but the same L3s, just red instead of blue. So I guess we could still be somewhat surprised. We know based upon the weather graphics shown above that WVUE is going blue. So maybe a custom open and the WBTV L3s? That wouldn’t be too horrible. Still was hoping for more tho. 

8 hours ago, EricTheEnthusiast said:

Last night during the news at 9 and 10 on WVUE, David Bernard had several graphics with the new look. See the attached screenshots. Seems less like a mistake and more deliberate at this point. Do we think a change is imminent? Any guesses as to when, and which package it will be?

Looks like it is the same package KPLC in Lake Charles (and others) have. Not very impressive, sadly. Considering how dominant WVUE is, you’d think they’d get something special. 

No one is going to mention daddy’s new sports anchor?

Starting the newscast with a prolonged apology about the number of screwups you’ve been having? “We’re still learning.” Maybe they should have given the staff a bit more time to get used to things. That’s rather embarrassing. 

1 hour ago, CircleSeven said:

From the NYPost, Dotdash Meredith is pulling the plug on PeopleTV. The program will air its final shows in April.

Cutting it in the middle of the TV season is … odd. What are stations supposed to do to fill the spot? More news in many cases, I’m guessing. Or double runs of a show they already have the rights to. 

8 hours ago, SS8609 said:

If that show ends up on KRIV, and with two hours for them to fill with Sherri Shepherd likely filling Wendy Williams' slot and Nick Cannon now gone, what does this mean for KHOU at 3pm? If Kelly Clarkson does end up going to KPRC (in line with the inevitable NBC O&O sales pitch from Graham), could Dr. Phil wind up on KHOU? Also important to note Drew Barrymore's surprise renewal (and splinter into two halves) and the FACT that Rachael Ray and The Doctors have been virtually absent from Houston TV since KUBE went all-shopping. There's also plenty of room on KTXH as well, assuming that The Real's time slot isn't taken up by another NBCU serial repeat block. And that's another thing...I'm surprised MyNetworkTV is still a thing. It will be interesting to see how Tegna fills the critical 3pm slot before the 4pm news, just before they hand off the station to Cox.

The most likely Ellen replacement on KHOU, pre-Cox at least, would seem to be Daily Blast Live. KHOU has been airing it overnights at 12:35a, as well as an hour each afternoon on sister station KTBU. KPRC will be interesting. They had a recent Houston Life job posting that said the show is eyeing an expansion. That would seem to make them unlikely to add any shows and presumably would mean Phil could get booted or be overnights only. KHOU, I guess, would be an option. KTBU should pick up at least some of what KUBE dumped. Rachael Ray on KTXH? I just don’t see it happening. 

56 minutes ago, newscopter7 said:

Yeah, KDKA is competitive. Can the same be said of WCBS, KCBS, or WBBM? 

Definitely not WBBM. WGN included ratings for all the stations in the press release they put out that was posted here. WBBM was awful. 3rd, 4th or 5th all day. 
 

https://wgntv.com/community/news-releases/wgn-tv-delivers-strong-viewership-and-growth-in-february-up-against-the-winter-olympics/

4 hours ago, Breaking News said:

Say what you will about WSB-TV & WGCL-TV and it looks like another Atlanta icon changing stations.  Karyn Greer who been at both WGCL & WXIA. She heading

over to WSB-TV.

https://www.ajc.com/life/radiotvtalk-blog/veteran-cbs46-anchor-karyn-greer-replacing-jovita-moore-as-wsb-tv-evening-anchor/4FEG6I4FJ5CU3F6BPHSXTXOCBE/

 

Who has been anchoring in Jovita’s place? It’s odd they would hire Karyn and not know which show(s) she’ll be on. 

KPRC tweaked its initial 1994/1995 set (the one that corresponded with the rebrand to News 2 Houston) multiple times before moving to the KPRC News Center, a working newsroom set based upon WSVN’s, in 1998. Even when they dumped the newsroom set and moved back to a more traditional one, it remained the newsroom with many of the fixtures still in place until the building was replaced and then demolished on the same lot about 5 years ago. 

5 minutes ago, ABC 7 Denver said:

 

If WFXT is what they consider a great investment of local news, then all stations under Standard are going to collapse.

 

 

CMG is taking all assets from and dissolving the entire StandardMedia brand.

 

Who knows what this means for WFXT, but WFXT is definitely not news leader. Maybe Standard can turn that around.

With Cox leaving Boston, I’d be shocked if Standard General doesn’t abandon the disastrous Boston 25 brand for a return of Fox 25. 
 

Also … someone above was asking about Cox blowing out the Tegna sets. I wouldn’t count on it. KOKI, their Tulsa station, is still using its Clear Channel set. The WFAA set is brand new. The KHOU set is only a couple years old and dates back to when the station relocated to the Galleria area after flooding from Hurricane Harvey. The KVUE set is the stereotypical Tegna “set in a box” but it, too, isn’t that old. Cox will likely let these stations pick whichever graphics they’d like, however. Maybe WSB, KIRO or the “Tonight” graphics. 

4 hours ago, cbs4dallas said:

Why wasn’t KENS included in the deal? It is because of Cox owned radio stations already in San Antonio?

If that were the case, then Houston wouldn’t have been included either. Cox has a cluster in Houston with 3 FMs and an AM.  
 

Only thing I can think of is that they felt the need to keep at least one large station in the state to work with all the small ones. The smaller stations share HR and other functions. The larger stations give them a lot of back office support. The general manager at KVUE in Austin has management oversight at their Tyler, Texas station, for example. 

There’s also this one from WBBM … one of the most ambitious talent opens you’ll ever see. 

On 2/17/2022 at 8:44 AM, sanewsguy said:

The one that piqued my interest in TV news for the first time:

 

This will always be one of my faves. It looks better than most of the stuff on the air now across the country, even though it’s around 25 years old at this point. They did such a great job with that package. Clearly a lot of time and thought went into it. The quality of the animations, the timing of shots … everything. And then to see it all swept away when they took on the “precious” WOAI call letters …  

Also … the KTVT package above is another great one. KEYE here in Austin swiped it and used it for a bit while they were still an O&O. They at one point used a modified talent open where the anchors’ actual signatures were shown in place of displaying their names using the designated font 

3 hours ago, CLETVFan said:

Here's a look for the recent ratings for the current syndicated season.

https://www.nexttv.com/news/syndication-ratings-jeopardy-dips-without-amy-schneider-but-still-leads

How sad is it that Jerry Springer and Judge Judy are beating multiple shows currently in production?!? 

Mornings are, by far, their weak spot. They have Jack Benny and Burns & Allen from 7-9a, pulled over from Antenna. Pretty much anything would be better. Also: With all the decent syndicated programming they do have (Kelly Clarkson, Family Feud, etc) why is the lead in for the 6p news Justice for All/Supreme Justice? Those shows have tiny audiences. A comically bad decision. 

17 hours ago, HoosierNewsie said:

The award for the most awkward talent open goes too… WJET.

 

Seriously, was is the morning anchor/meteorologist doing with their hands in the talent open…? 

Agreed. So many things wrong with these talent opens. The news anchor robotically lifting and tilting his head looks very forced and unnatural. The news and weather anchors both make awkward hand gestures. The weather guy looks off to the left at the end of the group shot on ABC. Clearly the shot ran out. They couldn’t fix? It’s especially odd because the Fox open doesn’t have that issue. Also … I’m not sure why they feature the sports director, whose segments are pretaped from the night before. Not trying to be a jerk, but if anyone knows the people who put this together, maybe have them reach out to a more experienced peer in a larger market for feedback next time. 

1 hour ago, MorningNews said:

Interesting but family is most important. I hope Keith is tapped to be the replacement.

Seems like there’s got to be something more to this. Maybe he’d been growing increasingly unhappy and just decided to walk? You leave the same day you make your announcement, the day before a major sweeps period when your station has the Olympics and the Super Bowl? I’m sure they had their anchors already scheduled for the entire month, had cut a ton of promos and now they have to shuffle. 
 

Perhaps one of his parents did take a turn for the worse but even then, would you quit the same day? I mean … he also has a wife and kids who have to be relocated. That takes some coordination. Switching schools, finding a new house, etc. Not to mention a new job, unless he’s going back to KXAS. Dallas is only a 45-minute flight from Houston on Southwest if something ever came up. 
 

Honestly it would just be easiest for KPRC to put Keith on the 5, 6 and 10. Keep Andy on Midday and noon, plus have him take over the 4 from Keith. They wouldn’t need to hire another male anchor, wouldn’t have to introduce a new face and would save some $$$$. They’ve been using Brandon Walker as a fill-in on some shows in recent months so he’d be available if need to help when someone is off. 
 

Blowing through both main anchors in a span of less than 6 months (and 3 in about 18 months if you add in Bill, who Kris replaced) isn’t a very good look for KPRC. 

26 minutes ago, sanewsguy said:

First look at WZMQ 19 News, This Is Home: 

 

Is the long-term plan to broadcast news from Erie, using Erie News Now talent? Or is this temporary? (I suspect I know the answer.) I’m already seeing Erie residents who’ve spotted John Stehlin’s posts about Marquette and are getting confused on Facebook. 

5 hours ago, GodfreyGR said:

Liz Collin has left WCCO after 14 years. The STrib sums it up pretty thoroughly.

Guess they waited till contract renewal time to avoid a potential lawsuit. 

9 hours ago, scrabbleship said:

 

When Emmis had KHON and KGMB in Hawaii, their newsrooms were kept separate. Doesn't Sinclair have a degree of separation between WOAI and KABB in San Antonio as well?

 

Though not a true duopoly the same could be said if WEAR and WPMI if anything for the geographical quirks of that market.

The WOAI/KABB bosses initially told the local newspaper there would be no sharing after Sinclair snagged WOAI. That has been watered down dramatically over time … especially since WOAI moved to the KABB building from its historic longtime home on the River Walk downtown. (A fire sped up the process.) They share weekend anchors, weekday morning traffic anchors and GA reporters. You will see the same news reporter turning the same story repeatedly mornings, bouncing between the 2. The weekday morning and evening anchors don’t really cross over. That’s about it now. 

The WJMN set is PLASTERED with the CBS logo. It’s on the desk. It’s on the dura. Curious to see how they frame shots to avoid showing it.