Monday Morning Short Takes

Short Take 1: When did WOIO/19's airwaves turn into the Sharon Reed Dating Service? OK, so we're mostly joking. But during the station's "McDonald's Browns Tonight" show late Sunday, we did indeed see the "19 Action News" anchor, in the hallways of Lambeau Field, asking Browns star rookie wide receiver Braylon Edwards if he'd "join (her) tomorrow night".

Uh, yeah, on the station's "Browns Town" talk show, she meant, but we'll assume he knew that without her having to say the name of the show. The little quip caught the attention of two of "Browns Tonight"'s co-hosts - WNIR afternoon drive host and former Brown Bob Golic, and former Browns star Hanford Dixon, the third member of the show's hosting trio. Both of 'em joked about it after the recorded segment. Bless you, Bob Golic...you don't hold back!

The entire exchange, in the back of OMW's minds, was powered by the knowledge that Sharon Reed had well-publicized dating relationships with Philadelphia sports superstars when she was in the City of, umm, Brotherly Love. Sharon, if you don't want to fuel that speculation here in Cleveland, you might not want to question a Browns player on camera like you were asking him on a date... it takes away from your otherwise very capable and professional performance in the station's Browns coverage team. If this doesn't bother you, well, fire away.

Short Take 2: OMW noted while changing channels that Channel 3's late Sunday sports show is also "title sponsored" by McDonald's. Is WJW/8's show open for sponsorship by, say, Wendy's? We know WEWS/5's sports programming is, as last we checked, sponsored by your friendly Chevy Network Dealers. So much for the fast food theme. Oh, and the burps on WTAM/1100 afternoon motormouth Mike Trivisonno's show are sponsored by Mallorca's. Oh, and Miller High Life.

Short Take 3: Continuing our sports theme this Monday, why in the world was the Cleveland Indians' spectacular win over the Kansas City Royals not televised anywhere? There's probably a good reason that the 11-0 blowout did not make TV, we guess...Fox Sports Net Ohio shows most of the Tribe's games, home and away, but 12 games were not on the schedule when the season started. There's probably also a rights problem with ESPN, which we believe may have exclusive Sunday rights. But watching the Tribe dismantle the Royals would have been a nice treat, while waiting for the Browns game. (26-24 Browns, for those who haven't hit the sports section yet.) The Browns game, by the way, looked spectacular not only on the field, but in a very good high definition broadcast via CBS and WOIO-DT.

Short Take 4: You knew we couldn't start the week without visiting the Land of Glunt, didn't you? Just a brief note...it appears OMW does have readers at the studios at Courthouse Square in downtown Warren, the World Headquarters of the Harold Glunt Broadcast Empire, and more specifically, home of "Family Friendly" oldies simulcast base WANR/1570 Warren.

You'll read no more complaints about that station's legal IDs in This Space, because they have actually fixed the regular legal ID to mention all three Beacon Broadcasting AM stations - WANR, and sister WLOA/1470 Farrell PA and WGRP/940 Greenville PA - with the proper call letters and city of license! Every single hour! All day long! (Someone call the media...)

We mention it here because we had what Television Without Pity's "Miss Alli" would call a "shout-out"... an on-air mention that would lead us to believe we're being read by the folks in downtown Warren. After playing the then one-station legal ID that only mentioned WANR, middayer Ron Leader...or was that "Doctor Rock"?... added the other two stations and jokingly berated the recorded announcer for missing them. Heh.

Have fun, guys...it's good to hear friendly, locally-run music radio on small AM stations in a market like Youngstown/Warren...