Official: O&A to WXRK/92.3 Afternoons, WNCX On Its Own

As expected, former CBS Radio afternoon bad boys Opie and Anthony are officially back in the saddle again at the company, taking over for the fired David Lee Roth in morning drive in six of Roth's markets - with a simulcast on their current home of XM Satellite Radio.

And as tipped last week by AllAccess, the pair's show will indeed air here in Northeast Ohio not on former Roth/Howard Stern affiliate WNCX/98.5, but delayed into afternoon drive on CBS Radio alt-rock sister WXRK/92.3 "K-Rock". The show will, according to the CBS press-release, air 3-6 PM on 92.3, while airing live 6-9 AM on the other six former Roth outlets.

Freed of syndicated morning talk, WNCX broke out the station's usual classic rock playlist this morning, with recorded announcements like this one at 6:30 AM:

"This morning show is 'under construction'. 98-5 NCX, Cleveland's Classic Rock, is conducting a search for the right person - or people - to create a brand new morning show...right here in Cleveland. And yes, we will involve you, the listener, in this process. For now, we'll be filling your mornings with the best classic rock. But soon, we will be building a new morning show - together, for Cleveland, on 98-5 NCX."

The station has also posted this on wncx.com:

"WNCX MORNINGS...WE'LL LEAVE IT UP TO YOU!!!!

We are going to be posting a questionnaire soon! This way, you can tell us what YOU want to hear in the mornings on WNCX! Maybe it's more music? Maybe you have a certain radio host you would like to hear? You'll be able to tell us! In the meantime, enjoy the music that has made us Cleveland's only ALL CLASSIC ROCK!"

OK, you don't have to drop an anvil on our head to get a hint through to us. Though we suppose anything's possible, we'd be very surprised to see 'NCX mount another syndicated morning show in the wake of this. Sure, there's Bob & Tom out there, but the Premiere-syndicated show based out of Indianapolis has, last we checked, few CBS Radio affiliates.

It could happen, but we expect a local morning show, with probably at least some music, and our gut feeling tells us they'll go after a recognized local "name" host. That last part is just a guess. Maybe we should stare at that list of guests for "Five Cleveland Mornings" a while back and see what might work...