Thinking It Out On The Weekend

SNOW-ED OUT?: Clear Channel talk WKRC/550 Cincinnati recently replaced Premiere's Glenn Beck with FOX News Radio's Tony Snow in middays. The station touted Snow's local ties - he was born not far from Cincinnati in Kentucky, and went to school in the Queen City. Now, the station may have to look somewhere else, as numerous media sources report that Snow is on the "short list" to replace departing White House press secretary Scott McClellan.

Snow's radio show hasn't really gained much traction in that competitive 9 AM-noon ET slot, and the commentator would seem to still have a higher profile from his weekend work on FOX News Channel. If Snow takes the White House job, does WKRC go back to Beck, or go elsewhere? If it were in any market except Cincinnati, the opening would be a natural for WLW-based Mike McConnell's new syndication effort...but McConnell is not moving off the Big One. (We also wonder if McConnell's syndicated show will eventually end up displacing Beck on WTVN/610 Columbus.)

SHUT OUT: Regular readers know this effort grew out of our long-time contribution to various radio message boards, in particular the Radio-Info Cleveland board.

Last night, the family of late Radio-Info co-founder Doug Fleming took over the board's domain, and has set up a new site with archives of some of the old messages. (At this writing, the replacement site is down for technical reasons.) Previous R-I management and staff have established a new site of their own, at RadioInsight.com.

Local radio-board-wise, the Cleveland.com Listening Party forum is still up... and it's a more civilized alternative than it was back a year or so ago.

MISSING OUT: Despite the fact that two widely-read and respected radio trade sites have reported that XM Satellite Radio's Opie and Anthony will NOT be directly replacing David Lee Roth on Cleveland CBS Radio classic rocker WNCX/98.5, no one seems to be getting that information in the print media.

It's been Plain Dealer columnist Chuck Yarborough following the saga for Cleveland's major daily newspaper, and he's still trying to figure it out. Yarborough got nothing but giggles and no confirmation from a CBS Radio spokeswoman, and can't get a call back from WNCX GM Tom Herschel. Meanwhile, down here at Your Mighty Blog of Fun(tm), you already know that O&A are expected to hold down afternoons on WXTM/92.3, not mornings on WNCX/98.5...

Elsewhere in the PD, TV/radio columnist Julie Washington checks in with the WVIZ/PBS Auction (this and next weekend), WJW/8 entertainment reporter David "Mossman" Moss, and a Sunday schedule change at local NPR outlet WKSU/89.7.

FOUND OUT: And OMW stumbled onto something we haven't seen mentioned elsewhere. Some time in the past few months, WKSU added to its far flung repeater and translator network, establishing W298BA/107.5 Boardman as a translator in the Youngstown market.

The stick is actually south of Boardman, closer to the town of New Middletown - where it was originally licensed. It would not appear, from signal maps we've seen, to be intended to cover even a part of the entire Youngstown area...it's a bit too far south and not powerful enough to put a full signal even over Boardman. But it appears perfectly situated to serve travelers on the last few miles of the Ohio Turnpike. According to its FCC service area map, the 10 watt translator's tower is located basically directly at the last rest stop on the Turnpike, southeast of Youngstown....