A Busy Weekend

It'll be a busy weekend not for us here at OMW World Headquarters, but for some local radio folks...

CAVS SATURDAY: Your Cleveland Cavaliers are, at this writing late Friday, on the cusp of Something Big...an NBA Finals appearance that the local franchise has never made since entering the league in 1970 or so.

And the local sports media atmosphere is starting to resemble the mid-1990s, when the Cleveland Indians made it into two World Series...in 1995 and 1997, if you're new to town and don't have all that memorized.

In the center of the action is Clear Channel talk WTAM/1100, the "Cavaliers' Mothership" and the flagship of the Cleveland Cavaliers Radio Basketball Network.

Game 6 of the Eastern Conference Finals series with the Detroit Pistons airs on WTAM and the team's radio network affiliates Saturday evening.

We haven't happened to hear what the Mothership plans for on-air pre-game and post-game festivities, but we would guess it's likely they'll do another 3 hour pre-game with perhaps midday host Bob Frantz, reporter Andre Knott and "Sportsline" host Kevin Keane in there somewhere, and we'd guess they will air extended coverage in post-game as well.

Meanwhile, WTAM morning co-host Bill Wills joined his co-host - Cavs radio network pre/post-game host Mike Snyder - for a remote broadcast of "Wills and Snyder in the Morning" on Friday morning from Detroit.

Oh, and the game once again will bounce the Cleveland Indians' Saturday evening game with the Detroit Tigers to backup Indians flagship WMMS/100.7. We're guessing that with the magnitude of the basketball game, the Indians' own radio network coverage will shrink somewhat on Saturday.

Over at WTAM's primary Cleveland sports radio competitor, Good Karma's WKNR/850 "ESPN 850 WKNR", we've heard on-air personalities promote an entire Saturday schedule of local sports talk, starting at 7 AM.

We're not sure if that includes or pre-empts the incumbent "Golf Show" from 7-9 AM. But show host Greg Brinda would be there anyway.

But it would include whoever hosts the "Saturday Morning Sports Show" this week from 9 to noon, then local talkers pre-empting ESPN Radio coverage all day long.

It'll end up with the usual "Wine and Gold Post Game Show" with Michael Reghi...which went into the wee hours of the morning Friday after LeBron James beat the Detroit Pistons in the double-overtime Game 5. Well, maybe with a little help before the fourth quarter from other players....

"Rizzo on the Radio" host Tony Rizzo noted that the schedule would be up later Friday on ESPNCleveland.com, but unless we're missing it, it's not up there at this late hour. "The Rizz" also said he'd be in the on-air schedule somewhere.

There's no guarantee that The King will score 48 points again Saturday night, but for sports radio junkies, their Cavaliers fix will be addressed all over the radio and TV spectrum.

And since one of our relatives didn't know, we'll remind readers that the Saturday game - and Game 7 if it's needed on Monday - will air on the TNT national cable network.

FOX Sports Net Ohio has to bow out this deep into the playoffs, due to national TV contracts...though the local FSN arm continues to air its local "Cavaliers Live" pre-game and post-game shows, and "Cleveland Rants" after the post-game...

A BRIEF 'KNR RELATED ITEM: We happened to hear why WKNR/Metro Networks morning sports update anchor Jeff Thomas was out for a few days.

Friday morning, the aforementioned Mr. Rizzo mentioned on his radio show that Thomas recently passed a kidney stone.

Thankfully, Thomas' health concerns have "passed" at least enough to allow him to return to his usual update duties and good humor on the air.

Our "get well wishes" to the long-time local sports news guy...

MOVING WEEKEND: There's no physical moving involved, but a reminder... Radio One makes that switch between talker WERE and gospel WJMO early Monday morning.

The change turns "NewsTalk 1300" into "NewsTalk 1490", and "Praise 1490" into "Praise 1300".

Though local hosts at both stations have promoted the change on the air, the station's websites have no mentions - that we can find - that the frequencies are being swapped.

We're not terribly surprised by this.

Radio One has generally been behind the times when it comes to an Internet presence, and many Radio One stations haven't had even a rudimentary website until the past year or two.

One other thing we found out while researching this story: It appears Syndication One midday host Michael Eric Dyson, the noted author and scholar, is no longer doing the 10 AM-1 PM slot on the Radio One-owned network, which also brings Rev. Al Sharpton and the "2 Live Stews" afternoon sports talk show to WERE.

We'd have to assume that his busy schedule got in the way of tying himself to a three hour talk radio show in the middle of the day.

We heard whoever is filling in for him, or replacing him, but don't remember the man's name. We get the idea that the person we heard is a local talk host at one of the Radio One urban talk stations...

AND WE ALMOST FORGOT: In his bid to purchase a number of small market Clear Channel stations in Ohio, former TV executive Dean Goodman's GoodRadio.TV has to slim down a little to get under ownership cap restructions.

AllAccess reported this week that three of the stations Goodman's company is spinning off into a trust are in Ohio, with one nearby:

* WIRO/1230 Ironton and WZZW/1600 Milton WV, otherwise known as the two simulcasters on either side of Huntington WV talk outlet WVHU/800. Until last year, WZZW carried a separate "Joy Radio" Christian music format.

* Top 40 WBKS/107.1, also in Ironton, the market's "Kiss FM" outlet.

* And oldies WBUK/106.3 Ottawa OH, aka Lima market oldies station "The Big Buck".

All four stations will go to the trust, which will sell off the stations to another company...