Monday, June 7, 2010

BREAKING NEWS: McConnell Out At "The Big One"

We'd speculated on this last week, but elected to wait before doing a longform post - and now the station itself confirms the speculation.

Mike McConnell, who has been part of the staff at 700 WLW-AM/Cincinnati first as a production director and then a midday host since roughly around when Your Tri-State Media Watcher was born in 1985, now leaves the latter position to head north to Chicago. 700 WLW confirmed the move today just before 5:00 PM in this news release (which you can also read here):

"The Big One" Turns A Page As Mike McConnell Moves North

700WLW Midday New/Talk Personality Seeks Greener Pastures in Chicago

Cincinnati, June 7, 2010 -- 700WLW Cincinnati - "The Big One" - today announced the departure of long-serving Midday News/Talk Personality Mike McConnell, who has elected to relocate to Chicago.
The move is effective immediately, and a search for a permanent replacement has been initiated.

"We'll miss Mike," said Chuck Fredrick, President and Market Manager - Clear Channel Cincinnati. "We've long known that Chicago has represented a 'dream market' for Mike - and we firmly believe everyone has the right to chase their dreams. We wish him all the best."

McConnell has served 700WLW Cincinnati since the mid 1980's, first as production director and later as a talk host. The station indicated that long term evening talk host Scott Sloan will fill in temporarily on the Midday broadcast while the search for a permanent replacement for Mr. McConnell is conducted.

The entire staff of 700WLW wants to take this opportunity to thank Mike for his years of service to The Big One and the Tri-State area. Few radio personalities are able to reach a community in a way Mike has and that will be missed. In life people start down new roads and begin new adventures all the time. We hope everyone joins us in wishing Mike all the best in this new beginning of his career.


Again, this had been speculated for over a week. We didn't post any more than a couple short tweets - because we didn't have our own sources at Kenwood Tower.

With this press release, the only thing still hanging out there from our tweets of last week is the future of Bill Cunningham, who is WLW's other daytime anchor in the Noon-3:00 PM slot. If he leaves, that's a huge hole in WLW's lineup.

As it is, we wonder if this will impact WLW's ratings. We don't expect it'll be much of one at this point, with the Reds still heard there and (for now) Cunningham still on "The Big One".

By the way: The other half of this speculation, as to McConnell's possible destination IN Chicago, is still not announced. The speculation did have McConnell heading to WGN 720 and Tribune Broadcasting - but that part is still unconfirmed, as Clear Channel obviously didn't announce that. If he IS headed to WGN radio, expect an announcement from Tribune sometime in the next month or so...

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Might this lead to:

(1) Bill Cunningham being cut back to just his Sunday-night national show, and,

(2) Glenn Beck going 9-Noon and Rush 12-3??

After all, WLW is owned by Clear Channel, and by replacing McConnell with a syndicated show, the station will save a lot of money.

J. Moses said...

I seriously doubt Cunningham would even keep his Sunday show. We're hearing McConnell MAY have already lost his "Weekend" program to his short-term replacement, Scott Sloan. That assumes Sloan didn't just replace him because he was on vacation.

As for scenario #2: it could happen. Both are actually on 550 WKRC-AM, which is 5,000 watts...and would stand to gain a lot of listeners if put on "The Big One".

J. Moses said...

Best guess however I'd say is that CC-Cincy would prefer to keep WLW live and local during the daytime. So I doubt Beck and Rush would be used. It COULD happen...but I doubt it.

Anonymous said...

I truly do not believe Cunningham is going to leave WLW. He is known to go around blowing steam and I think he has been feeding off all the hoopla surrounding McConnell. Cunningham has a long history of starting rumors about his leaving the big one, always around contract negotiations. He seeks publicity, always has. He has much more invested in Cincinnati than just his radio show. He has numerous business ventures as well as his wife being a judge. Chicago is one of the most liberal cities in the country and I think they would eat him alive. It is my opinion that this has all been started by Cunningham and that he is going no where...