Mike Francesa still flying solo post-Russo
After taking a week off, I suppose I ought to update you on the situation regarding Mike Francesa's search for a regular sidekick.
Umm . . . there isn't one, as far as I have been able to ascertain. Stay tuned, as they say in the journalism cliche department.
I often am asked how Francesa is doing in the ratings in the post-Russo, pre-new-sidekick era. Comparing numbers to last year at this time is difficult because of the conversion from the old diary system to the new people meters.
But Francesa's numbers are holding up well, especially given that people meters generally are perceived to hurt talk stations.
For the first month of autumn, WFAN averaged 5.3 percent of the audience among men ages 25-54 from 3 to 7 p.m., second in the market behind Q104.3-FM.
1050 ESPN ranked 16th in the demographic with an average rating of 2.4.
I should write my Tuesday newspaper column now. Enjoy WEC WrekCage on Versus at 6 p.m. I have no idea what that is.
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Comments (16)
Woo hoo! Bob Heussler!!!!!
Do you have WFAN has a whole losing listeners for 3 consecutive months?
http://njfrogman.blogspot.com/2008/11/wfans-ratings-fall-for-3rd-consecutive.html
And CBS is at 7.95. It was at 28.00 52 weeks ago and 17.67 on August 11th. Francesa brought up SIRI's numbers so...touche.
WEC | World Extreme Cagefighting is owned by the same company that runs the UFC: Zuffa, LLC
It caters to the smaller guys. Featherweight, Bantamweight, and Lightweight. Urijah Faber is its Featherweight champ and most marketable guy. Though with is locks - hair that is - he wouldn't have done well back in the day...
They do also have a Welterweight and
Middleweight - so Fox's Jay Glazer could have competed here.
Urijah Faber WAS the WEC Featherweight champ. He got knocked out last Wednesday live on Versus. Also, he cut his hair.
WEC is great!
Cgar, wow - thx! Mike Brown - that is the fight they are replaying tonight. It will be worth it just for that.
And thx NB for reminding us all.
B
neil.did you see keith give mike the worst person award on friday?
CG: I did. Thought it was a little weird doing it two weeks after the fact.
CB: I sent the link to Neil. I guess he thought it would be weird to post it, because then he'd be as late to the party as KO was...
Perhaps the YES/MSG thing had to be decided first?
Now there's joeandevan.com, which makes me think Joe B. is not going anywhere.
I personally liked the Francesa/Jones dynamic.
Perhaps there's someone else out there with a soon-to-expire contract that Mike has an eye on?
Bob (and Neil),
Your comments are misleading at Best.
I clicked thru to your blog and saw the following:
August 1,855,500
September 1,849,300
October 1,756,200
Based on this table, their ratings are down for 2 months, not three. (If you had the July numbers somewhere I couldn't find them.) The decline between August and September is 3-tenths of 1% (aka Rounding Error).
You don't show the shares for the same three months, which show that the FAN is attracting the same share month to month between September and October:
August 3.0
September 2.7
October 2.7
Finally, you didn't point out that the October rating period runs from September 29 - October 26. (The Mets season ended September 28) Don't you think that impacted the ratings just a bit?
Bob (and Neil),
Your comments are misleading at Best.
I clicked thru to your blog and saw the following:
August 1,855,500
September 1,849,300
October 1,756,200
Based on this table, their ratings are down for 2 months, not three. (If you had the July numbers somewhere I couldn't find them.) The decline between August and September is 3-tenths of 1% (aka Rounding Error).
You don't show the shares for the same three months, which show that the FAN is attracting the same share month to month between September and October:
August 3.0
September 2.7
October 2.7
Finally, you didn't point out that the October rating period runs from September 29 - October 26. (The Mets season ended September 28) Don't you think that impacted the ratings just a bit?
Neil,
Could you give us a quick primer on the difference between the "diary" system and the new "people meters" please? I have long felt that these ratings systems have been nefariously built to have absolutely no bearing on what people actually watch or listen to...much like a poll to measure a politicians popularity funded by that politician, i.e., a sham.
Also, a demographic grouping 25-54 year olds together I am assuming does not mention the fact that there are subgroups in that range that are used to fine tune programming.
Please say yes so that I don't have to chastise the radio executive ranks as being the sole repository for idiots.
Glad your back Neil.
Regards,
John
speaking of available people out there--Bill Pidto for second banana?
Eric, You are correct. I emailed the Blitz and they fixed that.
The July numbers were reported on the Blitz about 3 weeks ago:
http://njfrogman.blogspot.com/2008/10/wfan-ratings-tank-in-september-08.html
Eric: Thanks. Was going to point out the Mets factor.
JCF61: Involved answer, but basically the people meters measure actual listening while the diaries relied on people's memories. The talk stations are hurt by the fact they have more commercials than music stations, and people skip around a lot.
Joey B- those July numbers are for Francesa's (and Russo's) show only as opposed to total day (which I believe Arbriton calls 6a-midnight); that's what the cumes are based on.
He did change the headline, but not the text of his post.