Wednesday, May 03, 2000
Bengals return to WLW, sister stations
By John Fay
The Cincinnati Enquirer
The Bengals are back on the Big One — sort of.
WLW's sister stations, WCKY-AM (1360 HOMER) and WOFX-FM (92.5 the Fox),will serve as flagship stations for the team's broadcasts this season and carry coach Bruce Coslet's show and the weekly pregame show.
WLW-AM (700) will carry the games once the Reds' season ends.
The merger between AMFM, which owned Bengals rights-holder WBOB-AM (1160), and Clear Channel, which owns WLW, HOMER and The Fox, precipitated the change.
No announcement was made as to who will call the games. Darryl Parks, director of AM operations for Clear Channel in Cincinnati, confirmed that two TV sportscasters — Channel 12's Brad Johansen and Channel 5's Ken Broo — are candidates for the play-by-play job, and current analyst Dave Lapham, a former Bengal, is a candidate for the analyst job.
The fact that Channel 12 is owned by Clear Channel could give Johansen an advantage for the play-by-play job. Clear Channel has the call on the on-air talent; the Bengals have veto power.
Lapham will meet with Clear Channel today.
The Bengals moved from WLW to WBOB three years ago after Bengals President Mike Brown grew tired of some of the criticism on Bengals pregame and postgame shows.
“It's been an odyssey for us and the radio station,” Brown said.
The merger left Brown with little choice. WBOB has since been sold to Salem Communications. Its future as a sports station is up in the air.
“The plain fact is that Clear Channel has a powerful voice in Cincinnati,” Brown said. “We will benefit from that.”
By keeping most of the Bengals programming on HOMER, Clear Channel avoids a major conflict: WLW radio host Andy Furman, whose comments rubbed Brown the wrong way, will not be involved.
Brown said the past relationship between the Bengals and WLW was part of the negotiations, but he did not elaborate.
“We talked about a lot of things as you would do as part of normal negotiations,” Brown said. “We resolved it. It's best to leave what was discussed to the two of us.”
The big beneficiary in this is HOMER. “The Bengals will give HOMER an identity,” Parks said, “much like the Bengals gave BOB an identity.”
BOB has been beating HOMER in the ratings. In the last Arbitron book, BOB got an 0.9 (tied for 17th in the market) to an 0.7 (tied for 21st) for HOMER. BOB had its best two rating periods back-to-back in the 25-to-54 male audience it shoots for. From 6 a.m. to 7 p.m., BOB was no worse than 11th in the market in 25-to-54 men. Raw Fish, Paul Sturgeon's show, pulled a 3.6, good for ninth in the market.
BOB employees have been in limbo since the merger. Salem has given no indication to the rank-and-file about the future of the station.
Parks said WLW will continue with its “best Bengals” coverage, which included shows with former Bengals Cris Collinsworth, Boomer Esiason and Anthony Munoz.
At times, the Bengals show on HOMER will be going head-to-head with Bengals shows on WLW.
HOMER will have to adjust its schedule to allow for the additional Bengals programming. Parks said the station will add on-air staff.
“We're looking to do that,” Parks said. “We want to beef up things. We're going to put a lot of effort into all our Bengals programming.”
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 Bengals return to WLW, sister stations
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