An article in the Times this morning discusses the beginning of a new sports talk radio station in Seattle next week, 710 KIRO, which will be re-named 710 ESPN Seattle. For years, 950 KJR has been the only viable sports radio stations (the one in Everett is almost impossible to pick up in Seattle with any regularity, depending on where you live), and finally sports fans get a choice of who to listen to.
The article doesn't reveal anything particularly breathtaking but I did find some humor in a quote from a KJR executive about the focal point of each station:
[KJR AM Program Director Rich] Moore is banking on fans turning the dial to KJR morning hosts talking about the Seattle teams. "When you wake up the next morning do you want to hear Colin Cowherd talk about the Yankees?" he asks.
Anybody that has ever listened to a the Mitch in the Morning Show on KJR has got to be laughing themselves silly over that ignorant comment from Moore. Does Moore actually believe that his KJR morning hosts talk about Seattle sports?
Memo to Rich Moore: I don't want to hear Colin Cowherd talk about the Yankees anymore than I want to hear Mitch in the Morning talk about his "beloved" Miami Dolphins.
Occasionally I have to drive down to Portland for work early on a weekday and I'll listen to KJR on the way down. Mitch and his sidekick talk about lots of things, but almost none of it has anything to do with Seattle sports. Let's see if we can run through the usual hot topics:
1) Miami Dolphins football
2) Syracuse University sports
3) The Bigger Dance
4) Taking his son out Trick-or-Treating on Halloween
5) Anything other than sports
They recently had a little skit where they "pretended" to interview Gonzaga coach Mark Few by asking question and then replaying canned answers from an interview Few gave to ESPN. The interview was filled with their usually junior high antics.
I'd say 70% to 80% of the time the KJR morning show is talking about something other than Seattle sports, and most of the time it's not even sports related. It might be even higher than that. The biggest segment on his entire program is his daily snooze-fest known as "The Daily Schnoz", which has nothing at all to do with Seattle sports.
So next Monday the sports fans in Seattle will have the option of waking up to Colin Cowherd his ESPN-slanted show, or Mitch in the Morning and his Frat Boys on Spring Break yuk session. Is death an option?