Geov parrish: 710 ESPN KIRO hires brock huard

by Geov Parrish

Bla'M announced a while back, that since Seattle is about to become a competitive sports-talk radio market, and he has no interest in listening to (let alone writing about) sports talk, what he really needed was an ex-jock who knows something about media and radio.

(Insert punchline here.)

Failing that, what y'all have got is me, who was a jock once long ago. We won't bore you with the details, other than to note that the other lowlight from that period of our life, circa 1977, was briefly sharing a dorm floor at the University of Oregon with another young radio geek, a kid from Tillamook named Lars Larson. Really. He quit school to go work at KXL not long after. We went to go do mornings at the country radio station in Tillamook.

And since then we (that's the royal "we," not to be confused with Lars and us, or Bla'M and us, or the Bla'M's royal "we." Confused yet?) have been in and around radio and media for too long, but it's not our livelihood these days. (Which places us in a solid majority; there are way more ex-journalists than journalists left in this city.) And we've surely got better things to do than write about sports radio, which is probably why we like the idea of doing it, at least when there's something interesting to write about.

Like today.

 Bonneville Seattle Radio Group today announced the addition of local sports broadcaster, Brock Huard, to the daily programming line-up for its new all-sports radio station, 710 ESPN Seattle, launching next month.  Brock Huard will co-host a daily sports talk show.  The time of the show and Huardís co-host will be announced in the near future.

Huard is the new station's second local on-air hire, after veteran Sonics and new Seattle Sounders (soccer) play-by-play guy Kevin Calabro.

Note that he's a co-host. That says at least one other hire will be announced, probably soon, given that the format flip is due in a matter of weeks. But probably not many more than that -- or the station's handle wouldn't be 710 ESPN, suggesting both that the station will carry lots of syndicated national fare (that's how Bonneville lured the network affiliation away from Clear Channel's KJR, by promising more network clearance, likely especially the Mike & Mike Show in mornings) and that, for the first time since roughly the days of Marconi, the 710 AM station in Seattle will probably have call letters other than KIRO.

Huard is a former record-setting UW quarterback, from a Puyallup family famous for them, who turned out to be a bust in the NFL, "retired" (i.e., cut) after five seasons spent mostly carrying clipboards. Since then, he's done some radio and TV here and there, mostly color analysis on football gamecasts, most recently for the Seahawks (whose games 710 will carry) and on ESPN.

What Huard has not done -- unlike Calabro, who in his long announcing career has called every major men's team sport -- is demonstrate that he can talk intelligently about any sport other than the one he played. And what neither he nor Calabro have done, ever, is host a daily sports-talk program.

What Bonneville is going for, at least so far, is celebrity names that are known to local sports fans. By contrast, KJR, whose lineup over the years has been one of the most stable of any station in Seattle (of <I>any</I> format), uses ex-jocks like Hugh Millen for in-season analysis but leaves its hosting duties almost entirely in the hands of hosts who are experienced radio people but who are <I>not</I> ex-jocks at the collegiate or pro level. (The one exception is Elise Woodward  (m-f, 7-10 p), who played basketball at UW but put in a long internship at KJR doing updates, fill-in work, and co-hosting before finally being given her own show last year -- and she was hardly a marquee local name to the average sports fan.)

Hmm. A new format looking to make a splash by hiring people based on name value rather than the demonstrated ability to actually host a daily radio show.

Where have we heard that before?

I can't quite put my finger on it...

Comments

[marc vanhuisen]

Welcome Geov.

[Radio listener]

Going to be interesting to see how Brock does as a talk show host.

Evidently his job developing condos down by Qwest Field didn't pan out.

I don't like him as an analyst so probably won't listen to him.

I hope KIRO is ready to be knocked out of the #1 slot for stations. KIRO FM will be higher in the ratings than KIRO/ESPN/710.

Hopefully we will get some good sportstalk in the evenings/late nite since Fox Sports sucks big time now. Tony Bruno tries to be funny instead of talking sports, has to talk about everything else before sports; reminds me of Mitch/Bitch in the morning.

[Upton]

Great..as of April at my house, I will be able to get 2 all sports stations and exactly zero political talk stations that don't cater to rednecks.

Don't get me wrong, I like sports..but not 24/7. Lets at least hope that Huard's show doesn't decay into featuring the kind of bathroom humor that has become a hallmark of KJR.

[Gregory McKie]

Brock “too many chess references” Huard is a terrible announcer. Bad as the Huskies last season. He was on Dori’s show yesterday. What a bore? He will be off the air in less than six months.

[Rip]

Upton, stream at MyNorthwest.com

Blatherwatch blog master, your HTML went all kinds of funky here for some reason.

[chucks]

Warren, why in the hell do you beat Brock's wife? That is stepping over the line.
Beat your own damned wife.

[trickydick]

I see we're trying to butch up the blog a bit...how cute.

[Ryder]

If I am KJR AM, I shut down tonight. Unless I am needed as a tax write-off. I then take KJR FM and return to the days of the Fabulous 50. Some of you might remember. Play the 50 most popular songs be they pop, rock, country, whatever. Mix it up. Like KJR used to do. Don't be afraid to go out there and play new music of all sorts. FIRE all the specialists who design playlists for the masses.

Its worth a try. Because right now neither of the KJR's are lighting up much of anything. Bring back exciting radio.

[joanie]

I thought they already did that on FM? Isn't KJR FM still around - classic rock/goldy oldies/moldy oldies - some such thing?

The oldies I like are rarely played on these stations.

Brock Huard always seemed a little rigid to me. Stilted. Not an easy conversationalist. But the Huard name has gravitas.

[Ryder]

Joanie
I wasn't refering to oldies. I'm talking about playing new music of ALL sorts.
The oldies stations are a joke. They rrefuse to recognize that radio stations used play all sorts of music instead of the structured lack or variety we see today. I've always wanted to do a oldies show called, YOU CAN'T PLAY THAT ON AN OLDIES STATION. It would highlight music, all hits, that are ignored by oldies stations. EL PASO #1 for two weeks. BALLAD OF THE GREEN BERET #1 for 6 weeks. OLD RIVERS #3. YOUNG WORLD #2. BATTLE OF NEW ORLEANS #1 7 weeks. RUNNING BEAR #1 3 weeks. All hudge hits ignored by oldies stations. The list is endless. Locoal oldies stations have always ignored any hit that doesn't fit the current idea of what they consider hits.

I just think it would be interesting to see a local radio station go back to the idea of totally diversified current music. Its worth a try. Imagine a Top 50 featuring Enya, Garth Brooks, Hannah Montana, Seal, Barry Manilow, etc etc. Well, it used to be that way. Since most non-talk formats are failing it might be worth a try.

[sparky]

Don't forget Breaker Breaker This is Teddy Bear, and Little Green Apples.

[dave (not dave ross)]

i wouldnt tweet running bear on twitter much less listen to it on an oldies station. no wonder boomers get such a bad rap

[Tacoma Listener]

I've heard some mentioning of "the insiders" on the promos for 710 ESPN.

If Brock is one of them, that would be funny.

Evidently not hiring anyone from KJR are they? Otherwise the "no compete" clause would be in force.

Guess Groz knows he's not welcome at KIRO.

I'm sure KIRO ESPN won't have their sportcasters doing some of the non-sports stuff like Mitch in the Morning...

Nothing wrong with a 24/7 sport station, you can tune in/out just like u do with KOMO for news/traffic.

Just wish KHHO 850 would dump Tony Bruno adn put JT the Prick back on live.

[RobP]

I just think it would be interesting to see a local radio station go back to the idea of totally diversified current music. Its worth a try. Imagine a Top 50 featuring Enya, Garth Brooks, Hannah Montana, Seal, Barry Manilow, etc etc. Well, it used to be that way.

Well forget that idea. Thirty five years ago you didn't have niche formats like alternative, metal, rap, urban CHR, dance, etc. So everything got played on one station.

Any station trying that all-in-one format today would get a zero point zero faster than you can say Blutarsky.

[Ryder]

RobP, sad to say. But you are right.

[ExPatBrit]

There are several internet stations that do that. I use Pandora quite a lot at home and occasionally at work. Free at the moment but if the price was right I would probably sign up.

With Pandora you can set up various "radio" stations by putting in the name of an artist. This creates a station that will automatically play music of a similar genre to the artist(s). You can setup multiple stations and then "quickmix" them so you flip between them randomly.

So one minute it's Roy Orbison then its the London Philharmonic then King Crimson.

It works really well on my iPod touch as I can logon via any wireless connection.

Great when I am working on the car or house repairs.

[artbe]

First Paul Harvey, then George McAfee . They were both 90 when they passed. Guess you can't be too sad when they had such long lives. Wish Duffman was here to say something corny.

[beart]

Silver threads among the gold...