The ESPN Radio affiliation could once again be on the move in Boston. After “ESPN Boston” 890 WAMG/1400 WLLH went dark last September, ESPN Radio has been relegated to overnights on 850 WEEI even with the launch and strong presence of ESPNBoston.com in the market.
That could soon change. Anthony Pepe, GM of Black Strap Broadcasting’s 1510 WWZN, recently registered 1510ESPNBoston.com and ESPN1510Boston.com via his Mouthpiece Boxing company. WWZN is currently airing a mix of brokered Progressive Talk, Mouthpiece’s MMA/Boxing/Wrestling shows, and Sporting News Radio.
WWZN will be the third entrant in a sports battle between Entercom’s incumbent WEEI and CBS’ upstart “98.5 The Sports Hub” WBZ-FM. The 50kw WWZN has a highly directional signal sending much of its power over the Atlantic Ocean.
I wonder if WWZN-1510 might end-up running ESPN Desportes (sp?), the Spanish-language version of ESPN Radio.
Besides, WWZN is the current home of Spanish-language broadcasts of the Boston red Sox baseball team.
I say this because I don’t think ESPN Radio would want to go 24/7 in Boston on a signal clearly inferior to one that they’re on only during overnight hours.
Plus, I think there’s still a chance WEEI might move from 850 (Boston)/1440 (Worcester) to 93.7/107.3 on FM (with WMKK moving to 97.7), “blowing up” WAAF in the process, which would allow 850/1440 to simulcast ESPN radio 24/7.
If I had to guess, there will be ESPN programming on 1510, but it might well be En Espanol.
The ESPN Deportes thing could happen, who knows.
1510′s signal can be good by day dep. on where you are but does indeed have problems.
And an antenna or city of license move may not help.
I would like to think WEEI would move to 93.7 etc but one problem (I’d love it because 93.7 comes in OK at my workplace) is that 93.7 gets good ratings and I assume good billing with Mike. They do have a couple hired “voices” but no DJs.
This low budget, high profit organization
would make Entercom think twice about changing.
Though putting WEEI there would make sense. Signal pretty good. Of course I live in Beverly and work in N. Reading, each a town or two away from their stick
but I think they’d get into downtown Boston OK.
Again, WEEI on 93.7 would make sense (and put ESPN on 850?) but the success of Mike
makes that doubtful