By Jeff Moss
DetroitSportsRag@GMail.com
August 2, 2016
The first Arbitron ratings since Greater Media pulled the plug on Detroit Sports 105.1 and flipped formats to old school (censored) hip-hop are out and they are fucking (no radio edit here) HILARIOUS.
You might remember that WMGC struggled mightily during the over 2 1/2 year period in which they were an ESPN affiliated all-sports station. Their terrible numbers stagnated around a .9 for years and they usually were the second least listened to station on the FM dial.
The month that Greater Media flipped the switch, 105.1 bottomed out at a .7. So what was the station’s number for the month of July?
Un. Buh. Leave. A. Bull.
Three. Point. One.
Yep, immediately upon returning to a music format, WMGC rebounded to the ratings to which they were accustomed when Adult Contemporary was the genre. Like, it occurred INSTANTLY.
Drew Lane, Matt Dery, Tom Mazawey and Ryan Ermanni each would have sold a kidney for a 3.1 rating. And all it took was a flip to Notorious B.I.G, Eminem and 50 Cent and voila …..PEOPLE STARTED LISTENING AGAIN!!!
And now that we have seen Jay-Z quintuple the ratings of the sports station OVERNIGHT, it’s hilarious to think about the whining and complaining of the ex-staff members when the flip was made.
Remember Ermanni’s bitching?
No marketing? Greater Media put up billboards all over the city declaring “Drew’s Back.” There was a press conference announcing the format switch. The station hired scantily-clad “Knockout Girls” to attend Tigers, Wings, Lions and Pistons games!!!!!
And what did Greater Media do when they flipped to Bounce? They announced it in a press release. Posted it on Twitter. Created a Facebook page. That’s it.
And they got a 3.1 quicker than Ermanni could lose a three-team teaser with his bookie.
Unreal.
And then you had that MONUMENTAL LOSER Mazawey’s comments regarding Greater Media finally pulling the plug ….
“We were showing some growth.” Hahahahahhhahahaha. You abject failure. You industry punchline. You dipshit.
If Mazawey was getting all of these texts, phone calls and social media love when the station had a POINT SEVEN RATING, can you imagine what the current on-air staff is getting with a 3.1??????
Oh, right. There is no on-air staff. The station is playing songs without any DJs. Just classic rap and hip-hop from the nineties and early aughts with no interruption.
Which might be a good thing because if you don’t have an on-air staff, they can’t make insensitive remarks about sexual assault and rape victims. I mean, even Luther Campbell and N.W.A. weren’t as misogynistic as Mazawey and Dery.
Anyway, in one final irony, it won’t be Greater Media that enjoys the fruits of 105.1‘s newfound ratings success. As you probably already know, shortly after making the switch to the “Bounce” format, Greater Media sold all of their radio stations to Beasley Media Group for $240 million.
No greater authority than Howard Stern himself commented on that sale last week on his satellite radio program. He mocked the fact that Greater Media could “only” get $240 million for their 21 radio stations and observed what a mess the terrestrial radio business is if GM could only get $11.4 million on average for their properties.
Well, maybe GM could have procured a few more shekels out of Beasley if they had gotten rid of Rico Beard and Marc Fellhauer sooner.
And THAT should be the final chapter in the story of the epic failure of Detroit Sports 105.1.
(You can follow the writer of this piece on Twitter @JeffMossDSR. Also, you can join in on the discussion of this article on Facebook by clicking here.)