Milwaukee Sports Talk Radio

I was listening to "Milwaukee's Sports Leader", WSSP for much of the morning today. Not my usual routine, but I was in my car leaving for work at 4:30 and didn't have Internet access to stream something else until later in the morning.

Because of this, I got to catch almost all of the Doug and Mike show. I usually like this show, as it's the best program on this station (not saying much though).

It seems like I really get into the show, or really don't care for it, no middle ground. Today, it was the latter.

Those of you who don't know me, I work in the Milwaukee radio market, and have worked in sports talk radio in Wisconsin for close to five years now. My biggest gripe with WSSP is this, they either don't know their audience, or just plain don't care about it.

Milwaukee does not like Jim Rome, this was proven when then 1510 WAUK (540 now) made the decision to sandwich Rome in between the Tony Kornheiser show and the Dan Patrick show. The station was flooded with complaints from people who hated Rome.

Even the president of Brett Favre's fan club (Tony K.) took it upon himself to take shots at PD Bill Johnson over the air. Now since I didn't work for that station, I can't say for sure, but I'm almost certain they also got tons of positive feedback from Rome fans, but the people that hated it are the ones that stick out. I don't fault them for taking that chance, it was a shot worth taking. Kornheiser's show was stale, and a self-professed show for old people.

Johnson made the right call in taking a chance, but an even better decision in pulling the plug on that show.

Long-winded here I know, but bear with me. Rome is on WSSP. Again, Rome doesn't play well in the Milwaukee market. His show is too "national" and west coast based. Milwaukeeans don't want that. Now, I don't know if they're contractually obligated to air his show because of their affiliation to Fox Sports (I'd assume so), but if that's not the case, this is an awful decision to continue airing this show by the station PD.

Again, in fairness, it was a great move by the PD to pick up 2 hours of the Dan Patrick show, as Milwaukee loves Dan Patrick. Patrick is a national guy who comes off as your neighbor who knows a lot about sports, plus a lot of people in this market still remember him from when he used to do sports on the Bob and Brian show.

So, getting to my original point, I was listening to one of WSSP's only 2 local shows, the Doug and Mike show. They devoted entire segments to topics like:

• Do the Cardinals have a chance in the Super Bowl?
• Is Kurt Warner a Hall of Famer?
• Recapping both Championship games
• Julius Peppers wants out of Carolina
• Allegations that Oprah Winfrey smoked crack
• Is the Michael Irvin car-jacking story true?
• What do Warner and Obama have in common? (they both promised their kids a dog if they each reached the pinnacle in their profession - Super Bowl and Presidency - which then sparked a lenghty conversation about pets.)

All of this, and finally they briefly mentioned the Packers had hired Dom Capers to be their defensive coordinator (taking no calls on this, at least none that I had heard of).

Look, I can understand the Peppers talk, as most Packer fans are clamoring for the Pack to break the bank for him, but explain to me where all the other stuff fits in on a Milwaukee sports talk show? Milwaukee, actually Wisconsin for that matter, doesn't care about national topics. I've seen this up close. They only want to talk/hear about the Packers, Packers, Packers, Brewers, Packers, Badgers/Bucks/Marquette, etc. In that order.

The Packers are a big story. Finally hiring a new coordinator, and one with the pedigree of Dom Capers is a big story. How is this not leading and driving most of the content on your show?

It's not just today or the Doug and Mike show specifically either, as the Big Show (don't even get me started on this one) is just as guilty. I'm continually stunned they actually get callers to interact with on these topics, which is what they'll point to, justifying these topics.

I'm glad this station exists, as just with anything in life, the more competition you have, the better it is for the consumer, but that being said in my opinion they really need to refocus or start focusing on what their target demographics want.

Lastly, I think another major issue with that station is this, most of their talent has little to no ties to Wisconsin. Look, I'm not trying to say you can't talk sports in Wisconsin if you're not from Wisconsin, but they made a big mistake when they launched by not adding quality local talent that was already well-known. There are tons of talented guys in this market (believe me, I'm not talking about myself here) who were passed over while this station tried to load up with national, "hard-hitting" guys. Not so surprisngly, guys like Peter Brown and Cliff Saunders aren't there anymore.

Well, I'll come down from my high-horse now, but I just needed to get that off my chest.

Until next time...