• Contact QNO

• Weather

  Fair	Quincy, IL 82°

• Births and Deaths
• Classifieds
• Jobs & Economy

JRG Blog

What a great run by the QND Lady Raiders this weekend. I was lucky enough to catch some of the second half of Saturday's title game via the IHSA Network. Kudos to WTAD for carrying the game on the radio as well.

I found out over the weekend that WGEM Radio wasn't carrying the game and I talked to a couple of people who were surprised at that. After thinking about it for a bit, I decided that as long as one radio station was covering it, it wasn't a big deal that WGEM didn't cover it. They already had obligations for QU's GLVC tournament games.

Being basically a one-person shop, I try to post as many scores and a couple of stats for Quincy and QND games. The colleges are very good about sending information and I gladly post that.

But when people want to hear the games (television coverage of high school sports died here a couple of years ago), there is room for improvement by the local radio stations and it is an easy fix...but it requires working together, so it will never happen.

Most radio station managers claim they lose money by carrying high school sports once they pay for the travel and announcers. Quincy High School boys basketball and Quincy Notre Dame boys basketball are the only two sports that have two radio stations covering all of their games.

So I have the following proposal, which my friend Jeff Dorsey of Y-101, has talked about for years:

We don't need two stations covering most boys sporting events and zero stations covering most girls sporting events. How about throwing all of the local sports in a hopper and dividing who covers what? The college coverage is a more difficult proposal as I believe WGEM still has an exclusive deal with Quincy University. Heck, throw the Gems and John Wood in there too. The price tag for Gems coverage has to be going up with the Prospect League expansion and greater distances to travel.

The stations could alternate schools and sports from year-to-year. I would be willing to prominently post the game times and schedules and I believe The Herald-Whig already does that.

With Chuck Mahon's retirement as WGEM's Blue Devil basketball play-by-play guy, this is a perfect time for WGEM, Double O Radio and STARadio to discuss a joint coverage agreement that would ensure at least one radio station is covering the major team sports for both high schools...girls and boys.

Split the profits and split the costs. I'll bet the bottom line impact will be small and you will generate tons of goodwill.

And somebody ought to go back to carrying some of the other Adams County schools' games as well. 

Blog Buster
Posts: 1

sounds good
Reply #2 on : Tue March 02, 2010, 12:30:51

---

This makes everyone feel good to say this, sounds good but NOT going to happen. Ok hold both hands out, wish for this in one and take a dump in the other...see which hand get full first. Stuff happens, local media sharing money doesn't.

UrKidsWillPay
Posts: 1

On top of that
Reply #1 on : Mon March 01, 2010, 11:38:51

---

the stations could enter in to reciprocal agreements with local stations that cover teams we play every year. Under such an agreement, they could simulcast a broadcast of a local station rather than send our announcers out of town.

The only hang up would be the folks would have to tone down the homerism. The same could be said of newspaper coverage. Radio stations and newspapers are going to have to be creative to cut costs and using local professionals instead of sending people out of town would be way to do it.

• Home
• Top Stories
• Business News
• Regional News
• Vox Populi
• Sports
• Community Calendar
• JRG Blog / Blogs