Laughable Programming during the Coronavirus

I retired from 42 years of working in the broadcast industry almost three years ago.  Over the years I heard a lot of strange things, dumb talk show hosts, announcers and bizarre programming.  But, two sister radio stations in St. Louis have played some of the strangest content you can imagine during this COVID-19 pandemic.

The station that like to call itself the "Sports Voice of America" has gotten lazy and is re-broadcasting every St. Louis Cardinal baseball game from September 2011.  The Cardinals won the World Series that year after being eleven games out of first place in August.  (For the record, all MLB games this season thus far have been cancelled and this outlet was the Cardinals' flagship station when they won the series). OK, but this radio station, KMOX, airs baseball games from September 2011 and then makes its announcers act as if they are in real time.  So, the night before last I heard the sports guy saying "the Cards are now just four back of the last wild card spot".  What the What?  Just plain dumb.  I am embarrassed for the poor sports guys that have to pretend its nine years ago.

If you think that's stupid, another St. Louis radio station decided to broadcast Christmas music for people under home quarantine.  Are you freaking kidding me?  Christmas music in March?  For example have you ever heard "The Little Drummer Boy" on St. Patrick's Day?  I have.  KEZK radio must have gotten the message from its listeners, or lack thereof, since they are back to their standard format.  Apparently, the station's attempt to make its listeners happy during a pandemic was a miserable failure.

Let's hope the remaining 45 other stations in this market don't also lose their minds.

Good Luck Redbirds

Here it is 19 days later and the Cardinals are still playing. I really didn't have much hope for their playoff chances but...they are still playing. In fact the World Series starts tomorrow night at Busch Stadium.

It's the Cardinals against a very good Texas Rangers team that tore through the American League playoffs and destroyed the Rays and Tigers along the way. At the same time the Cardinals edged out a tough Philadelphia squad and then got past a good Milwaukee team that hit the ball hard.

But, bottom line it's the Cards in the Series for the 18th time in their history. This has also been one of the most enjoyable baseball post-seasons for me in a long time. Maybe it's because of the Cardinals underdog role. Maybe, it's because of their never-say-die attittude. But, it's a great group of guys and they seem to be having a lot of fun and seem unfazed by any pressure. Witness the teams catch phrase #HappyFlight and tweets from Allen Craig's pet tortoise @TortyCraig. Whatever it is they are having fun and so am I. I won't make a prediction on the World Series this year but I certainly wouldn't be surprised to see this team win it all. Go CARDS!!!