Three Quick Hits to Get Another Thread Going

(1) I'm not the biggest fan of the more juvenile aspects of The Ticket, but I have to confess (of course) that the Hardline's new "Throw Down Your Anus" challenge had me larfing mightily in the old Conestoga yesterday on the way home.  The guy ("Ted") who was talking to his girlfriend/wife about giving medicine to the cat, and her absolute I'm-not-having-any-of-your-nonsense responses while putting away groceries (and knocking down a shelf in the process) -- ya know, one likes to think one is a sophisticated consumer of highbrow humor, but Ted (who is apparently a law student) and his anus talk and w/g's responses about had me driving off the road.

(2) We have a pretty amazing population of Confessors here.  All of the people signing themselves "not" someone triad of obscure philosophers or fictional characters  .  .  .  I don't really even care if the writer had to look those people up or whether they knew who they were to begin with.  I'm getting a nice education just looking them up.

(3) Listen up, pilgrims:  You got a point to make, make it.  I'm reading along in some of these comments, and the comment is fine, well-put, legit, and then, in the last sentence, the author seems to feel the need to take a shot at another commenter's intelligence, motives, identity, whatever.

As Bob Newhart said:  Stop it.

Bob Newhart -- Life Coaching

[Tried inserting the video itself, but Blogger wasn't having it.  You have to click on the hyperlink.]

Two for One Sale, and No Sales Tax: Speculation AND a Rant!

First of all, I'm sympathetic to the viewpoint that what a prominent person does in his or her personal life, up to a point, is his or her own business.  Where that point is depends on why the person is prominent, the particular private action involved, when it took place, whether it compromises the person's public activities, and other contextual variables.  This site generally avoids broadcasting stuff about the hosts that may come its way that is not in the public record.

The very different reactions of The Hardline and The Musers on the Jerry Jones photos is notable.  I'm referring here to the first segments done by those shows on the subject.  If they've gone into it more deeply since -- that is anything other than passing mentions -- I didn't hear it.

The Hardline crew was unanimously dismissive.  Their points:

       --  Jerry's philandering and alcohol-fueled carousing are well-known.  Actually, I hadn't known it, but a little scouting on the Internets suggests that it may indeed be the case that Jerry's a too-often-drunken poon hound, or at least has some history of it.

       --  Many men have arrangements with their wives that permits extramarital adventures; the wife "signs on," as it were, to this circumstance in return for whatever benefits she gets from the marriage.

       --  Nothing will come of this.  Nothing should come of it.

All of those points may be correct.  I am mildly skeptical, but only mildly.  I'll get to that in a moment.

The Musers mused a little more deeply on the matter.

       --  They noted that, at that point, not a single major media outlet had given the publication of the photos any play at all.

       --  They wondered what Roger Goodell thought of this.  I believe they made reference to Roger Goodell's dithering over what, if anything, to do about Jim Irsay.  (Nothing, yet, but he has commented on it.)

       --   They made passing reference, if I'm recalling correctly, to the possible effect on the Jones family.

As I said, the Hardline may be right that nothing will come of this.

But I think there is at least the possibility that something will.  I'm wondering if we'll hear from women's groups.  I'll bet Roger Goodell has at least made a phone call to Jerry.

But what I'm really wondering about is Gene.

True it may be that she knows what Jerry does when he goes out at night and travels to faraway places.  And true it may be that she's made the bargain the Hardline ascribes to women like her.

But the women who make those kinds of deals do so with the understanding that the tomcatting itself will remain private.  They do not sign on to be publicly humiliated, and that is what is happening to Gene Jones.

Which takes me back to those contextual circumstances I mentioned above.  What if Gene decided she'd had enough?    Independently prominent spouses like Hilary Clinton and Huma Abedin have hung on for their own craven political reasons (hell, Hillary told Huma to divorce the pathetic Anthony Weiner), but Silda Spitzer divorced Eliot's sorry hosebarge ass and got millions; on the Republican side, there's Ahhnold, quickly sent on his way by Maria Shriver.  Sports example?  Elin Nordegren Woods.

Texas is a community property state.   Property acquired by a spouse after marriage is, generally speaking, the property of both spouses.   I was speaking to a long-time well-informed observer of the Cowboys, and expressed the thought that surely Jerry had some kind of post-nuptial agreement with Gene that partitions their property in a way that would designate Cowboy-related assets as Jerry's separate property (i.e., his in the event of a divorce).  This guy said he doubted it (although he was in no way privy to the Joneses' estate planning).

So I speculate -- of course! -- on a possible course of events should the mortifying photos not go away and Gene's society buddies (who may themselves be Cowboy fans as disgusted at Jerry's incompetent management as by his injurious behavior) tell her to make her move.

My point:  While we're very uninformed about Jerry's financial planning and Gene's disposition, those photos do have the potential to influence the ownership of the Cowboys.  Even if Jerry has the Cowboys tied up, a divorce nevertheless might influence the team's operations.  Consider:  Jerry's net worth is estimated to be in the $3.1-3.2 billion range.  That includes the value of the Cowboys, which is estimated at $2.3 billion.  Would Gene have made a deal after all those years of marriage that didn't give her halvsies, even if it didn't include the Cowboys (purchased at the time for a measly $0.14 billion)?  (I have considered the possibility that these numbers are apples and oranges, as the net worth figure includes aggregate indebtedness but the Cowboys value figure may not.)  Is it possible that a divorce would have a negative impact on Jerry's ability to invest in the Cowboys?  If Gene walked off with the oil and gas, would the franchise throw off enough cash for Jerry to continue to flirt with the salary cap?

I have two answers for that:  (1) Probably, and (2) I have no idea.  And, of course, they may have a post-nuptial/partition agreement that would give Jean much, much less than half in the event of a divorce.

OK, I'm way off in cloud-cuckoo land, big surprise.  All I'm saying is that those pictures have the potential to do something that no mortal ever dreamed possible, and that is to shake up the management, if not the ownership, of this franchise.  Has this not even occurred to people in the sport reporting biz?  While I concede I'm speculating, are these scenarios so remote that they don't bear the slightest consideration?

Which leads me to my final point, which is:   The Musers started to make an excellent point when they noted how the MSM were running from the story like MSNBC from the IRS scandal.  The Hardline is going to be exactly right if this story dies, either because the Niffle does nothing, or news media do nothing.

I say:   Roger Goodell, you're terrific at bullying players.  Whatcha going to do about titgrabbing, crotchoffering, possible extortion target, so-drunk-he-allowed-himself-to-be-photographed Jerry Jones (and Jim Irsay, for that matter)?  I quote the Commish, speaking after fining Detroit Lions owner Tom Lewand $100,000 and suspending him for 30 days in 2010:  "You occupy a special position of responsibility and trust.  [T]hose who occupy leadership positions are held to a higher standard of conduct that exceeds what is ordinarily expected of players or member of the general public."  What's changed since 2010?

I also say:  Dale Hansen, how about showing some real courage, yes, courage even greater than required to support a gay player that the country is already largely rooting for?  How about calling out your pal Jonesy, who has mortified your city, disgusted Cowboy fans, and is in the process of revealing your own profession as a willing handmaiden to the AlDavisization of a once-great franchise.

So yeah: There's a real story here -- the corruption of the major sports media.   There's another one lurking:  a Jones family shakeup.   (We haven't yet considered the effects on future Cowboy ownership of a Stephen Jones divorce.)

You know, though:  The Hard Ones are probably right.  This story is going to die, and with it, any likelihood that Gene will kick Jerry's wizened glutes to the curb.  I'd just like to see someone do some digging, and think it through.

At least The Ticket is talking about it.  Here's your assignment:  Let us know what The Fan ("the station of YOUR Dallas Cowboys") had to say about this story.  [Also, please advise on Norm's and BaD's reaction.]

I'm FOS?  Sure, happens.  But my hypothetical isn't crazy, and The Musers share my bafflement, if not my disgust, at the supine sports media.  Those pictures are a disgrace, and I'd like to see someone claiming to be a reporter do some, you know, reporting.

I'll conclude by thanking you for shopping at My Ticket Confession, and remembering that comments are moderated.  (I've gotten some amusingly bilious ones lately.)

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CORRECTION:  Earliest editions of this post misspelled Mrs. Jones's name as "Jean."  Thanks to Confessor Anonymous for correcting my error.

Demo Redux

ALERT:  Long.  Repeats comments you may have already read.  You've been warned.

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The last thread had some very thoughtful pieces and responses on where The Ticket might possibly be headed.  Here are some of them (sorry about the formatting irregularities -- Blogger's word processing is pathetic), and then I have a couple of thoughts:

This first one, from Anon 225, doesn't focus on the Hardline, but on Ticket competition generally:

Flipped on 103.3 today. Elf and Friedo have a show. Nice to hear Elf on the airwaves again. Like B&S and Greggo, he's now done the trifecta. Except in a way, working for 103.3 is sort of a return back to The Ticket. On that note, by the way, the cross over between the two stations is already underway. Programs on both frequencies are beginning to cross reference/mention the other. In a friendly manner, too boot. While listening to Elf and Friedo (sorry, Dick Hicks, I know it's the last Race Week of the year, but I can't deal with it), I started to think how 103.3 might be about to embark upon cracking the code that is The Ticket. How? By taking the IDEA of The Ticket and making it their own. Instead of, like certain ESPN programs in the past (looking right at you, B&S) and well, every single FAN show, copping Ticket lingo, segments, and just about everything - basically aping The Ticket to a T with zero success - they've decided to take the "guys just being guys who happen to know about and have inside info on, sports" concept and run with it. But do so by actually being themselves, and not trying to be THL of The FAN or whatever. It's early in the game, but so far they have my attention. Pman's too, for that matter. I'm looking forward to the ratings books over the next six or so months to see how this shakes out.

Things got rolling with runitandrunitandrunitandrunitandrunit, expanding on Anon 225's point:

Exactly right, 2:25. What's going on at ESPn is kind of what went on during the first years of The Ticket. They're getting for the most part locally known talent who've been around the media scene for a long time who 'get' the DFW area mentality and who have lived here and know the area intimately. The demo for sports talk radio is not going down. It's still the same as it's always been: mostly approaching, in the midst of, or about to exit middle age/d white dudes. The young aren't listening, and the scant numbers that are diminish with each year. No getting around it.  *  *  *  If you've ever been to a remote or a bigger event, you see their demo first hand. All of this means that on the whole (please note that part, "on the whole" which means of course there are exceptions) the majority of the listening audience wants to "converse" with guys like them. Not snarky younger guys who come off as knowing everything (whether they do or not is not the question), are into music that is for the most part alien to them, and who are experiencing and relating their adventures that most listeners went through themselves years, decades ago. They want the guy next door who gives the knowing nod, not Jake, not TC, not Sean, not Machine, or whomever. It's not a knock on the guys I just mentioned, at all. It's just the way people are and how they relate to others and to whom they relate to. LIke seeks like. Unlike might be interesting for a bit, but in the long run it isn't. 

Thus the picture here is that with a demo that ever remains the same and yet will inevitably shrink, and an up and coming demo that really doesn't exist, and the little that does keeps dropping off, you've got yourself a shaky future for The Ticket because they have no veteran replacements. Due to the probable future of the industry a youth movement is actually counterproductive. Cheaper, yes. So the upshot is that over the next years don't be surprised if a group of vets who've passed their 20 year mark begin to set sail, a group of (absolutely deserving) up and comers take their places, and the once mighty Ticket begins to slip in a most major way. Falling prey to its sibling with big mouse ears and a largely aging talent pool that connect with a largely aging demo.

runit had some additional thoughts in the thread you may want to check out.  Anon 111 had an interesting contrapuntal observation:

As someone who is probably in the younger end of the demographic (too old to start a high school fan club but around the age of the up and comer JVers), I am amazed that we are listening to the same shows. I love the Musers but The Hardline is my show of choice. 

I started listening right around when Greggo left. Thanks to our pals at the Unticket, I've gone back and listened to the old shows and I probably wouldn't have been into the show that much back then. Greggo just isn't my thing. And maybe it's coming to the station towards the end of things with him and just not being there Day 1 but he leaves me with a big old meh when I listen to archived Hardline shows. 

Corby can be too sheltered/pompous/privileged. I like Mike's music and TV segments and hearing old band stories. But I really like the weekend guys a lot and think they're finding their niche. Shake Joint and Cirque are solid and most people I know in my age group that listen agree. Again, love the Musers too but that didn't seem to be a point of argument here.

All very interesting.  Got me thinking.  

First, I am no expert on the overall radio audience, but I have a hunch that when it comes to The Ticket and its competitors, the demo business is somewhat overblown.  The market for sports itself is huge and growing.   The NBA, MLB, and NFL are prospering even in this dismal economy.  Driven mainly, by guys, and guys of all ages and levels of prosperity.  They get in the car, they turn on the radio, they want to hear sports talk.  They stay for the guy/pop culture talk.  Maybe that talk is by guys in their 30's, maybe their 50's.  But as long as it's good, and knowledgeable, and doesn't insult their intelligence, they'll like it and hang.  Check between the three stations, see which they like the best.  But still a huge audience to go around.   This, of course, does not address the relative popularity of the shows.

Second, the Ticket has been on top since almost the day it came on the air.  That's 20 years.  If a demo is going to change, it's going to change over two decades.  And yet The Ticket is more popular than ever, and The Hardline -- which has taken it in the jewels in the comments for the past little while -- if I'm not mistaken, is the highest rated show on the station.  This, of course, does not address what some here have urged to be the waning popularity of terrestrial radio generally.

Third, I'm willing to listen to our experts who predict the coming decline of terrestrial radio.  But if anything iHeart Radio, SportsDay Talk, podcasts, and even social media have, if anything, expanded the radio audience, so I'm guessing that radio -- or programming produced for radio -- isn't going away anytime soon as a destination for sports fans.

And one more thing:

Fourth, I have a feeling that the demo for this site is not closely representative of the P1 universe.  I'm thinking possibly somewhat older.  Perhaps more critical.  Just perhaps.  So when I see lots of comments slagging The Hardline (not that it doesn't need some slagging now and then) or predicting the coming decline of The Ticket, I do wonder.  Now, of course, The Ticket will change with the passage of time.  Stars will retire or leave -- almost lost Bob and Dan there awhile back.  Rome fell.  But it took a long, long time.  Gibbon's book is three heavy and closely-printed volumes.

And with Cumulus bringing a different strategy to ESPN -- which, on the evidence of the afternoon show, may be exactly as Anon 225 described -- it should be an interesting few years.

Notes from Camp

Ladies and gentlemen, my apologies for being away for so long. My work and household duties have escalated recently and my posts are, unfortunately, going to be few and far between for a while.  The commitments cut into both listening and writing time. I do keep an eye on comments and have appreciated most everyone's observation of the site's unwritten rules.

I have made a few notes from the last couple of weeks, some ticket-related, some not. Nothing too profound here, but maybe this will get some the threads kick-started:

          1.     Junior Miller:  "There are too many idiots in the world, and half of them are commenting on websites."  (Referring to comments to news items in the DMN.)

          2.     Both the Hardline and Musers have remarked on the fact that there seem to be lots of people hanging around Southern California who "aren't doing so well."  No kidding.  I have a lot of good feelings for California, having lived there with great pleasure for five years in the '90's (hence my fondness for Lee "Hacksaw" Hamilton), but it's a holy mess.  Decades of mismanagement (Democrat and Republican), have left the state broke.  Its legislature is a corrupt candy machine (Democrats are the problem here), devastating state taxes that are going higher, enormous public payroll, vast welfare benefits for illegal immigrants, it goes on and on.  The leading candidate for a catastrophic Detroit-style bankruptcy.  It's America's Greece.   Meanwhile, Texas still can't get free agents to come here.

          3.    Can we get a report on how Norm and BaD handled the camp?  I heard zero minutes of either show while they were in Oxnard.

           I actually like the travelogue aspects of The Ticket's travel to faraway places, yes, even Corby's stories.  I do wonder whether there is a whole lot of sportsy value to having all those shows out there, and at Super Bowls, and at playoffs.  Some take it more seriously than others.  I would think that Norm and BaD, broadcasting during daylight hours, would snag a relevant interview or two along the line. How was their time out there?

          4.     This site's deepest condolences to Mike Rhyner and his loved ones on his mother's passing.  She seemed like a sweet lady in her few interactions with the station, and Mike's voice took on a different tone when she came up.  One had the idea that one would mess with that woman at one's considerable personal peril.  RIP.

          5.     Several commenters have taken the opportunity of Mike's occasional absences to note how good Corby can be when he has responsibility for running a presentation. He's also on good behavior with other hosts.  This site has mentioned this on several occasions.   More than one person has observed that perhaps Corby's excesses are encouraged by the kind of chemistry he has with Mike. I got an e-mail from Confessor N:  

"Perhaps it's just me, but me and some of my real good P1 friends all find Corby with anyone other than Rhyner actually very good, crisp, funny and more likable.  It started last week with Corby manning the ship when Rhynes suddenly left Oxnard for his mom's illness.  I thought his chemistry with Craig, Gordon, Dan, Donny, the Commander et al was great.  Then Friday it clicked for me when Rhynes was out for the funeral  - I like Corby leading with Danny in the co-pilot seat and Jake as the on mic producer.  The chemistry is much more free-flowing.   I respect Rhynes but it is clear to me now that he gives this thing the 'cruise control'/'I don't give a damn' vibe."

I think that's right.  He knows he's untouchable, nearing the end of his reign, and feels little obligation to incentivize Corby or Danny.  Although I will say, once in a while the last few weeks, it has seemed to me that Mike, while clearly tired from his schedule and the emotional drain of his mother's passing, has generated some pretty strong segments.

          6.     Greg Williams's blog:  Seems like there's not much to it any more -- song lyrics, definitions, and recently a TMI post from Jenn on "what Greggo's really like" that didn't exactly flatter the guy.  Apparently they are moving, which, she reports, will make it hard to keep the blog up to date (although it seemed like they weren't actually moving, just planning for a move).

           7.     Gordon is 100% correct about the Geico Old MacDonald's spelling ad.  The joke about spelling "cow" is completely wrong and unfunny because it misses the real joke that the Geico ad writer apparently misremembered.  Bet I can find it  .  .  .  yup, took me about 12 seconds:

A Hoosier, a Kentuckian and a West Virginian were on a Hollywood TV quiz show. The host asked them to complete the sentence: "Old MacDonald had a ..." The Indianan said, "Old MacDonald had a carburetor." "Sorry," said the MC. "That's incorrect." "Old MacDonald had a flat tire," said the Kentuckian. "Wrong," said the host. "Old MacDonald had a farm," said the West Virginian. "That's correct!" shouted the MC. "Now for $200,000, spell farm." The West Virginian thought hard and then spelled carefully: "E-I-E-I-O."

The Geico ad should either have had Old MacDonald spell "farm," which he then spells "E-I-E-I-O," or spell "cow" and spell that the same way but not preceded by C-O-W.  Anyway, it's a bad ad.  In fact, all of the Geico ads that use the "well, did you know .  .  . " format are weak.

          8.     However, Gordon and George are entirely wrong on "The Girl from Ipanema," a wonderful bossa nova pop song.  The English lyrics were originally meant to be sung by a man, not a woman (Astrud Gilberto having made it famous), which accounts for the gigantic grammatical blunder "she looks straight ahead, not at he" when sung by a woman -- should be:  "she looks straight ahead, not at me," sung by a man.

          9.     Love George, we all love George, but he has apparently graduated to dropping 100% of his g's on present participles and gerunds (-ing words).  I swear, one morning a few days ago it sounded like he was deliberately workin' at droppin' all those g's.  I wish he wouldn't.  It makes him sound hickish, which he's not.  Maybe it's his increased C&W profile, he's got to use some kind of backcountry patois to keep it real.

          10.    Matt Garza has a tiny brain.

          11.     While we're on the subject of Ticket word usage:  Is The Ticket the last bastion of the overuse of the word "awesome"?  It was bad enough when this perfectly lovely, evocative word was devalued back in the Bill-and-Ted's-Excellent-Adventure days, but it seems to me that the language has finally moved on with the exception of George Dunham and BaD radio.  Sorry, man, every time I hear someone on the station use that word (and it's not just those guys), I think -- you know, this station really needs to get out more.

          12.     It has been pointed out that the signals (1310/104.1) have been sucking more than usual lately, probably because of the hot weather. That's not an excuse. The best station in the country shouldn't be hostage to North Texas summers.  Just more evidence of how really bad these signals are.

          13.     Johnny Manziel is a sociopath.

          14.    Caught a little bit of Ben and Skin one day, only about ten minutes.  This is not a general Ben and Skin opinion, only observation about the tiny slice that I heard.  I want to give those gents a fair shot, and that just can't be done by flipping over for the odd segment.   They had some Ranger talk about "overpaying" players (Elvis Andrus was on the griddle at that particular moment) that did not make any sense to me in the context of a free market for players and widespread information on their current skills.  (I think that was Skin but cannot be certain.)  

We are very fond of Kevin Turner around here, but during my short time of listening I caught a very unfortunate remote segment that only lasted about 35 seconds that ended with Kevin asking some group of people how many were ovulating.   Could not figure out what the bit was supposed to be about at the outset, and, whatever it was, it cratered almost instantaneously and B&S seemed somewhat startled to have the show tossed back to them.  Sorry, KT.  I promise I'll get around to giving B&S the benefit of a sustained listen one of these days.

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Hope to see you all soon.

LATER:   Just saw this post.  Blogger has once again defeated my efforts to make the thing look nice.  Sorry for all the inconsistent margins, fonts, spacing.  

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Wednesday, August 7, 2013 BONUS:  Today's Ticket Traffic Twist Julie Mac, who looks like she sounds:

Yu Yes, U No

Massive and repeated U2 talk on The Hardline lately.

I'd like less of it.

Much less.

Zero, actually.

Especially Corby's messianic browbeating.

Having said that, I'm with Mike R on U2.

Actually, I may go a little further than Mike R.

I recognize the tunefulness and unique sound, but it's a sound I tired of shortly after being introduced to it all those years ago. Production is too often bombastic, and so many of the songs sound labored, as though it's really, really hard for them to perform them. (I have the same issue with Springsteen's music and band.)

Exception: The Daniel-Lanois-produced-and-Brian-Eno-influenced "Achtung Baby," very striking, still sounds fresh two decades later.

So yes, I "like" U2, I "get" U2, but they're not even in my top 20 acts to put on the record player when I have some free music-listening time.

Having unburdened myself of this review, I am declaring a Hardline and Muser moratorium on U2 talk.

They breach it at their peril. 

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Email: ThePlainsman1310@gmail.com

Twitter:  @Plainsman1310

A Nice Quiet Ticket Friday Night at Home with Mrs. Plainsman

It was a very interesting Ticket day, I thought. 

Mrs. P is recovering from some surgery (she’s fine, thanks for asking) and we’re watching some March Mildness (although this Kansas-Michigan game is concluding in an interesting way).  I’m in the old rocker and thought I’d give you  a number of items to chew on.

 

A SOURCE!

A commenter to the last post chided me for not having “sources” that would have instantly alerted me to Alexis’s departure.  I was going to respond that when one has no sources at all, my ignorance might be excused.

And later that day, I heard from someone.

I never know how to evaluate the stuff that (quite rarely and unexpectedly) comes my way.  I kinda consider the content, figure out it makes sense in the context of other stuff we know or think we know.  I decided this communicant probably had good information.  He (?) was someone who has been listening to The Ticket for a long time, and also exhibited some inside knowledge.  And in this case, his stuff was not incendiary, no apparent axes to grind. 

Paring it down s/he said:  The Campout was a Muser-only thing for several years before the whole station went.   The Musers decided to invite the whole station and make it a Ticket event.  It was never popular with some of the hosts, but they soldiered through.   After last year’s campout, only three of the nine on-air hosts were interested in doing it this year.  Thus, no more Campout, at least not this year and maybe never.

S/he also reported that the end of the Compound had nothing to do with Greggo’s departure.  S/he did not identify any specific reason the Compound was shelved, but did suggest that the talent sometimes feels that some items get stale and resist improvement.

Thanks to the Source – tried to think of a funny name for this correspondent, but nothing comes to mind.

I will say, however, that in general this tends to support my fairly unremarkable thought that there is some extremely interesting stuff that goes on behind the scenes.  Not all the hosts are on board with all of the stuff all the time.  This isn’t a shocking conclusion, but it’s the kind of stuff that the P1 would love to know about.  But, just as people beyond your employer don’t know the politics at your workplace, I don’t reckon we’ll ever get the story behind, for example, the demise of The Great Game.  There were some ill feelings after the last one, as I recall, centering on Mike Bacsik’s team-switching.  (Am I remembering correctly that that was the last one?)  You know, it’s probably just as well we don’t know.

 

 Trademarking Fun Ticket Phrases and Names

Confessors!  How unseemly!  You should receive your gratification entirely from the adoption of your descriptors by Confessors and others.  (I ran into a guy the other day who told me that he was the author of the “Yuck Monkey” designation on The Ticket.  I actually believed him.)

 How Mike is Sounding

Faithful Confessor ausgang left a comment to the last post reporting that he thought he detected sadness in Mike’s voice, that he seemed a little depressed.  Seemed to start 3-4- months ago.  (ausgang stated that he had no knowledge of any issues in Mike’s life.)

Well.   ausgang, I was startled by your comment because I noticed something in his voice at about the same time.  I thought about writing about it, but decided I may have been hearing things, and, truth to tell, I only hear it once in awhile.  (And not at all today, see below.)

But I had a different thought.  I didn’t feel that what I heard reflected any attitudinal issues.

What I thought was that for the first time, I thought I heard age creeping into those incredible pipes.    As I say, I don’t hear it often, but just once in awhile, I’ll hear a little crack, or a little breathiness, that I don’t recall hearing before.  The man is what, 62?  I mean, jeez, he comes by it honestly, and he’s not a young 62.   And he’s a regular vocal performer with his bands, singing out of his range (my opinion).  Not easy, and maybe what I’m hearing is just a little vocal weariness from a recent performance. 

 

 

But yeah, ausgang, I noticed something, too.

Mike and Mark

I only heard bits and pieces of The Hardline today, but what I heard sounded pretty good.  Mike was fully engaged, sounded great, and there was some sports talk on both their parts that indicated either preparation, or just plain sportsy knowledge.  I think most of us would like to hear more of this Mike with Corby and Danny, not just when sports is on the table, but in segments across the board. 

I wish I had heard more of their talk about the genesis of The Ticket, specifically Mark’s hiring by Mike.

 

Intra-Show Sniping

(1)  Corby won the E-Brake this morning for his show stop-down with a bad pun (that is, a pretty good pun).   George took the opportunity to take on The Hardline, who had been sniping at The Musers for not selecting enough of THL gaffes for the Friday contest.   George made some rather cutting comments about The Hardline, and concluded by recalling Corby’s suggestion that THL should do an internal blooper competition of its own.  George rather pointedly invited THL to do exactly that.   (I think that THL has won the last three E-Brakes.)

Of course, there is frequently some jabbing between the shows and it’s usually pretty-obviously good-natured.   George’s remarks did not have that flavor.  Anyone else thing George was just the tiniest bit hot under the collar?

 

 

(2)  I believe this one took place when Jake was doing E-News.  He made reference to a former Ticket guy, I believe it was Psycho Dave, who had stated somewhere along the line that he quit The Ticket because of Bob Sturm, although it could have BaD generally.  Mark said that he had left The Ticket way back when because of some friction with the cadre of BaD interns.  And there was talk directed generally against BaD interns (this may have been a reference to times past, hard to tell).   I forget who said that Bob was also amazed when learning that his management style did not get good reviews from his minions, but Mike jumped in at the end to support this piling on Bob.

(Attention UnTicket – that would be a nice clip to hear again.)

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As I said – an interesting Ticket day.

And now, I'm going to sit back and watch Perry Mason on Channel 24. 

Twitter: @Plainsman1310

Email:  ThePlainsman1310@gmail.com

 

OPEN THREAD: Friday Give-Up

Confessors, I'm on the run.  Wouldn't be posting this except with the increase in readers the comment threads are getting long and unwieldy.  May just have to put up with that.  Anyway, here are some random quick hits.

(1)  Are my ears deceiving me?  The TC-and-Muser computer screwups of the past week will not be candidates on the E-Brake?  Cannot have anything to do with the length of TC's misery -- this is a station policy at work here that wants to lower the volume on the continuing problems arising from the inexpert move to Victory.

(2)  The Hardline did a live spot on Wednesday similar to its taped Texas Land and Cattle piece where the boys parody the copywriter's tendency to introduce each piece of dialogue with the speaker using the name of the listener.  In live spot, which may also have been for TL&C, they took this to an extreme and by the end of the spot they were screaming at each other.  Very funny.

(3) I've heard Mike and Ty read some copy about something or other that talks about "30 megabits per second."  Are megabits any longer a meaningful measure of digital performance?

All right, that's it.  Get us started, someone.

OPEN THREAD: Is Ticket Tech Really as Bad As It Seems?

We need to hear from some radio experts and, ideally, Cumulo-Ticket insiders.

I used to think:  The Ticket does a lot of remotes; I'm sure those present some technical challenges as they move from venue to venue.  So, atrocious signal(s) aside, in my early years of listening I tended to give Ticket tech a pass.

Then:

(1)  I heard the hosts grow increasingly testy about the lousy technology they had to deal with in the studio.

(2) It occurred to me that the number of remotes mean that they should have figured out how to do them fairly seamlessly.

(3) There was the absolute disgrace of the move to Victory, during which, apparently, a large chunk of Ticket history disappeared in addition to the overall amateurism of the transfer.  If no one lost his/her job in that disaster, then  .  .  .  well, I guess you see a lot of this in ossified corporate cultures.

(4) The tech meltdowns in the last two Hardline remotes, one of which won the E-Brake today.  Now, I will say that Hardline meltdowns tend to be extremely entertaining, between Danny's exasperation and sarcastic sing-songy efforts to broadcast over the mortification and Corby's and Mike's disgusted commentary.

It occurs to me that I've been listening to sports radio and other talk radio for a long time, and I've never heard anything as technically error-prone as The Ticket. 

Really -- what's the problem?  Bad equipment?  Bad IT/AV administration up the ladder?   Insufficient investment in personnel? Or are we (am I) just wrong about how lousy Ticket technology is?

Please advise.

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Final Words on Hardline Profanity Until the Next Time

     (1)  If freakin' Barry Switzer thinks you're working blue, you're working blue.

     (2)  If you run ads featuring freakin' Barry Switzer commenting on you working blue, you know it.

Penn State Sodomy Quick Hits

(1)  The Musers and The Hardline did a good job with this hot topic on Thursday.  I thought that their efforts to tone down the comedy were notable.  (The Musers generally more sincere, and successful, in this than The Hardline, but the fact that they acknowledged the gravity of situation was to the credit of both shows.)  I felt that they also made an effort to find something different to say about the matter in addition to the obvious.

The seriousness with which both shows treated this topic, and that fact that the Penn State mess was almost the only topic covered, was perceptive.  This is one of those events that changes the way we look at an entire institution, and I'm not talking about Penn State -- I'm talking about sports in general and perhaps even large, powerful institutions of all kinds where horrors are swept under the rug because the consequences of exposure are so vast.  It seems like any time we get past the surface of what we see on the teevee in college or pro sports we find financial, sexual, medical, political, and other-words-I-can't-think-of-ending-in-"al" misdeeds that take our breath away.  The drive shows didn't get all philosophical on us like I'm doing right now, but I thought that their reaction -- being brought up short by the enormity of what took place -- was a perfect mirror of how many of us are reacting.

(2)  I was able to have BaD on in the background on Thursday, but couldn't hear it very clearly.  I got the impression that they didn't devote much airtime to this subject at all, but I may be way wrong about that.  Can anyone give us an account of how BaD handled matters?

(3)  The student riots and support for Paterno are excellent reasons for raising the voting age to 25, and also fodder for the growing literature on the worthlessness of the modern liberal arts education.  It will be interesting to see what happens to applications there.  It's one of the largest universities in the United States, so perhaps it is to be expected that some irreducible core of maroons would be out and about spouting fatuities.

(4)  "With the benefit of hindsight, I wish I had done more."  HINDSIGHT?  HINDSIGHT??  Does Paterno even know what kind of activity is involved here?  Is there a more poorly-worded confession in the annals (yes, that's "annals") of American history?  Who drafted Paterno's appalling statement?  That mouthy lawyer kid of his?  Craig Rosengarden?

"Hindsight":   Astoundingly unfortunate word choice aside, think about what he is saying.  "Hindsight" doesn't mean that you now have more facts than you had back at the time to which you are looking back -- it means that some new circumstance has caused you to interpret those facts differently.   What are those new circumstances here?  Only the threat to his own skin and Penn State arising out of disclosure of the matters he and his staff chose to at best ignore, and at worst to cover up.  

His effort to instruct the Trustees on their duty not to regulate his employment is exactly the kind of tone-deaf arrogance that has now tarnished his legacy.

(5)  OFF-TOPIC:  This site strongly endorses The Hardline's increased references to Green Tail Shiner.

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Follow Your Plainsman on Twitter:  @Plainsman1310