Should I have prefaced the title of this piece with my occasional warning: "LISTENING TOO HARD"? Maybe. Maybe.
In his Ask Me Anything on My Ticket Confession, the Western Hemispherical Catman reported his opinion that The Hardline was like a stool (not that kind of stool) with three equal legs.
He took some heat for this.
Listeners hear the same evidence that he does. It is plain that Corby has come to dominate the show, with the aid of Danny. Not everyone finds this a problem. While I join those who have wearied of The OverCorby, I also think he's a terrific broadcaster who is very entertaining when taken in the originally prescribed doses. But yeah, Mike "Short Leg" Rhyner had begun to disappear on the Ticket anchor show he founded. Come on, now.
Cat knows.
My evidence for this is circumstantial.
It centers on an ad that The Ticket ran for quite awhile. After I made the observation I'm about to report, I had hoped to hear the ad again so I could get the quote exactly right, but I haven't heard it in awhile.
It's an ad for The Hardline, and at one point, Conrad says something like:
"And you'll get to hear a Texas Radio Hall of Famer -- or not." (Accompanied, I am dimly recalling, by a sound effect.)
I don't know that Cat approves internal ad copy and final product, but I'm betting he does.
If so, with this phrase he's winking at the P1.
If you tune in to The Hardline, maybe you'll hear Mike, maybe you won't.
There's something else.
My schedule has really cut into my Hardline listening in recent weeks. I tune in when I can, but recently my PM commute coincides with the waning minutes of the show. But on those occasions when I'm able to listen to the meat of the presentation, I've heard something I haven't heard in a long time:
Mike.
Participating in interviews. Conversing with Corby and Danny. Analyzing Ranger baseball. Jumping in. (Or is it "popping on" at this point?)
You all need to tell me -- am I imagining this? Or has he picked up his game very noticeably in the last month or so?
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One of the nice things about having a blog is that I can just dump my utterly unprovable guesses on an unsuspecting congregation.
Here is my theory about when Mike began to check out with greater frequency:
It was when he was introduced to the iPad.
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QUICK HIT: Pet peeve vindicated.
Mike Sirois chastised Mike "The Machine" Marshall today for calling the show "Cirque de Sirois." The Machine was unfazed. Made no difference to him.
Sirois said that it was like George Dunham perpetually mispronouncing Norm's name as "Hitchges," and he sounded pretty disgusted about both.
* * *
A Confessor leaving a comment to the last thread noted that the incomparable Sturm and the coming-to-seem-indispensable Mike Sirois had put in an appearance on the Reddit page to clear something up. He speculated that MTC may have lost some of its "cachet."
I was flattered to think anyone ever thought it ever had much cachet, but there's probably something to that comment.
MTC will be six years old on Tuesday. You are reading post number 711. Hits and pageviews are stronger than ever. Maybe we should have a party.
But unlike Reddit -- by the way, the guys that run that page do a terrific job and yes, as someone also observed on the last thread, they do appear to clean it up -- the topics here tend to be guided by the posts (although comments have very free reign). And, this post aside, Your Plainsman hasn't had much original to say lately.
I'm hoping this will change. It's a time of ferment at The Ticket. Competition among stations is more vigorous. The ratings on which broadcast decisions are based are equivocal and may well be faulty. The JV 43-Man Squamish for attention is heating up. Contracts will be running out. Most will probably be renewed, but that day is coming when there will be an organic change in one or more of the shows.
There's lots to think about, lots to write about. I'll do my best to continue to find the time.
Thank you for your loyal patronage of My Ticket Confession.
But unlike Reddit -- by the way, the guys that run that page do a terrific job and yes, as someone also observed on the last thread, they do appear to clean it up -- the topics here tend to be guided by the posts (although comments have very free reign). And, this post aside, Your Plainsman hasn't had much original to say lately.
I'm hoping this will change. It's a time of ferment at The Ticket. Competition among stations is more vigorous. The ratings on which broadcast decisions are based are equivocal and may well be faulty. The JV 43-Man Squamish for attention is heating up. Contracts will be running out. Most will probably be renewed, but that day is coming when there will be an organic change in one or more of the shows.
There's lots to think about, lots to write about. I'll do my best to continue to find the time.
Thank you for your loyal patronage of My Ticket Confession.
