I am sometimes truly astounded by the naivete and convinction that so-called experts who pontificate on social media for sh-ts and giggles insist is true. A fresh new cry of “what, MORE fascism?!!” erupted when DEADLINE’s Ted Johnson dropped this story Thursday morning:
ABC is switching affiliations in the St. Louis market, with plans to move from the Sinclair-owned outlet to Gray Media, sources familiar with the plans confirmed on Thursday. The change will take place on Sept. 1. Gray will provide locally produced news at its station, KMOV-TV, with ABC programming broadcasting on the outlet’s D2 digital channel…A spokesperson for Sinclair did not immediately return a request for comment.
Immediately this story and similar ones were linked to with fresh new conclusion jumps that those Jimmy Kimmel-hating bastards were heeding their fat fuhrer and jettisoning him and “fake news ABC” to the netherregions of the television dial. If there is any “fake news” in this case, it is that of those who apparently don’t know or care to know a damn thing about the history of St. Louis television or, for that matter, the current value of network affiliations to the few companies still dedicated to local broadcasting.
First off, ABC has generationally been an afterthought in the Arch City. Two generations ago, on one of the most level playing fields around where all three traditional affiliates were clustered between channels 2 and 5, ABC programming on channel 2 was perpetually third. The CBS owned-and-operated station on Channel 4 was typically the overall audience leader, buoyed by a history and association with its sister AM radio station that could be heard practically all across the country and carried Cardinals baseball games throughout the region. Channel 5 had the TV rights to the Cardinals as well an aggressive slate of talk shows, including the locally-produced Sally Jessy Raphael show that became a national hit. Channel 11, a locally owned VHF independent, eventually got those Cardinals rights as well as practically every consequential off-network rerun and children’s program. As someone who grew up at a time and in a market where ABC was number one with everybody under 50, it was a true learning experience to see how unpopular the network was.
Hence few tears were shed when in the mid-90s FOX swooped in to upgrade its own affiliation in the market from bottom feeder and sole UHF independent KDNL to said Channel 2 (KTVI) just in time for cable to become dominant and for the NFL to return to the city after an eight-year lapse, with FOX’s usurping of those broadcast rights immediately making Channel 2 relevant at once. KDNL gladly took ABC’s compensation as a lifeline and a raison d’etre and even attempted to launch a local news operation that frequently ranked fifth in the market but never made any significant dent ratings-wise. When Sinclair took ownership of the station its cancellation was much more a result of indifference than ideology.
So the fact that ABC is now being further downgraded isn’t all that big a deal after all–it’s merely a continuation of shoulder-shrugging that has gone on for decades. And in a city where the NFL is booed mercilessly since the Rams returned to Los Angeles a decade ago even Monday Night Football isn’t enough of an allure to bring affiliates to its knees.
And besides, it’s not like this sort of maneuvering doesn’t have precedence, as Johnson reminded:
Such affiliation switches are not all that uncommon. Last year, the network switched from Berkshire Hathaway’s WPLG-TV in Miami to a subchannel of Sunbeam’s WSVN-TV in that market.
You regulars here hopefully already knew that. We mused at length about that even more seismic shift when news first broke last winter. We painstakingly explained how paying a network for the right to broadcast content that now co-exists on globally distributed streaming platforms–albeit with some delays, buy nonethless often more watched there than on linear stations–was no longer the most logical nor profitable way to run a business. And leave it to a station run by a one-time research guru to immediately brag about how prescient a move said shift was when it released this press release last August:
The Nielsen ratings are in and WPLG Local 10’s decision to part ways with ABC was clearly the right call. The station, which celebrated its Independence Day from ABC on Monday, Aug. 4, scored a huge ratings success on day one. WPLG programming beat ABC programming in nearly every time period throughout the day, including outpacing ABC’s Good Morning America and ABC’s prime and late-night programming. “We are incredibly happy with the first day results,” said WPLG President and CEO Bert Medina.
Here’s the other reality check. Every minute of WPLG’s programming that now carries locally sold commercial inventory as opposed what the ABC network goes directly to the broadcaster’s bottom line. A typical network program allows a station to sell roughly a fourth of an hour’s ad load locally–which means even a local news show that gets a third of the rating of its network counterpart is immediately more valuable to a station’s bottom line.
It is with that framework that the other and even more immediate affiliate switch news that Johnson followed up on a day later was shared–once again accompanied by some disturbingly inaccurate conclusions:
CBS is switching the affiliation of stations in a half dozen markets from Nexstar-owned stations to those from Hearst and Forum Communications…Among the markets impacted are Albuquerque, NM, where the CBS affiliate will switch to Hearst’s KOAT-TV, while Nexstar’s KRQE-TV will upgrade its Fox programming from a digital placement to its primary channel. In Birmingham, AL, CBS will be affiliated with Hearst’s WVTM-TV, while Nexstar said that it plans to expand local news in the market, where it owns WIAT-TV. In Greenville, SC, CBS will be seen on Hearst’s WYFF-TV, moving from WSPA-TV, where Nexstar also plans to expand local news content.
In Jackson, MS, CBS will be found on Hearst’s WAPT-TV, and Nexstar plans to replace the CBS programming on WJTV-TV with its own network The CW, which has been on a digital channel. In Bismarck, ND, CBS moves to Forum Communications’ KBMY-TV, with Nexstar’s KXMB-TV also upping The CW. In Rapid City, SD, CBS will go to Forum’s KNBN-TV, with Nexstar’s KCLO-TV also elevating The CW to the main channel.
In the larger of these cities this was front-page news, and theories abounded that there may have been somewhat related to CBS’ ideological pivots and pending overhaul of 60 MINUTES. Outside observers seemed to think this was a small win. Anyone familiar with Nexstar’s leanings would know that’s not quite the case. But again, that’s not the driver.
Albuquerque, Greenville and Birmingham are all measured by overnight Nielsen ratings and have had historically stronger NBC , ABC and, more recently, FOX affiliates. In the trifurcated DMA that is Greenville-Sparatanburg-Asheville WSPA was licensed to the substantially less populated Spartanburg area which made WYFF (nee WFBC) one of NBC’s most successful affiliates even before the network itself was restored to prominence on geography alone. In Birmingham CBS has aired on a traditional UHF station that even had trouble negotiating equivalent cable and satellite channel positioning. And in both markets there’s no major league professional sports team to make any material difference.
What did matter was that Hearst was willing to play ball with CBS at a time when Nexstar wasn’t–a point that thankfully wasn’t lost on TVND.com’s Substack man-splain:
Loyalty that is bought with money may be overcome by money.” – Seneca
A brief bit of history: Lucius Annaeus Seneca was a Roman Stoic philosopher who became a key advisor to the Emperor Nero during the Roman Empire’s “go-go” years around 50 AD. He delivered the famous quote above with irony, because even though he was a Stoic who was supposed to be detached from the trappings of wealth, he was one of the richest men in ancient Rome.
We think today that in our more modern current times, Perry Sook, Chairman and CEO of Nexstar Media, could have used an advisor like Seneca to remind him of the key weakness of loyalty that is purchased. That being in simpler terms, somebody can always come along and pay more for it. (A)s that rich Roman Seneca would have said, had he ever heard the music stylings of Puff Daddy:
“It’s all about the benjamins.”
(T)he whole network relationship issue has become more complicated because of Nexstar’s acquisition of rival group owner TEGNA and its local stations. Industry sources suggest that TEGNA had network agreements that were sending more money back to the networks than Nexstar has been doing. Thus Nexstar has been letting the networks know that it will seek to have all renewal agreements set at the current, lower amounts of “reverse compensation” that Nexstar enjoys. Apparently, while Nexstar was negotiating “down to the wire” on its CBS affiliation agreement, the good folks at Hearst Television let it be known that they would be just fine with following the Miami example and taking on the CBS network on the so-called “dot-two” digital subchannels of their stations—and just like that, CBS will be moving to those new homes.
You can think what you will about oligarchs like Sook and the even more notorious David Smith of Sinclair as to how and why they think and what fat fascists they choose to fellate. But you cannot argue with the logic and strategy that made them rich in the first place. And you’d best believe they–or at least their subordinates who deal with ratings and revenue–are acutely aware of impending changes to Nielsen’s local methodologies that will likely credit more reportable audience than ever to stations. Which means even lower-rated newscasts will be that much more profitable–and impactful upon its community–than ever before.
And incidentally: In the very same digital landscape that those bad, bad siphoning streamers operate in the dot-two and up iterations of those local affiliates are immediately upgraded to equal opportunity viewership. If someone actually wants to watch GOOD MORNING, AMERICA in St. Louis or Miami or 60 MINUTES in Spartanburg or Bismarck they can. They simply choose not to.
If anything, that’s as much of a tribute to free thinking and clear-headedness as we’ve got going on anywhere these days. You bet it’s all about the benjamins. His principles, not the paper his portrait is on.
Until next time…