News

Kudos to our friends at Sports USA, which will become the longest-tenured broadcaster of NFL Sunday afternoon games when it kicks off its 17th NFL season this weekend. Since broadcasting its first NFL game on November 3, 2002, on just 32 stations, Sports USA has continued to expand and can now be heard on over 500 radio affiliates across the country.

South Carolina State Bulldogs football games will be broadcast on WLXC KISS 103.1 (Columbia, SC) under a new multi-year agreement. The station will be the official radio broadcast home of the SCSU football team.

WTMJ/Milwaukee has raised more than $40,000 so far for the American Red Cross to aid victims impacted by the recent historic flooding and severe thunderstorms across the state of Wisconsin. The initial donations came as part of the stations' three-hour "Wisconsin Strong – Storm Relief" radiothon on August 31.

When most people think of radio formats of appeal to Hispanic consumers, their minds may drift to regional Mexican, or perhaps the ever-popular "trap" music and Latin Urban reggaetón-infused sounds making waves from L.A. to Miami. There may be another big opportunity to drive growth with Latino radio listeners you've not yet considered. And, it may not even involve a format change.

That's according to a new blog posted by Westwood One's Pierre Bouvard on the eve of the 4th annual IAB Podcast upfronts. Westwood commissioned Advertiser Perceptions to conduct its fourth annual study of brand and agency podcast spending sentiment. Here's what they are reporting.

The IAB just announced that iHeartMedia CEO Bob Pittman and NPR CEO Jarl Mohn will keynote the final session at the IAB's Podcast Upfronts, Thursday. NPR has been successful at podcasting for a long time. iHeart carries hundreds of podcasts on the iHeartRadio app. Pittman and Mohn are long-time friends.

Radio Hall of Fame inductee Johnny Morris has died. Morris was the first black chief engineer in Southern California radio and an award-winning radio broadcaster/program director. Morris, who has been characterized as “godfather of soul radio in California." He was 70.

Westwood One is ready to kick off its 32nd consecutive year as the network radio partner of the NFL with the opening night game on Thursday, when the defending Super Bowl champion Philadelphia Eagles host the Atlanta Falcons. Boomer Esiason will join Kevin Harlan in the booth for his farewell broadcast after 18 seasons with Westwood One.

Gen Media Partners announced Monday that it has acquired national radio network Sun Broadcast Group. SBG founder Jason Bailey and COO Julio Aponte Jr. will retain partial ownership of Sun and continue to run the day-to-day operations. How much Gen Media Partners paid for SBG was not revealed.

Some may know Bonnie-Jill Laflin as a social media personality and actress, but she’s also a radio talent. San Francisco sports station KNBR is adding Laflin to the on-air team of the Murph & Mac morning show.