Why Is Radio Shunning The Oakland A’s?
You may recall last October when the Major League Baseball team took to Twitter to post a video aimed at Entercom’s 95.7 The Game, with radio equipment being wheeled out of the broadcast booth, and the tweet ‘It’s not us, it’s you.’ The A’s are still without a broadcast partner, which is quite unusual. The team made the playoffs last year and, for the most part, radio loves partnering with professional sports teams.
A’s President Dave Kaval told SF.Gate that he will have a radio partner when the teams starts the 2019 season. However, he also said, “Terrestrial radio is kind of dying and we need to look long-term at how you get in front of people with audio.” What he means by that is that the team is looking at several apps to carry the broadcasts.
After saying radio is dying, Kaval also admitted the team was looking into purchasing a station. “That’s a possibility. Those transactions take some time.” The A’s even kicked the tires at KGO in San Francisco.
In the end, Kaval believes the team will have a better radio partner than what they had. “Suffice it to say, we’ll have a terrestrial option that’s better than what we had. We didn’t feel we had a partner that was a good long-term fit or that was really promoting this amazing team and all we’re doing. That was something that was not working and we heard from fans who were frustrated. We needed to go another direction.”
It’ll be interesting to see of the A’s really do start the season with a radio partner, or become another Internet only audio team. Entercom’s radio’s biggest supporter of professional sports, by far, and that didn’t work out for some reason. Plus if radio’s dying why would the A’s be looking into buying a station?
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