Sunday, August 20, 2006

Sid Michaels out at WYOU

There's been another high-profile departure at the Nexstar duopoly. WYOU sports anchorman Sid Michaels resigned Friday, weeks ahead of the station's plans to eliminate weekday sportscasts on its Dialing for News format. A tipster says Michaels started looking at his options after WBRE sports anchorman Jason Knapp was canned earlier this month.

(Look at it this way, at least WYOU doesn't have to update his bio anymore.)

While sports typically doesn't fare well in viewer demographics, I'm rather surprised that WYOU would kill its weekday sportscasts before the start of the high school football season, which viewers in this market love. However, it looks like the Friday night sportscasts will stay, which means all the big high school games will still be covered.

14 Comments:

Anonymous Anonymous said...

Another classy guy undone by Nexstar. I'd like to ignore the obituaries for broadcast news I see written here, but when all the pros like Sid are gone who will be left?

Can you say, "Lowest Common Denominator?" boys and girls?

And do you even know what it means?

12:34 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

What does Frank ("Andrews") Shimkus have to say about all this?

Isn't he still on the Nexstar payroll as a consultant? Doesn't he still show up every day? What does HE have to say about what's going on at 22?

He was always a big Sid Michaels supporter and fan. Or was he? Is he going to help Sid pack? Is that what friends are for?

2:40 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

I saw it coming. Another stupid canning by the wonderful management at Nexstar. I swear that do things to deliberately take those stations down the tubes. It "could"be for tax reasons, so they can write off all the losses 22 and 28 have each year. They are 2 of the worst staions to ever work at.

3:53 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Sid's a great guy! He'll be greatly missed. In the grand scheme of things he is way better off. It amazes me that Frank Andrews is still on the payroll at Nexstar. Has this guy ever put in an honest day's work for an honest day's pay? First he'd miss weeks of work for a hangnail, now Nexstar is dumb enough to pay the guy to show maybe once a week and do nothing.

4:22 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

They can always let a tape editor track a sports package.

It was done Saturday.

5:34 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

my question is why - he seemed to know what he was talking about - he was fluent and not highly discussed here so i'm assuming well liked - why does it look like Nexstar doesn't have a clue? are they this bad elsewhere? -- i'm only asking cause i'm not in the business...

8:33 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

They let a tape editor track a package? Damn. I'm a tape editor in a top 25 market and I'm pretty sure they'd have the Spanish-speaking housekeepers track before me.

Stories like this are why I thank God each and every day that I left this valley when I had the chance and never looked back.

12:53 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Frank Andrews wouldn't stop Sid or anyone else from getting canned. He only looks out and cares for #1.
It's people like him and so called companies like Nexstar that made me get out of that business. It's a shame people who SHOULD be fired, like a certain Operations Manager at 22/28 are still there.

1:57 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Funny if you click on Laurie Monteforte's picture it sends an email to Sid. Another quality broadcaster is lost. Didn't he almost go not too long ago?

10:58 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

What is the big deal about who tracks a package? The info still gets out to the public. Didn't 16 have a photog that use to/still does get infront of the camera to do high school football? No one seemed to mind that at all. It is strange the double standard that seems to be not only on this board but in the whole viewing area.

I feel sorry for Sid. Great guy, really knew his stuff. I am sure he will find something else to do right away. I can't blame him for not wanting to go to weekends on WBRE.

11:01 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

let clear everything up a little. sid wasnt fired, he resigned, mostly because he didnt want to work behind phil schoener and do weekends. sid doesnt deserve to play second fiddle to someone with a fifth of the experience he does. he waited for them to come to him with new contracts and they never did and when they finally did, it was for him to do weekends so he had enough and told them where to go. sid is a good man and he will be missed. good luck sid.

1:05 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Chances are the Tape Editor was trained as a broadcast journalist (or at least has a good grasp of it) and just can't get a job as a reporter.

Hell, as a recent grad, I could probably track a package better than some of the WBRE reporters.

2:21 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Tape editors should not be tracking packages. Their job is to edit...not to report. There is nothing in that job description that dictates a tape editor is to be used as a reporter. Instead of doing things on the cheap, WBRE/WYOU should hire quality employees instead of running them off.

3:39 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Keep in mind that Sid was doing his second tour of torture at that place. Both he and Jim Miller resigned within an hour of one another, oh, 6-7 years ago. Sid moved along, then he came back. Why? No one knew, but most all thought he was foolish for doing so.

7:24 PM  

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