It has been over a month since Sandy Clough was on-air for 104.3 The Fan in Denver. Since then, "filling in" for Sandy has become a regular theme. Fans of Sandy Clough have been clamoring for his return or at the very least an update on his status. The simple answer to Where in the World is Sandy Clough. From what I have gathered is the station itself is not sharing what is going on and may not know exactly what is going on themselves. It appears Clough's departure is equal to a song opening for one of his segments and has left both Sandy Clough fans and his stations co-workers "In The Dark"
The vagueness of his departure has led many to speculate on what is going on from illness to rehab to even my own bad jokes of Clough being brought back eventually but like Bernie of the 80s movies Weekend at Bernie's:
While Clough has regularly been known to not be my cup of tea, the simple fact is I respect Sandy's knowledge and true hard work and old school approach to the profession. Clough's knowledge is lacking in the Denver Sports Radio and his diverse sports abilities are missed when his own station has taken the approach to focus all efforts on the Broncos coverage. The Fan had the opportunity to present a solid short term replacement in the likes of a young Sandy Clough type protégé in Ryan Edwards and bring back his counterpart in Shawn Drotar and/or James Gomez but instead brought in the cackling hen voice of Charles Johnson. I love CJ as a Buff but he just isn't very entertaining. I will say Clough didn't have to work with Brandon Stokley for a week while at the Final 4 and realized how much better his show was without him and he can't stomach the thought of having to share the radio with such an imbecile. The Fan could simply say Sandy Clough has taken a temporary leave of absence and they are unsure of his return but hope to have him back as soon as possible.
The Fan's mistakes don't stop there with 104.3 The Fan now wasting an hour of their time replaying Stink and Evans. That is now four hours of sports show replay that The Fan puts on-air between that and the replay of The Drivel, I mean Drive. It is lazy and shows a complete disregard for their fans. If anyone can stomach listening to the same thing twice in one day, then they are simply void of the necessary brain cells to function in life and not a surprise that they have been brainwashed by some subliminal message 104.3 The Fan puts on-air.
I won't rehash it too much, but The Fan put together a great line-up and diversity in their programming that presented hope that even with 105.5 FM ESPN going off-air and The Fan's sister station 1600 AM absorbing ESPN that The Fan would become strong, instead since March all I have seen is one bad mistake after another from canning their two diverse shows (Shawn Drotar and Ryan Edwards and their Fan Late Night 2.0 with James Gomez and Joshua Dover) to leaving fans and employees in the dark on what is going on with Clough.
All these changes have pushed a lot of listeners to turn back time and return to The Fan's old station 950 AM and tune into the month old Altitude Sports Radio. Altitude Sports Radio came on with a bang starting their first show on opening day and have hit the ground running.
I have been impressed with their pairings. The stars are no doubt Vic Lombardi and Nate Kreckman, but the entire cast is actually a very solid one put together by Will Petersen and James Merillatt and their balancing act of running two radio stations.
6-7 am: Joshua Dover bats lead off. His show is mostly a scoreboard recap and while I have shouted from the mountain tops about my love for Dover's sports radio abilities, I feel like this format holds him back from being his best. I would prefer he be allowed to freestyle and do what he does best.
7-10 am: Tom Helmer and Scott Hastings with Lauren Gardner. Honestly, Lauren has made this show more entertaining. I initially thought three voices and a female I have heard/seen very little from was a bad choice but Lauren adds another dimension to the show I like. It is vast discussion of topics you will get on this show and some may just be Ditch Date Prom Guy for an hour, but you will at least get a laugh in. I tend to flip the dial to here when my main show Morning Mayhem with Cello Romano & Danny Williams is on commercial or lacking their own focus.
10-1 pm Rich Eisen national: I can't get into it. I like Eisen a lot but it is a 3 hour tour of trying to find what I want to listen to between the very talented and undervalued Sports Guy Mike show. His work is strong and sorry but Cecil Lammey is meant for specific times of the year, football season and the weeks leading up to it with some occasional draft talk. This constant breakdown of positions is scout talk and while I love scout talk, it doesn't make for the most entertaining May sports discussions.
1-4 pm Vic and Kyle with Vic Lombardi and Kyle Keefe. Kyle Keefe needs to grow on people but I have been waiting for this pairing since Keefe's Horace Rhemy impersonations were unearthed when Vic was on The Fan. These two are the spinoff of Vic and Gary like Van Halen was when they switched to Sammy Hager from David Lee Roth. These two are great and allow me to fill an hour of emptiness from 1-2. From 2-4 pm they battle the dial with the late day breakfast of champions in The Big Show with Benny Bash, Benjamin Allbright and Kent "Toast" Erickson.
4-7 pm: Nate Kreckman and Tom Nalen. By far the best option for a drive home and when taking that early evening bathroom break, these two are the best Denver has to offer. The only time my dial wanders is during commercial break. Simply put, if you are too lazy to give the show more than 5 minutes, you are most likely listening to replay radio on 104.3 The Fan and wasting brain cells.
So I have been asked, do I hate 104.3 The Fan? No, but in fact their best talent are their producers and fill-in host Ryan Edwards. Their on-air talent is the weakest in the Denver sports market right now. At every time slot The Fan has live radio their is a better option or TWO better options for the listener. Ask more from your radio than sticking with what has been around the longest or what is on currently on top. With that reasoning, we should all tune in to Drew Soicher and think Woody Paige and Mark Kiszla are the best sports guys in the business. We all know that the only people that think that are those 3 people and Big Al & D-Mac listeners.
Appreciate this update and I am in complete agreement. The station has gone right to hell since Bonneville bought it. First they can Hastings, then they turn loose Ryan and Shawn, and now Sandy is MIA. I was a daily listener for nearly all of my ten years in Denver, but I have given up on the station and have switched to Altitude as well.
ReplyDeleteThe Fan has become such an annoying listening experience I removed it from my presets.
ReplyDeleteHow about D Mac kill us with truth about Sandy. Easy to kill with truth when it is not the company you work for.
ReplyDelete104.3 has become totally unlistenable. I used to listen to Evans and Schlereth on my 45 min drive in, because the 950 is basically just a recap of the previous day from 6 - 7:00 a.m. However, even Schlereth has just become unbearable (Evans tends to do that to the people he works with). I love Altitude 950 - I had started listening to the Comedy channel before 950 came along because I just could not stand 104.3 anymore. 104.3 has proven one thing - there definitely is an off-season for talking Broncos.
ReplyDeleteSchlereth and Evans are ok but D Dummy and Big Loser Al were terrible when they did late nights and worse now. So full of themselves and their sophomoric humor. The Fan lost me when they took Sandy off the drive home time 3/6. He is the BEST sports analyst in the Denver area! And yes Stokely and CJ need to go!!!
ReplyDelete