To open up their show this morning, Dennis and Callahan congratulated themselves on winning another ratings book, and struck out at competitors Toucher and Rich at 98.5 (though they never actually named them) and at media writers Jessica Heslam and Chad Finn of the Boston Herald and Boston Globe respectively.
Rather than having you listen to the entire segment, here are the highlights, and I figured we can let John and Gerry’s exact words be on the record and in print here. I do wish I could accurately portray the sarcasm, venom and whining that some of these statements were made with.
After some silly talk about “high body slams”, they said this:
JD – …We want to keep it subtle.
GC – We don’t want to gloat too much, but congratulations.
JD – We just want to wait for Jessica and Chad to write it, which they always do…
GC - The hell with them, We don’t care about them, we’ll announce it ourselves…
JD You know who we care about? We care about the people who made us # 1
GC – That’s true.
JD – The ones who appreciate what we do and like what we do and support what we do. AND by the way, for the record, and this needs to be said, this was the BOSTON rating book, not Providence, not NESN, these are not all the other stations, and I would dare say this, if you added up the people who are listening or watching on NESN and the entire radio network, including Providence, and including the station from Providence that comes up into the Boston signal area, the beatdown would be like bully beatdown. But this is just the Boston audience. Boston vs Boston, number one, I believe that’s seven books in a row.
GC It’s more than that, but it’s at least that many. We can go back and get the number if you want..
A few moments later, Callahan alluded to their demographic by saying:
GC – In our business, in our genre, the only thing that matters is men, and in men, in the winter ratings book, we won again. Congratulations Meterparel.
JD – What a minute, hang on, you mean being slightly ahead for like three weeks doesn’t count as something? REALLY. So we shouldn’t celebrate if we’re slightly ahead for three and half weeks?
After a few more comments referencing their competition lying to their listeners, D&C unloaded on media reporters, specifically Chad Finn.
GC You know what the amazing thing is, you could call a reporter, lie to them, he’ll run with it, the paper will correct it, I’ve been in that business for a long time, that’s the most embarrassing thing, a correction, to fix your mistake,
JD …and you still continue to carry the water…
GC – How that works, I don’t know. If someone lied to me, and I was forced, the paper, you know, you’d obviously be called into the boss’ office, and he’d be like what the hell are you doing, don’t you check your facts, and then they run a correction, an official correction, and that would be painful, I would never forget it.
JD – Right, you’d be pissed at the person who erroneously who lied to you and gave you misinformation which went with into the paper…and yet some people say “That’s ok…as long as you call me back, and you remember my first name, isn’t THAD. “He didn’t call me Thad!”
GC – That’s how it works.
JD – I’ll just write some story and be your PR agent, basically.
GC – That is the height of unprofessionalism in this business, and kind of pathetic. ….wouldn’t you double-check it next time? It’s one thing to be corrected once, can you imagine being a writer and the newspaper was forced to run corrections multiple times?
Then they dipped into the area that has caused the most controversy. The allegations that WEEI tries to include numbers from Providence in their total ratings.
JD- That’s part of the lie, Gerry, that they’re counting people who listening in Providence.
GC – That’s never been true, and if you say that, you’re either stupid, or dishonest.
JD – As a clarification the Providence signal comes north. It doesn’t just go south to Rhode Island. It comes north to places like Canton, Stoughton, Randolph and places like that, and people can pick it up on the FM side.
GC – Why wouldn’t you? We don’t have the best signal, that’s another thing we’re proud of, overcoming that obstacle.
JD – So the Providence signal comes north into the Boston market, and so when they do count Providence, and this number one has nothing to do with it, nor did the last one or the seven before that, when they do count people who are listening in Boston, but on the Providence radio station, then the beatdown is significant.
GC – Again, if you say there is anything deceiving about that, then you are either A) Stupid, or B) lying. Because you know if someone is sitting in, forget Canton, sitting right here in Brighton, and they happen to get the FM signal, and they listen to our show, you’re think for some reason they shouldn’t count?
This morning, on his Facebook page, 98.5 morning host Rich Shertenlieb posted the following:
THANKS for making Toucher & Rich #1 in ALL male demos in March. For the months of Jan Feb & March- We had 35% more Men 18-49 listeners & a whopping EIGHT TIMES more Men 18-34 listeners than WEEI. Time & time again, our listeners continue to show that they are hands down the most diehard and loyal in radio. Never seen anything like it. Thanks from all of us…even Wallach for letting us do what we do.
