seattlepi.com Mariners blog

M's time at KOMO
seems to be coming to an end




One can imagine that the folks at KOMO-1000 are enjoying Friday's game, given that the Mariners are up 8-0 in the eighth inning and Felix Hernandez having set a new record with 15 consecutive scoreless Fenway Park innings

There hasn't been much for the Mariners' flagship radio station to whoop it up about this year.

But KOMO's time celebrating Mariner success or bemoaning Mariner collapses may be at an end.

Seattle will almost certainly be on another radio station starting next year.

The club's contract with Fisher Communications-owned KOMO is up at the end of the year and sources with the station and with the club say a deal to bring the Mariners back in 2009 is all but dead.

There will be more in an online story later this evening, but for now, look for KJR-950 or KIRO-710 to land the club's broadcasts for 2009.

Posted by John Hickey at June 6, 2008 6:34 p.m.

http://blog.seattlepi.nwsource.com/baseball/archives/140641.asp

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M's unlikely to be on KOMO radio in '09

By JOHN HICKEY
P-I REPORTER

BOSTON -- The Mariners are unlikely to return to KOMO-AM/1000 radio for the 2009 season, sources close to the club and the station said Friday.

The club's six-year contract at a reported $10 million per season with the Fisher Communications-owned Seattle radio station is up at the end of October, and employees at KOMO were told Thursday that it was highly unlikely a deal to bring the Mariners back to the station would happen.

Randy Adamack, the club's vice president for communications, when asked Friday if the talks with KOMO and Fisher were dead, said, "they're not dead, dead, dead, dead dead."

"There's still a chance," Adamack said.

KJR, owned by Clear Channel, is one possible landing place for the Mariners. KIRO-AM/710, which is owned by Bonneville International and which was the Mariners' home for almost two decades before Fisher stepped in, is another likely spot for the Mariners broadcasts

"We've been talking with those groups over the last few months," Adamack said. "The types of deals and the structure of the deals have changed over a period of time. We're still working on it."

When the Mariners and Fisher first struck the deal, the Mariners were in the afterglow of an American League-record 116-win season and in the middle of a four-year period in which the club would average more than 98 wins per season.

However, sources said, the radio market has changed since Fisher took over the broadcasts. Major league games now are available on the Internet, although the local station doesn't have streaming rights. Rights fees have declined in many markets, and a sagging economy hasn't helped.

Sources indicated the Mariners lowered their original asking price when talks with Fisher were moving slowly, but even at the reduced figure Fisher was not willing to commit.

"Our challenge," Adamack said, "is to come up with the best contract for the club."

Although there is no firm deadline to get a deal done, a new organization handling the game would have to build up staff internally and work on marketing, so, as Adamack said, "the sooner the better."

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/baseball/366200_mradio07.html

The Seattle Times says SportsRadio KJR is not thought to be involved in talks with the Mariners, leaving 710 KIRO as the lone suitor for the radio rights.

These sports teams get greedier and greedier. They price themselves out of the market which forces a sale to a new city. Isn't that what happened with the Sonics.