Sports radio: Josh Innes' show continues ratings slide

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Albeit with an asterisk, KBME (790 AM) continues to struggle in the afternoon drive ratings since ousting Charlie Pallilo in October for Josh Innes.

Since Innes’ debut Oct. 10, KBME has lost almost two-thirds of Pallilo’s audience from late September among men 25-54.

Now, for the aforementioned asterisk: The Media Ratings Council, which audits ratings services that provide measurements estimates for Internet, print, radio, TV and cross-platform media use, declined to certify Nielsen Audio’s portable people meter estimates for December.

Nielsen says it lost contact with 8 percent of its approximately 5,600 meters nationwide from Nov. 3-9, which meant it was unable to monitor radio use during that time for those panelists. It’s not known how many Houston meters were included in the outage, but Nielsen says it still achieved its reporting goals for the month and the outage was no big deal.

Still, at least for the moment, the December ratings book is not certified for use by advertisers and stations.

Even an 8 percent outage, however, wouldn’t be enough to mask the degree to which KILT (610 AM) continues to dominate the four all-sports stations in Houston and the degree to which Innes has thus far been unable to hold on to KBME’s existing audience, let alone build on it.

Pallilo, ironically, was enjoying his highest ratings of the year when he was let go. Earlier in the year, his audience share dipped to as low as 1.1, which was more akin to Innes' most recent number.

Next up for reporting purposes is the holiday book, which is always skewed by KODA’s (99.1 FM) Christmas music juggernaut. That means it will be February or March before we get a clearer picture of the degree to which the Innes hire is succeeding, or not.



Click through the gallery to see station-by-station ratings for November 2016. KBME (790 AM) continues to struggle in the afternoon drive ratings since ousting Charlie Pallilo (right) in October for Josh Innes.

Click through the gallery to see station-by-station ratings for November 2016. KBME (790 AM) continues to struggle in the afternoon drive ratings since ousting Charlie Pallilo (right) in October for Josh Innes. Image 1 of / 50 Caption Close Sports radio: Josh Innes' show continues ratings slide 1 / 50 Back to Gallery

The December book was for Nov. 3-30, which means there was no December in the December book. Weird, indeed, but remember that the Nielsen Audio year consists of 13 four-week ratings period, with the Holiday book being the 13th.

KGOW (1560 AM) once again did not show up in the numbers for sports stations.

We start, as always, with 6 a.m. to midnight among men 25-54, the key demographic for sports radio, where KILT (610 AM) once again outdraws its three competitors combined. The number in parenthesis indicates where sports stations rank among all Houston stations.

Station Dec. Nov. Oct.

KILT (610 AM) 3.2 (13) 3.6 (T11) 3.7 (T9)

KFNC (97.5 FM) 1.6 (24) 1.7 (24) 2.2 (21)

KBME(790 AM) 0.8 (T26) 1.1 (25) 1.7(T24)

Despite a slight drop from November, KILT maintains a comfortable lead in morning drive time (6-10 a.m.).

Station Dec. Nov. Oct.

KILT 3.4 (13) 3.9 (8) 4.0 (9)

KFNC 2.0 (19) 2.0 (19) 3.5 (12)

KBME 0.8 (26) 1.3 (T23) 1.8 (T19)

KILT’s lead narrowed during December at middays (10 a.m.-3 p.m.), the most competitive daypart among the sports stations.

Station Dec. Nov. Oct.

KILT 2.7 (11) 3.6 (11) 3.3 (T10)

KFNC 1.9 (T17) 1.6 (T20) 2.3 (T17)

KBME 1.0 (26) 1.2 (23) 1.7 (24)

KBME continued its sharp decline in Innes’ second book, and KILT continues to lead in its strongest day part with a boost from the Texans.

Station Dec. Nov. Oct.

KILT 3.9 (9) 4.5 (5) 4.7 (5)

KFNC 1.8 (24) 2.4 (20) 2.6 (18)

KBME 0.9 (T27) 1.4 (26) 2.3 (22)

As usual, KILT has a big lead from 7 p.m. to midnight.

Station Dec. Nov. Oct.

KILT 3.1 (T12) 3.0 (T11) 3.1 (T13)

KFNC 0.6 (T25) 1.1 (24) 1.2 (26)

KBME 0.5 (T27) 0.4 (T26) 1.6 (T23)

Let’s turn to show-by-show rankings for the month.

Hosts Dec. Nov. Oct.

Lord/Pendergast/Johnson (2-7 p.m., KILT) 3.8 4.4 4.5

Meltser/Payne (6-10 a.m., KILT) 3.4 3.9 4.0

Gallant/Texans/NFL (7-11 p.m., KILT) 3.2 3.1 3.3

Lopez/Stoots (10 a.m – 2 p.m., KILT 2.6 3.5 3.0

Granato/Salisbury (11.m.-1 p.m., KFNC 2.2 2.0 2.5

Faour/Hoffman (4-7 p.m., KFNC) 1.7 2.7 2.7

Joel Blank (1-4 p.m., KFNC) 1.6 1.3 2.0

Granato/Ramzanali(9-11 a.m., KFNC) 1.5 1.8 2.4

Jones/Clanton (noon-3 p.m., KBME) 1.1 1.5 1.8

Koch/Kalu (10 a.m.-noon, KBME) 1.0 0.8 1.3

Josh Innes (3-7 p.m., KBME) 0.9 1.4 N/A

Zierlein/Thomas (6-10 a.m., KBME) 0.8 1.3 1.8

Charlie Pallilo (2-6 p.m., KBME) N/A N/A 2.3

* Also includes Texans programming

Strongest hours for each station, beginning with KBME, are 7-8 a.m. (1.1 share), 11 a.m.-noon (1.1) and 1-2 p.m. (1.2). On KFNC, top hours are 5-6 a.m. (5.8 share), 7-8 a.m. (3.0) and 8-9 a.m. (2.6 share). All three, it should be noted, are for ESPN Radio’s “Mike and Mike” program. The top local hour is a 2-4 share from noon-1 p.m.

KILT’s strongest hours are 7-8 a.m. (5.6 share), 5-6 p.m. (4.5) and 4-5 p.m. (3.9).

From sports, let’s turn to the general market radio leaders. As usual, KODA (99.1 FM) ranked among all stations in the December book among persons 12-plus with a 7.3 weeklong share, followed by KLTN (102.9 FM) at 6.8, KMJQ (102.1 FM) at 6.8, KGLK (107.5/106.9 FM) at 6.8, and KSBJ (89.3 FM) at 4.6.

KLTN led in morning drive at 8.6, KODA in middays at 8.3, KODA in afternoon drive at 7.7 and KMJQ at 8.8 at night. Among sports stations, KILT was at 1.7, KFNC at 0.8 and KBME at 0.6 in the all-day weeklong ratings, which shows how the sports stations lag behind general radio in this market to the degree that they do not in Dallas-Fort Worth.

In adults 18-plus, it was KODA for the seven-day lead at 7.2, KLTN in morning drive at 9.5, KODA and KLTN in middays at 8.2, KODA in afternoon drive at 7.5 and KMJQ at night at 9.1.

Leaders in adults 18-49 were KLTN at 8.7 for the week, KLTN in morning drive at 11.0, KLTN in middays at 10.6, KODA in afternoon drive at 7.0 and KBXX (97.9 FM) evenings at 9.4.

Adults 25-54 leaders were KLTN for the week at 8.7, KLTN in morning drive at 11.2, KLTN in middays at 10.8, KODA in afternoon drive at 7.1 and KMJQ at night at 8.8.

Ending where we started with men 25-54, for comparison purposes with the sports stations, KLTN led for the week at 10.9, in morning drive at 12.9, at middays with a 12.7 share, in afternoon drive at 8.7 and evenings at 10.5, a clean sweep.