Will be dead soon. Does that mean that WGN will also die?

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Be well

GO BEARS!!!

If you ask most old people, WGN died the day Bob Collins crashed his plane. Or when Paul Harvey retired. Or if you ask my grandma, it was when Kathy & Judy got fired.

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I expect WGN to essentially become a round-the-clock news operation. I have no idea what they'll do in prime time. Two and a Half Men reruns?

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I think that WGN will rebuild a minor sports presence after they successfully lay off all their current people. I could see them partnering with a Learfield and brokering some low cost times for a weekend college basketball series, and maybe pick up some Fire road games.

I think they could actually do a pretty decent competitor to Chicago Tonight in the 7-9pm slot. Maybe a little more long form like the old 70s shows like Common Ground and Tilmon Tempo, something that would lend itself to podcast downloads and revenue.

But what I'm more curious about is when WBBM TV is just going to give up and fire their entire local news crew and stop having newscasts. They barely crack a 0.3, they are a joke. Partner with some ethnic radio stations and do some weekend public affairs programs, simulcast an hour of 780 from 6-7am with a screensaver, and call it a day.

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"When people want their version of the truth, they go find it, no matter how baseless their beliefs." -- Ken Rosenthal

They tried to give up on producing a morning newscast. It involved Mike North.

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When I was In high school I really enjoyed the lineup of Kap/Waddle, Milt, and then Nick Digilio.

Learned a lot from Milt

None of this will happen.

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I hope not.

But it will probly turn into another WB, except with more news.

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As long as WGN has Pat Tomasulo in the fold, don't count WGN out, that guy has talent.
Maybe they just run a nightly comedy/variety show with Pat and Wink Winkle as hosts,
I'm giggling now just thinking of the endless possibilities for hilarity....

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Blackhawk goal, scored by number 20, Al Secord.

Isn't their morning news the top rated in the market? The station will still be around. They were just bought by a large media group.

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Why are only 14 percent of black CPS 11th-graders proficient in English?

It's kinda sad. Hopefully the Sox and Cubs can find a way to let WGN air a couple dozen games next year. The Yankees and Mets both have their own networks, but still air 20 or so games a piece on regular TV each season.

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The Cubs are plenty charitable, but I'd say bestowing gifts on for-profit terrestrial television stations should not be one of their causes.

WGN had plenty of chances to keep the Cubs on WGN 720 and they had plenty of chances to keep more games on WGN9. How do you think ABC-7 got the rights to broadcast some games? WGN didn't want them.

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Rick Hahn is the best GM in baseball.

Terrible thought.

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WGN got rid of their CW affiliation a few years ago because they wanted to stop having conflicts with sporting events.

Now they don't have to worry about sports anymore.

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I wouldn't say your thought was that terrible, you just have a bit of nostalgia for sports on WGN.

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Rick Hahn is the best GM in baseball.

Used to race home from grade school to catch the last few innings on WGN TV back in the day. We all would emulate the batting stances of our favorite players, had the lineups of most NL teams memorized. Wonder if there would be the love for the Cubs if we did not get to watch it all for free on WGN? Are the teams sacrificing future audience for current profits or did we just have nothing else to watch/do back in the day? Was a different era, had to wait for Uncle Bobby's news guy to read the school closing list to see if you had a snow day, now kids just refresh phones to see if they have an off day.

Cubs should have taken less money to play for WGN.

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You do not talk to me like that! I work too hard to deal with this stuff! I work too hard! I'm an important member of the CSFMB! I drive a Dodge Stratus!

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That, and I recognize the fact that being broadcast on WGN for nearly 70 years is the single biggest reason the Cubs are as big as they are today. It's certainly not their long history of winning. To spurn WGN airing (or even simulcasting) a handful of games - "charity"- is awful. But since your baseball posts are awful, its not surprising that you would support such a move.

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Are you trying to intimidate me?

You have to think that there will be a decline in the popularity of sports with the younger generations and that there will be a bubble that will burst at some point.

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God is the uncaused cause of the universe. He had no beginning and has no end. He is not bound by the laws of the universe he created.

I think I'm younger than you but this is similar to the way I remember it. I was a Cubs fan first because of WGN.

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Be well

GO BEARS!!!

It will just be consumed differently.

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Be well

GO BEARS!!!

Tomorrow will be a very sad day for me, on so many levels. I’ll be in the truck as WGN does their last telecast of a Cubs game. It’s not nostalgia for me. It goes much deeper than that. I’ve been in television for over 35 years, and the fact that I’ll be there as we turn off the cameras is simply bittersweet. I’ve only had the privilege of working with them over the last 4 or 5 years, but as a freelancer they have been so important to me. The very reason I’m there in the first place is because of Arnie Harris. I saw a picture of him in the old Chicago Daily News TV Mailbag column…sitting in a TV truck circa 1972. I knew right away that that was where the action was.

The men and women I’ve worked with on these productions are genuinely talented and proud of their work. WGN treated their freelance hires with dignity, respect and genuine appreciativeness for our efforts. They’ve paid us a very good wage. They’ve been the Bailey Building and Loan that gave me a chance against Mr. Potter.

But that all ends tomorrow (and for the Sox, next Saturday).

Enjoy the homogenization of all things NBCSports has to offer. We’re losing an independent lens at a time when the concentration of power, commerce and ideas will eventually throttle creativity.

We’ve gotten used to Walmart replacing the local store, I’m sure we’ll get used to this as well.

It still sucks.

I think it took a few years of YES exclusivity, including a first year where they struggled with cable carriage due to fucking over MSG, which was owned by the predominant cable company in the market (does any of this sound familiar?), for the Yankees to get back on WPIX a dozen times a year or whatever.

But I don't see the Cubs ever going back to WGN. Maybe the better play all along would have been for the Rickettses to buy channel 9 and keep the Cubs parked there, maybe even do the impossible and figure out how to do something with the superstation feed that people might actually want to watch for once. I think they're making a terrible mistake with this channel considering the primacy of Comcast and the lack of year-round programming. The best-case scenario for "Marquee" (which I prefer to envision as the first cable channel entirely dedicated to journeyman fifth starter Jason Marquis) is that Sinclair essentially runs it as Fox Sports Net Chicago and rounds it out with whatever sort of off-brand college packages the FSN RSNs carry nationally, whatever those even are anymore. Worst case, it's Cubs Public Access with the Ron Santo documentary, repeats of the time Kerry Wood struck out 20, and Ryan Dempster's Def Comedy Jam. Either way, whatever they charge cable companies to carry it will be too much.

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Be well

GO BEARS!!!

Well said. it does suck. This is why I hated Ricketts from Day 1. You knew he was gonna bring in a buncha shit to destroy all our traditions. Day baseball during the week gone. Ads all over the ballpark. Destroying WGN. Longtime Cub employees fired.

Is this really the last telecast tomorrow? Fuck, I'll have to record it.

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It would seem that there would be increased pressure to put out a quality product as it would be easy to drop Cubs network if team sucks or in winter when there are no games. Would replaying old games with features like, "Shopping with Kris Bryant", be enough for people to fork over dollars each month if team is 10 games out in mid July? Many of us became fans as kids simply because games were free on WGN and there really wasn't much else to watch on weekday afternoons. Harry Carey was a bigger star than many of the players back in the day. There is a risk of losing the opportunity to develop future clients by making your product less accessible to the general public. This seems to be a definite gamble for the Cubs and MLB given the declining attendance numbers.

Like MANY over 50 here, I will miss the rich sports legacy of WGN as well.

Great memories as a yoot watching Cubs in about the 7th inning after school.

I seem to recall a lot of the Blackhawks' games on WGN as well - way before the dismal PPV Sports Channel thing.

Maybe they could bring back Andy Griffith to fill in the void?

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"This is Chicago, my friend. Anything can happen."

This will also suck for those of us who do not have cable and are too cheap to pay for a streaming service. I'll have to see how it goes next season and then make a choice as to whether or not the streaming service is worth it. For those of you who stream, who is the best provider to pick up NBC Sports Chicago?