R.I.P.

Tom from Hanover Park is probably greeting Les in heaven, drunk of course.

Bravo Bruce.

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Proud member of the white guy grievance committee

It aint the six minutes. Its what happens in those six minutes.

wow i remember that guy from the 90s. always use to call in. when did he pass away?

Very nice article. Some great details in there.

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not sure if les' personal benefits at the score have been revealed. he definitely qualified for medicare by age, but supplemental medicare and prescriptions can add up. if les didn't qualify for premium-free medicare, he could still get obamacare health insurance at age 69..and his wscr/audacy low wages would have certainly seen him get that for almost nothing.

he could have married his g-friend and if she works and gets insurance, he likely would have been covered by her health insurance plan.

when it comes to life insurance, i believe every company must offer a basic plan (maybe $30k or maybe 1x your yearly salary) - you must have been on payroll when you died for payout. i'm thinking les' beneficiary qualifies for this. unions will tell members who have a terminal illness not to retire/resign/quit, because life insurance policy becomes null and void, once you are off the payroll.

what i fear is that details emerge that les passed away because of this $600 or that $1,100 that wasn't spent. that's bitterly nonsensical.

from a personal point of view, i'm a cubs fan and enjoyed les the most when he was talking cubs on late summer nights. i believed football passed him by some 25 years ago. the older les got, the more he would steer conversations to be able to pontificate on something that occurred in 1972. is that a criticism? yes. i will still miss his show.

yup, i remember les hosting mike tomczak once a week/late afternoon on wls when the bears were the bears. if 1984-1989 was today, les would have been much more nationally known, due to all the talk sport stations looking to talk to a bear 'insider' - les would have talked bears with radio izvestia from the soviet union.

i still believe that chuck swirsky had a bigger chicago sport talk radio footprint, but that takes nothing from les' history. also a legend.

Grote doing a great job with the Les tribute show.

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Sherman remarked, "Well, Grant, we've had the devil's own day, haven't we?" Grant looked up. "Yes," he replied, followed by a puff. "Yes. Lick 'em tomorrow, though."

It was a good listen. Someone mentioned he had been off the air a bit and was sick - was the illness confirmed?

It is outrageous Les was considered a freelancer/contractor. Was this the entire duration of his second run, or was he an employee at some point early on?

I'm curious what he died of. I think it was Bruce I heard saying people close to him were urging him to see a doctor and he didn't go.

Yes

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Feder with a great summary of comments and tributes to Les from his post yesterday morning. Lots of comments from WLS and WLUP radio folks, some TV people as well.

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

When I was just out of school, I was working on a campaign doing some research on opponent ad buys. I was at whatever station Les was working for at the time. The secretary obviously didn't care and gave me access to files well beyond what I was looking for. I was looking through one file and what do you know but there was a copy of Les contract. Nothing exotic and very boilerplate. I think I recall he was making 50K. This was pre 2000s so not bad.

He might have still been making that at the end.

I know all the talk about it being a dying medium but Parkins said the station was still making eight figures of profit. It's immoral that a full time host, employed for over a decade was being paid per shift wages. Where is the union?

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O judgment! Thou art fled to brutish beasts,
And men have lost their reason.

Rongey commented how Les would watch his food in the microwave cooking go round and around.

Les' producer said he got a morning text from Les that he'd be returning to work the night he died.

I-80 Frank who called in a couple times is a member of Les' "wack pack". He and Les got into a big Cutler/McMahon argument recently where Les called him an idiot on-air.

Les probably had something like a heart condition that needed attention and he could of lived well into his 80s.

Sorry for your loss

Bernstein keeps saying that Les's "real legacy" will be the number of young producers he helped break into the local radio scene.

I really don't think he understands who Les was--or his broader significance within the history of Chicago radio.

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Tom Shaer had a comment about how the BBWAA was shutting radio reporters out of press boxes and Les successfully lobbied to let radio people in. But no, I think his real legacy is Adam Harris.

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If Parkins isn't lying about the profit it's beyond embarrassing that they pushed a Go Fund Me. The station that started as Fans Talking to Fans is now Fuck You Peasants. Nice dose of thoughts and prayers for your troubles when longtime employees die.

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

I'm sure that Audacy was thrilled with Parkins offering that they're making 8 figures of profit. I never had a chance to listen to overnights, what kind of commercials were running during Les's show?

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"I give you my word as a Biden"

daamaneel agrees

i tuned in late last week..i believe wednesday & thursday and amy lawrence/cbs radio was on the air. hmmmm...i figured les was on vacation.

i heard he passed away yesterday morning and can't remember who said on the air that les had 'called in sick' late last week.

thought bernstein was fantastic talking about les today, during transition. bernstein took me back to the mid 90s, when he was an obvious up and coming wscr star.

no woke nonsense. dan was great this transition. hit the nail on the head about les.

No, it's not immoral at all.

Les worked for a rate he agreed to.

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Proud member of the white guy grievance committee

It aint the six minutes. Its what happens in those six minutes.

We should be honest at least and admit Les hasn't been relevant for a long time. He had to eat a lot of shit to be on the air. So he made the choice to eat shit.

Didn't Les used to do his own play-by-play for events he covered and use his own broadcast tape recording sound bytes during his sports updates the next day?

Or was that someone else?

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You know me like that.

Does Les' willingness to work at the Score mean that the Score wasn't also mistreating him or acting immorally?

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They had a fiduciary duty to kill Les.

Launched Larry's career apparently. Some nice stories in the article.

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

I was only half-listening but I thought I heard Parkins say that Johnny B was going to be on today to talk about Les.

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“Mr. Trump is unfit for our nation’s highest office.”- JD Vance
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