Courtesy St. Louis Post Dispatch

(August 20, 2010) Big League Broadcasting no longer is in the St. Louis sports-talk radio business, as the sale of KFNS (590 AM) to Grand Slam Sports has been approved by the Federal Communications Commission, all but ending a costly and rocky ride locally for the Atlanta-based company.

Grand Slam president Dave Greene, whose company had been operating the station under a lease arrangement, said the station was bought for $1.4 million. That means Big League will end up with about $9 million less than it paid six years ago in its investment in St. Louis sports-talk radio. When it entered the market in 2004, it purchased KFNS and its FM outlet (100.7) as well as KRFT (1190 AM) for what is believed to be about $11.5 million. In the ensuing years it sold the latter two stations for a combined total of approximately $1 million.

But during BLB's local tenure, the economy had a major downswing and media — especially radio — was hit hard.

"There were a lot of things out of our control," Big League President Andrew Saltzman said. "We did a lot of things right, we learned an awful lot. We know St. Louis is a great sports town, we have no regrets."

Grand Slam also has purchased the joesportsfanstl.com sports-humor website and will work in conjunction with founders Josh Bacott and Matt Sebek, and is nearing the completion of purchasing KSLG (1380 AM), a sports station it already is operating.

Big League's local business isn't quite finished. Kevin Slaten's wrongful termination suit is set to be heard Sept. 13, although indications are a settlement might be reached beforehand.

blog comments powered by Disqus