No more Mount Rushmores... please!

[Jon Chelesnik]

Please -- no more "who do you put on the local Mount Rushmore of sports" on your local radio show. Its tired, boring, uncreative and lazy. Be better than that.

[AaronOster]

What's the Mt Rushmore of overdone show segments?

[Jon Chelesnik]

Ooohhh....good topic. I'll start it:

* The Mount Rushmore of local sports
* Best and worst sports movies
* (At Thanksgiving) What are you thankful for?
* What three people would you want at your Thanksgiving table
* Holiday gifts for famous sports personalities
* The craziest athlete names of all-time. (ex: Coco Crisp -- hahaha. Hello... Is this mic on?)
* Best nicknames
* Best/worst athletes-turned-actors

Generally, any kind of list-making is horrible radio.

[garjedi85]

I agree with the point Jon 1000% from a show of ability standpoint, but lets be clear about something, people, especially millennials LOVE lists. It fits in well with our google smart phone fast paced culture so while it is lazy and uncreative it is something people gravitate to. Linkedin articles are a perfect example of this; how many of them are "5 ways to increase brand awareness" or "10 tips for hiring great people?"

[Tyking]

Oooh, oooh, weekly NFL picks! Those are just the *best*.

[Jon Chelesnik]

Agree 100%. Everyone does 'em but it is almost always a boring segment. I don't gamble or play fantasy football, though, so perhaps my judgement is clouded.

When I was at ESPN Radio, instead of picks we did Pick 6. Listeners could submit six winners, straight up. Sounds easy but no more than two or three folks from a national radio audience were ever able to do it.

[JohnGregory]

I have to disagree with you on lists as bad radio, Jon. If done infrequently, they can work very well. Especially when it comes to filling up the phone lines with callers who disagree with certain picks. That's also helpful for getting lots of callers on one specific topic-that keeps the show focused and moving forward. Nothing makes me switch stations faster than a caller who hijacks the conversation. Stop them from doing that with a focused discussion(like a list), you've got me for a whole segment, and there's some quality TSL for your ratings.

I do agree that the examples given have been done to death.

[Jon Chelesnik]

You are right -- some listeners are passionate about some lists. The problem is it is usually a narrow segment of your audience. Hard core fans will listen to sports radio no matter who is on or what they are talking about. You don't get paid by appealing only to them. You build ratings and get paid when you entice casual and the non-sports fan to listen.

Asking callers for their top 5 quarterbacks or best baseball teams of all-time is lazy, boring radio. Lists like this are tired and overdone. Great hosts give their listeners something they can't get anywhere else.

[VLavalle]

You know, with Father's Day just passed, here's a topic I'm quite sure no one has touched on:

NBA stars coping with adversity: then and now. Believe me, I could go on for at least 10 minutes with monologue about this.

[PhilGiubileo]

Speaking of the NBA, Father's Day and Mt. Rushmore's... How about a Mt. Rushmore of Shawn Kemp's favorite children? If you want to add in the NFL, you could do the same w/Antonio Cromartie's kids...

Jokes aside--I'm w/Jon--not a big an of these types of topic fillers...

[pbpisfun]

NBC/Pro Football Talk guru Mike Florio is doing a Mt. Rushmore for every NFL franchise right now on his site/Twitter. Dragging it out for a number of weeks.

[JimRiley]

The sports versions simply address the four greatest figures in a franchise, which is not the same as Mount Rushmore. George, Abe, Tom and TR were just choices of the designer. Old West personalities were the original plans.

And is the "Sportscasters Mount Rushmore" thread still accessible?

[Jon Chelesnik]

In Dan Sileo's RadioInk article about why callers are bad for sports talk radio, he writes, "If your host has great content and can carry segment to segment, you will not need a host who trolls for calls or asks, "What is your favorite sports movie?"

Again, lists are for lazy hosts. Here is the Sileo article: http://www.radioink.com/Article.asp?id= ... spid=24698

[YoungDuck]

Say what you will-I find them entertaining. Especially highly relevant/seasonal/Holiday-related ones. I'm a cheese-ball in some ways but I am what I am.

[Duff007]

Jon,
What we need are good conversations with the people who are actually playing the sports that people are talking about. Here in Detroit, all I hear is the same stuff over and over that is meant to get people to call in with their two cents. First off, Detroit fans are fair-weather gripers. Second, who cares what they think? I want to hear from the players, coaches and front office guys. If I want to hear guys talking about their Top 10 lists, I'll stay up for Letterman.