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SportsMap Radio Network Adds Greg Frank

“Frank’s role with the network will include a mixture of on-air and behind the scenes work.”

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The SportsMap Radio Network is adding a new voice. Greg Frank has relocated to Houston to join the Gow Media brand, working for network boss Craig Larson. He’s expected to make his on-air debut on Wednesday night November 24th (8p-10p).

Frank joins SportsMap after nearly four years at Wild 102 in Roseau, Minnesota. The Philly native and Temple University graduate started his career in the city of brotherly love, interning for 97.5 The Fanatic and working on the promotions team for CBS Radio Philadelphia. He then accepted part-time roles with Fox Sports 920 in Trenton and ESPN 97.3 in Atlantic City before moving to Minnesota to pursue full time on-air work. He’s also contributed to Blue Wire’s sports gambling podcasts, and written for sports gambling sites BettorsInsider.com and BettingPredators.com.

Frank’s role with the network will include a mixture of on-air and behind the scenes work. He’ll be heard on Thanksgiving Day (10p-1a ET), Black Friday 11/26 (4p-6p ET) and during different points in December before settling into a regular weekend hosting role in mid January. Frank is part of the BSM Member Directory and learned of the opportunity thru his membership.

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Greg Hill Oversleeps, Late to WEEI Morning Drive Show

“I wish I had a great excuse.”

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Greg Hill
Courtesy: Audacy

As WEEI began its slate of prime-hour programming on Tuesday morning with The Greg Hill Show, co-hosts Jermaine Wiggins and Courtney Cox were seated in the studio ready for the program. Conspicuously absent, however, was Greg Hill, who was nowhere to be found during the first segment of the show in discussing the University of Connecticut taking home its second consecutive NCAA Division I Men’s National Championship. Rather than sitting behind the glass, show producer Chris Curtis took the hosting chair and participated in the discussion with Wiggins and Cox instead.

Following a commercial break, the discussion continued surrounding UConn, specifically discussing their head coach Dan Hurley and whether or not he would remain with the university. In the middle of the conversation, Hill walked into the studio and took his position to explain what happened and why he was late.

“I wish I had a great excuse,” Hill said. “I watched the game, fell asleep, [and] I put my alarm on – I don’t know. Do you go through this when your alarm doesn’t go off; you can’t remember. Like I don’t remember whether I hit ‘Snooze’ or whether I awoke or not.”

In response, Wiggins assumed that Hill had probably hit the snooze button on the alarm. Hill also shared that he watched the National Championship Game between UConn and Purdue, which aired on TBS, TNT and truTV on Tuesday night. The problem expressed by Hill and other viewers on the East Coast, however, pertained to the scheduling of such a matchup.

“It would be helpful if the game started at a reasonable time,” Hill said, citing the 9:20 p.m. EST tip-off time for the National Championship Game. The contest took place from State Farm Stadium in Glendale, Ariz., which is currently in Mountain Standard Time (MST). Courtney Cox sent a message to Hill this morning and thought upon seeing the text that he had to get up and go to work.

“Well remember, Greg, you have your days,” Wiggins said. “You must have a ton saved up of coming-in-late days that Ken [Laird] gave you.”

The show then moved back to its discussion on UConn and Hill decided to check the Twitch chat and text line. One message he received from a listener castigated him for still needing an alarm to wake up, imploring him to grow up. Hill then revealed that he stayed inside during the total solar eclipse because he did not care about it and stated that people have “real problems” if they drove to see it and found themselves in a traffic jam on the way back home.

“By some reports, there are hundreds of cases of people calling into their medical providers in the hours and moments after the eclipse to talk about how their eyes are killing them; their eyes are burning,” Hill said. “Did those people miss the announcement about not staring directly into the eclipse?”

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Seth Payne: ‘Now I Remember Why I Got So Annoyed’ with Rich Eisen

“And Nick Caserio, I’m not wondering what the hell you’re doing anymore or thinking.”

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Photo of Seth Payne and Sean Pendergast
Courtesy: Audacy

SportsRadio 610 in Houston hosts Seth Payne and Sean Pendergast talked about a social media exchange Pendergast had with NFL Network host Rich Eisen recently. Eisen was on vacation but replied to a re-post of an X post he put out about the Houston Texans. Payne and Pendergast wanted to let Eisen know they had not forgotten his previous comments about Texans General Manager Nick Caserio.

Pendergast explained, “Rich Eisen, NFL Network, he has his own radio show. We have had some fun with Rich Eisen on this show, based on his reaction to the pick of Davis Mills back in 2021.”

The hosts then played the clip of the actual draft announcement back in 2021 which was the 67th pick. The Texans selected the former Stanford quarterback and Rich Eisen could not believe what he had heard.

“So now what’s up with that,” he said on NFL Network’s draft coverage at the time. “What’s up with the Texans not having any choices in the first and second round and then when they finally get one, they choose a quarterback? “What is up with that? I cannot stress this question enough, ‘what is up with that?’ Hold on, let me go ahead and put another accent on another one of the words. WHAT is up with that?”

As the clip ended, Payne was taken back to that time and said, “It was the way he tripled and quadrupled down on it that annoyed me at the time. Now I remember why I got so annoyed.”

The two hosts discussed what was happening at the time with the Texans and that nobody was sure what would happen with their then quarterback, Deshaun Watson. Reports had surfaced about sexual misconduct allegations and Payne thought Eisen should have been more aware of that and also talked about the way the NFL Network was initially handling that story.

“…The NFL Network, they followed a…strategy of just trying to ignore that the DeShaun Watson situation even existed.”

Back to recent events, Pendergast lays out the post Eisen made where he said last week, “In trading their 1st rounder to Minnesota, moving down only 19 picks to the 2nd round, the Houston Texans also acquired a 2nd rounder in 2025 that they just flipped to get Stefon Diggs,” Eisen wrote. “And they ALSO got two 6s this year and a 5th next year in both trades.”

As Pendergast explains, “So, Rich Eisen…lays it all out in a tweet about how awesome the two trades were together and puts a GIF of a conductor, emphatically, energetically conducting the symphony as if to say this is Nick Caserio now…he has conducted a symphony of an offseason.”

Now, Pendergast gets around to why he had brought this up on the show, which was that Eisen spent time on The Rich Eisen show Monday talking about his post and the reply.

“So, that whole thing happened,” Pendergast said. “Come yesterday he gets back from vacation, Rich Eisen, and what did this whole ordeal yield? A very nice segment about the Houston Texans in which he acknowledged a radio host from Houston.”

“Let me just say something about the Houston Texans,” Eisen began. “I got some crap from a radio host in Houston…another thing I couldn’t resist replying to on vacation. I had forgotten this moment. Draft moments they come and they go for me…All I do is sit there and have natural reactions to what I think the fans are thinking…”

Eisen went on to explain that when he made his comments in 2021, NFL Network draft analyst Daniel Jeremiah explained the situation and that Watson would probably not be the quarterback of the Texans much longer.

Payne added, “I think the majority of Texans fans did say the same thing as Rich Eisen.”

Eisen continued on this show Monday saying he believes the Texans are the favorite to win their division and added people should be talking about the Texans and the Chiefs together with the young talent each team has.

He then ended with, “And Nick Caserio, I’m not wondering what the hell you’re doing anymore or thinking.”

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Ken Carman: Men’s College Basketball Had Me ‘Bored to Tears’

“I do sit there and think – I go, ‘If I didn’t watch these games; if I didn’t watch the tournament games [or] if I didn’t watch Ohio State, would anybody really care?'”

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Ken Carman
Courtesy: The University of Akron School of Communication

The NCAA Division I Women’s Basketball National Championship Game between the Iowa Hawkeyes and South Carolina Gamecocks averaged 18.7 million viewers on ABC and ESPN, establishing a new viewership record for women’s college basketball. Additionally, the game accounted for the most-watched basketball matchup – women’s or men’s, college or pro – since 2019 and peaked at 24 million viewers, according to data from Nielsen Fast Nationals. On Tuesday’s edition of The Ken Carman Show with Anthony Lima, the show began one of its early segments discussing the significance of the viewership milestone and the interest surrounding women’s college basketball throughout the season.

Carman, who used to call play-by-play of games, explained that he had not been this locked into women’s college basketball games ever throughout his life. While he has awareness regarding various different sports as a morning show co-host of 92.3 The Fan, he evinced that some of his predilections are beginning to change. In fact, he explained that watching men’s college basketball this year felt like a chore, only deeming Akron and Ohio State as appointment viewing for various reasons.

“I do sit there and think – I go, ‘If I didn’t watch these games; if I didn’t watch the tournament games [or] if I didn’t watch Ohio State, would anybody really care?,’” Carman explained. “Would anybody go, ‘Ken, you’re not doing your job?’ I want to know.”

Co-host Anthony Lima replied that the program is broadcasting in a locale that differs from areas within the Big East Conference or in the Carolinas where college basketball is heavily scrutinized and consistently discussed. Furthermore, he reminded Carman of the time they listened to a morning radio show in Indianapolis the day after an Indianapolis Colts game and that the beginning of the show pertained to college basketball.

“This is still mostly football, and college football is still very big here obviously, and when Ohio State basketball [is] humming, it goes,” Lima said. “When Cleveland State is a great story or Kent State is a great story or Akron is a great story, that does happen, but that’s a sliver of time.”

When the Cleveland Browns season ends, Carman does not look forward to the times where the team is conducting a coaching search. Although there is plenty of discussion surrounding the Browns in the offseason on 92.3 The Fan, the station discusses several other topics including the Cleveland Cavaliers, Cleveland Guardians and local college sports. Carman is generally able to extrapolate storylines within the larger context of a given sport and discuss it on the radio program, but there was a stark dichotomy in that mission this year pertaining to college basketball.

“I sat and watched and [turned] on Saturday ESPN basketball,” Carman said. “I did not want to do it this year – I hated doing it this year and because I’m bored to tears – I had no story. Caitlin Clark; Angel Reese; Dawn Staley. Stories – it being in Cleveland, stories just falling out of the sky right into your laps.”

Lima was curious to discover why Carman was feeling this way when ratings for both the women’s and men’s NCAA tournament games increased year-over-year. In response, Carman felt that gambling could be a reason behind the rise, especially since many sports fans fill out brackets ahead of tournament play. Lima, however, shared that it is difficult to distinguish which sports are receiving ratings windfalls because of this activity. As Clark and Reese prepare to join the WNBA though, Carman knows that he will be watching the action.

“Say what you will – that WNBA Draft is on [April 15],” Carman outlined. “I don’t know when the season starts. I’m going to find out because I’m going to see Caitlin Clark and Angel Reese play, I can guaran-damn-tee you that.”

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