Jim Moore: What’s behind Seattle’s recent sports radio shakeup? Here’s what you don’t know
Last week 710 ESPN Seattle shook up its sports talk show lineup for the second time in 10 months with the dismissals of Danny O’Neil and Paul Gallant, who co-hosted the station’s morning show “Danny and Gallant.”
I guess that was a cost-cutting and going-in-a-different-direction move, combined with the hope that the return of Mike Salk will spark 710’s sagging ratings.
Salk co-hosted 710’s original morning show, “Brock and Salk,” with Brock Huard when the station launched the sports talk format in 2009. Salk left for his hometown of Boston to co-host a sports talk show there and came back to Seattle in 2014 when he was hired as 710 ESPN Seattle’s program director.
Since that time he has co-hosted a weekly podcast with Huard and remained the program director until three months ago, when Kyle Brown took over those duties as Salk took some time off to prepare for his return to the airwaves this month.
Full disclosure before I go any further: I was a host at 710 ESPN Seattle for 10 years before I got fired by Salk last November. I used to joke with him that he would fire me someday, and to be honest, I wasn’t really joking, I pretty much figured it would happen after my former head boss, Dave Pridemore, was fired during the summer of 2020.
Pridemore was one of my biggest supporters, and Salk was not. He never thought much of me as a host, and that’s fine. If I didn’t realize it already as a columnist, it was reinforced as a sports talk show host — you can’t please everyone. Some program directors and listeners might think you’re great while others think you’re the absolute worst.
When he returned from his rough stint in Boston, I went into his office and told him I felt bad for him and while fishing for words, I said that it probably wouldn’t have gone well for me in Boston, either.
“Let’s face it, Jim, you’d suck anywhere but Seattle,” Salk said.
I wasn’t sure how to respond to that. It sounded like something you’d say behind someone’s back, not to his face, and in a weird way I kind of respected him for it.
All I could come up with was:
“That’s not very nice, Mike.”
And he said: “But it’s true, isn’t it?
On the day I was fired I wish I had told him that I lasted 10 years in my hometown, and he only made it one in his, but I didn’t.
From that day forward we had a chilly relationship and I knew I’d be on shaky ground if layoffs were considered. When it happened, I wasn’t completely surprised as the oldest guy on a three-person show. With advertising revenue down dramatically during the pandemic, it made sense to go with a two-person show and lose one of the salaries.
If you’ve been fired or laid off, you know how it goes most of the time. You go through all of those emotional stages before you come out the other side and think: “Hey, it turns out it was a blessing in disguise.”
That’s certainly been the case for me. My wife and I have not entirely figured out the financial ramifications, particularly with twins who will be going to college next year, but I’ve really enjoyed spending time with my kids and going to all of their basketball and baseball games, which wasn’t possible when I had a job.
It took me back to the day I was fired when I heard the news about O’Neil and Gallant. I used to work with O’Neil on an afternoon show called “Danny, Dave and Moore,” so this is an admittedly biased opinion: I think 710 should have figured out a way to keep him since he’s a terrific host who offers a nice blend of insight and humor.
Gallant was up against the odds from the very start when he arrived from Houston two years ago. New guy in town trying to get up to speed with the new teams and trying to build rapport with O’Neil through a flat screen since Danny was doing the show remotely from Manhattan.
Here’s the worst part: Three months ago all the hosts were told that Salk would return to the lineup in August or September. So during the summer most of the hosts were justifiably concerned about their job status, wondering if they’d be dusted when Salk came back.
They figured correctly that somebody would have to go, and it turned out to be two somebodies. Firings happen all the time in sports radio, but these were different. The hosts were put on notice that they were essentially playing for their jobs while Salk was in the on-deck circle.
I would have rather not known what was going on behind the scenes than to be on pins and needles as Gallant described it in a social media video. Just tell me I’m fired without putting me in stressful limbo for three months.
The other part that’s interesting and inaccurate, in my opinion: Since Salk technically gave up his program director job title three months ago, it’s believed that he had no say in the decision to fire O’Neil and Gallant. I don’t buy that for a minute. Brown’s and Salk’s boss, Cathy Cangiano, deferred to Salk all the time when I was there, and I’m guessing he had a lot of input with the decision to pink slip O’Neil and Gallant.
Since he’s replacing them with the debut of “The Mike Salk Show” on Tuesday, it wouldn’t look very good if he were even perceived as the least bit responsible for the firings.
I’m not a fan of his know-it-all jackhammer style, but Salk is considered to be a good host who offers strong opinions. Whether you like him or not, he has a big following that’s certain to boost the ratings. Then again, as one skeptic noted on Twitter, the ratings are bound to go up in the fall when the Seahawks’ season starts, no matter who’s hosting the shows.
For the longest time 710 ESPN Seattle held a ratings advantage over KJR, the other sports talk station in Seattle. Not so much anymore. Salk’s return is designed to help in that regard.
Morale is said to be at an all-time low at 710, but at least all the uncertainty has been replaced by a sure thing — if the station sinks or swims, Mike Salk will get the credit or the blame.
Jim Moore has covered Washington’s sports scene from every angle for multiple news outlets. You can find him on Twitter @cougsgo.