Station Hires Stacy Taylor to Compete With Hedgecock

Finally acknowledging that it had to do something to shake up its moribund lineup, KFMB-AM (760) has hired former KSDO talk host Stacy Taylor to do ratings battle with KSDO and its top draw, Roger Hedgecock.

Reached in Chicago, where he has been working for the past 2 1/2 years, Taylor was ready to throw down the gauntlet to his ex-employers.

“I don’t get any special pleasure from going against Roger, but I do get special pleasure from competing against KSDO and their heavy hitter,” Taylor said. “I didn’t like the way they dealt with me there, frankly.”

Taylor will take over the 10 a.m. to 2:30 p.m. shift, replacing the five-year-old “Clark and Cavitt Show,” featuring Clark Anthony and Geni Cavitt, who will stay with the station to fulfill other assignments. Taylor is scheduled to start Dec. 19.

In a station press release, Anthony is described as “one of San Diego’s most well-known personalities for nearly 20 years,” which isn’t in the same league as Cavitt, who is labeled “one of San Diego’s most-loved personalities.”

Together, “well known” and “most loved” made for one of the most boring radio shows in San Diego. Oldies music was occasionally tossed into the show, apparently to kill time between light and friendly conversations between Anthony and Cavitt.

With Taylor following “Hudson and Bauer” in the morning and preceding Mark Larson’s show, the station will follow a more traditional news-talk format, putting them into direct competition with KSDO, a perennial ratings leader. KFMB-AM does well during Padres season, but its ratings are mediocre at best in the off-season, and, despite cutbacks earlier in the year, the station clearly felt it needed to break open the piggy bank to get Taylor.

KFMB-AM program director Larson said Taylor, who was known as something of a conservative ranter during his stint at KSDO, will do a different type of show than Hedgecock. Taylor’s will be more than just politics, Larson said.

“Stacy is the kind of guy who can talk to the Rotary Club one day and then (talk about) dirt biking the next day,” Larson said.

Taylor left KSDO in a swirl of miscommunication and misunderstanding. He said he wanted to stay, and station executives said they wanted to keep him, but it didn’t work out. More recently, he talked to KSDO about returning, but Taylor was again unable to reach an understanding with the station.

“Everything they did wasn’t right,” Taylor said. “They had a chance to keep me and they didn’t. They had a chance to get me back and they didn’t.”

KSDO general manager Mike Shields said Taylor “was more interested in talking to us than we were in talking to him” and that KSDO didn’t have an opening for him.

Taylor said he hoped to focus his new show on a wide variety of topics, including his satirical bits.

“Talk radio is not just for political junkies anymore,” he said.

Not all is sunny at KJQY-FM (Sunny 103). A few weeks ago, overnight disc jockey Joe Cox was fired after a fistfight with program director Jere Sullivan. The next day, morning guy Kenny Noble was gone, after he reportedly refused Sullivan’s order to eliminate metaphors and analogies from his act.

Now Sullivan is out. He’ll be replaced today by industry veteran Kurt Kelley, most recently of KHMX-FM in Houston.

According to station general manager Mike Kenney, Kelley was recruited because Sullivan had expressed a desire to find a job closer to his daughter’s home in Florida, and there is no relationship to other events at the station.

Meanwhile, Noble has hired local attorney Sebastian D’Amico to help him pursue legal action against the station. Hired in August, 1990, Noble still had nine months remaining on his two-year contract, which he wants the station to honor.

“Instead of buying out my contract, they’re using the metaphor and analogy thing as an excuse to get me out without paying me,” said Noble, who was hired by previous management and is now working part time at KOST-FM in Los Angeles.

Kenney counters: “You can’t work somewhere and refuse to follow the guidelines of management.”

In one sense, all this could not have happened at a worse time, considering that Sunny’s main competition, KYXY-FM (96.5), recently hired a high-profile morning team, which it is heavily promoting.

“The timing is not great” for this type of turnover, “but it’s never a good time,” Kenney said.

Tough economic times prompted a major shake-up at XTRA last Friday. At least seven positions were eliminated. FM (91X) general manager Mike Glickenhaus has been given the title of station manager, and will now focus on sales, while Tom McKinley, who formerly ran the AM side, among other duties, will now oversee both the AM (690) and FM. Ironic twist: McKinley’s wife, national sales manager Nancy McKinley, was one of the employees laid off. . . . Jeff Prescott and Gabriel Wisdom have reunited to do offbeat news segments for XTRA-FM (91X), but don’t call them the News Brothers. KGB-FM (101.5) has threatened anybody who will listen with legal action if the duo uses the name. KGB recently canceled the long-running News Brothers feature, which for many years featured Wisdom and Prescott. So Wisdom and Prescott are calling themselves the News Ballerinas, the News Buddhas, the News Bras--everything but the News Brothers. . . .

The sale of KRMX-FM (94.9) has finally been finalized. Anaheim Broadcasting took over late Thursday afternoon. General manager Bob Visotcky is out, but, for now, the format remains unchanged. Rick Shaw, from Anaheim’s Riverside album-oriented rock station, KCAL, is the acting program director . . . .

Why San Diego television sports coverage drives us crazy, Reason No. 12,876: Last Thursday, KFMB-TV (Channel 8) professional sports reporter Curt Sandoval did a feature on Chargers rookie Eric Bieniemy, focusing on the fact that Bieniemy hasn’t played this year, without bothering to ask a coach--any coach--why Bieniemy hasn’t played. . . .

In what may be a sign that KUSI-TV (Channel 51) is ready to improve its news product, in the last week the station has hired a new news director, Paul Beavers, who spent 23 years with NBC; a new executive producer, Jim Valentine, most recently of KDFW-TV in Ft. Worth; and a new art director, Steve Bangos, most recently of G & G Communications. The executive producer and art director spots are newly created positions; Beavers replaces long-departed Pete Jacobus. . . .

Changes continue at KCBQ. John Q. Lawrence, who did news reports, is out. Former AM operations director Liz Medina has moved into the overnight disc jockey slot.