The Beast : Baseball, Football and Radio

So much on the the brain right now regarding baseball, football and the state of radio in South Florida. Let’s dive right in.

Miami baseball. What a weekend. The one thing this team needed was to find a way to sweep North Carolina and that’s exactly what happened. What a tall task to beat up on the No. 3 team in the nation and again, I’ll bring it back to defense. When the Canes don’t make defensive mistakes, they tend to win. UM had only four errors this past weekend while the Tar Heels recorded seven.

Pitching is also the name of the game and the six perfect innings of relief provided Saturday by closer E.J. Encinosa might wind up being the turning point of the entire season. Encinosa’s effort may be as gutsy a performance as I’ve ever seen in twenty years of covering this program. Eighteen batters up, eighteen batters down. Amazing.

Miami also got great starts from Eric Erickson and Steven Ewing, who really has to step up now that Bryan Radzieswki has undergone season-ending surgery.

The next three weeks will say a lot about this team and its post-season outlook. There’s a road trip to Blacksburg this weekend, another away series at No. 1 Florida State next weekend and a home stand against Virginia the week after.

It goes without saying that the showdown in Tallahassee will be the most important of the year. Especially considering road wins count 125 percent versus a home win that counts for 75 percent as far as RPI rankings go. Just another attempt by the NCAA to even out the playing field for northern teams that play a lot more road games than southern squads.

The Canes are ranked sixth in the latest RPI and the goal, as always, is to finish in the top eight. Things are on a nice roll, but there’s still a ton of baseball left to be played. For more on the current state of UM baseball, check out Thursday’s night’s edition of allCanes Radio where I had a great one-on-one with E.J.

To football we go.

It’s great that Stephen Morris is throwing again, trading his warm-up gear and whistle for a red jersey and a helmet. I watched the potential starter throwing on Tuesday morning and while Morris went through a few drills, he was definitely limited. When the other quarterbacks worked on rolling out, he didn’t take any reps. Morris also didn’t stretch with the rest of the team.

When prompted on Tuesday morning, Morris stated that his back isn’t sore and that he’s able to do everything. I’ll take him at his word on that.

Regarding depth, I can’t stress what an issue it is for this team. Normally head coach Al Golden and staff would have held a draft for the Orange and Green teams for this weekend’s Spring Game, but they didn’t even have enough players to attempt that. Between injuries and underclassmen defections, this year’s incoming freshman can’t get on campus soon enough.

Offensive coordinator Jedd Fisch mentioned Tuesday morning that all he wants for his offense is to score in the Spring Game on Saturday. Personally, I’d also like to see some smart, turnover-free play. I want to see quarterbacks like Ryan Williams not throwing into double coverage, or project where he’s planning on tossing the football. Outside of that, my expectations for what I think will be a rather vanilla spring game are pretty low.

I’m actually more anxious about the tailgating opportunities for Saturday morning. Parking lots open at 10am, doors ninety minutes later and an autograph session before the 2pm kickoff. Shoot me a Tweet and I’ll drop by your tailgate to talk Canes … and mooch off your spread.

On to radio.

Pardon this departure from Canes chatter for a moment as I’ve been contemplating a radio-themed blog lately, but haven’t been able to perfect the concept. Bear with me as I attempt to discuss all the change we’ve seen in the South Florida market recently.

First up, DJ Laz leaving Power96 after over two decades on the air. I had the pleasure of working in the same building as Laz for more than a decade and of all the big-name talent I’ve been around, I was most in awe of this guy. Laz was a guy that pretty much put the Miami music scene on the map.

I can remember coming down to South Florida as a kid to visit my grandparents and the first thing I did when hopping in our rental car was turn the station to 96.5 immediately. I can still here Cox On The Radio’s booming booming voice and can still close my eyes to recapture that feeling of being in a rental car in the 80s, bobbing my head to one of Laz’s mixes.

We had nothing like that at the time in Boston. I mean, I’d heard DJs scratching records before, as well as rap DJs getting busy on the ones and twos, but I’d never heard anything like the mixing Laz was burning up on the wheels of steel. I used to record his mixes on cassette and bring them back to Boston to share with friends.

Laz is a true legend in my eyes and I’m not really sure why he left Power96. He said he wanted to try new things. I’ve also heard that he was sick of taking pay cuts. It also couldn’t have helped that Power96’s role as an innovator and discoverer of talent has taken a backseat to just playing hits in the recent years.

I don’t know what Laz will do next, but whatever it is, I’ll be listening. I’m always good for a ‘Journey Into Bass’.

Moving on over to the AM dial.

The three-plus year tenure of Sid Rosenberg, at my previous employer WQAM, is over and I’m sure most of you know the story. If not, check it out here.

Sid is like a cat that simply ran out of lives. There aren’t too many people – in any line of work – that have had as many chances as Sid. His past problems have been well-documented. From outlandish comments about Venus and Serena Williams or singer Kylie Minogue, to missing a Giants broadcast because of a degenerate trip to Atlantic City, Sid has often defied logic with his behavior, yet always found a way to rebound, though that doesn’t appear to be the case this time.

Sid was lucky after being let go at 790 The Ticket, for allegedly getting wrapped up in some shady deal with a handicapper, that WQAM general manager Joe Bell had a soft spot in his heart for him.

Joe developed an infatuation with Sid since the radio personality’s move to South Florida from New York. Joe used to go as far as to call Sid when he was on the air at 790. I’ve never seen anything like it. Then again, this is South Florida. Weird things happen here.

A few months back stories started to leak that Sid owed thousands of dollars to several gambling sites / bookies and there have been rumors of representatives of these sids showing up at both remote sites where Sid was hosting a show, or at WQAM advertisers. That in itself would get most radio show hosts fired. It earned Sid a six-week ‘vacation’. Now he may have a much longer vacation after getting fired on Tuesday.

I sincerely hope Sid realizes that while he may be pressured into getting another job to support his family, the most important thing for him to do right now is get some much-needed help. Hopefully this last straw and bottoming out becomes a turning point for him.

In an effort to always be transparent, let me honest for a moment. I always had resentment about Sid getting hired at QAM. About a week before they brought him on (though we all knew for months he was coming on board), I was let go and while there was much more to my leaving QAM than one incident, I was officially fired after being outspoken about the Dolphins. Of course a few years later, anything I was saying back in the day pales in comparison to what is currently being said about Miami’s professional football franchise.

On one hand they were telling me that I was too outspoken about the Dolphins (who were on QAM at the time), but on the other, hiring a loud, outspoken Giants fan who loathed the hometown team and a personality who had been fired on more than one occasion for saying something over the top. It all seemed very hypocritical to me.

I absolutely understand that I couldn’t bring in the advertisers the way Sid could and revenue is what drives this business, but in my mind it was unjust that I would lose my job for something that literally got someone else hired.

Again, there was more to the story regarding my firing, but speaking to this one point, it never added up.

With Sid gone, QAM has since hired former Cane defensive lineman Dan Sileo , who was also recently fired for saying something over the top. Sileo’s previous gig was a morning show in Tampa and for those of you who missed how that all shook down, click here.

As Cane fans we should be happy that Sileo will at least talk up the Orange and Green, but from a radio perspective, I’m not sure how his approach will work down here in South Florida. Once again, QAM’s general manager (Bell) has been infatuated with Sileo for years. In turn, Sileo probably would’ve given up an appendage to work down here in Miami.

I’ll be honest with you, three weeks ago Sileo was asking me where he should live in South Florida, which means he was hired before Sid had been fired – and also means he was originally hired to take over a different time slot.

I have a feeling he was slated to take over The Playmaker, who’s ratings and inability to foster advertising have been sub-par. I wonder what QAM does with Michael Irvin now. I have a feeling he’ll be gone by the time football season rolls around.

The other big radio news on Tuesday; 790 morning man Jorge Sedano stepping down. I’d known for a while that Jorge wanted to focus on TV and had been readying a show for CBS Sports Net that could end up leading into Jim Rome, but it’s odd to quit on a Tuesday without saying goodbye to your audience.

Something must’ve happened to speed up Jorge’s departure. They have a new program director in Tod Castleberry, who spent a lot of time up in Washington D.C. and I wonder how veteran talent took to the new PD.

So who takes over for Sedano? Good question. Here are a few names to keep in mind:

– Scott Kaplan – Sid’s former co-host has been a morning host in San Diego for years before being let go for off-color remarks made about a women’s basketball analyst. Scott is from South Florida, knows the market, knows morning radio and would be a natural fit. I’ve also heard he has TV offers pending, so we’ll see if he choose to stay in radio.

– Mitch Levy – Mitch has been the morning host in Seattle on KJR for years and became well-known for producing the Tony Kornheiser show. I’ve been on Mitch’s show as aguest and he keeps it going mornings out in the Pacific Northwest.

Those are a few lay-ups. Some from my back pocket, if I were Castleberry (aside from putting in a call to The Beast).

I’d try to wrestle Bobby Bones out of Austin. He’s a solid host in Texas and a good friend of tennis pro Andy Roddick. The two have been hosting a weekend show on Fox Sports Radio and the get great guests.

It’s a solid show and with Andy’s tennis career winding down, he’s made his intention to get into sports radio a known. Andy has some great local connections, having lived in Boca and Bones is an up-and-coming radio host. It might just work. Whatever the case, we should know something pretty soon.

More on the radio stuff and some great Canes talk coming Thursday night on our edition of allCanes Radio, kicking off at 6pm ET.

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