Ch 9 in & Randy Little out at B105

The TV wars on radio continue. Channel 9 folks today added country WUBE-FM (B105) to its list of stations airing Channnel 9's news and weather reports. Kathrine Nero and Larry Handley were on this morning, and Clyde Gray or Carol Williams will do news chats with Duke Hamilton during afternoon drive (3-5 p.m.). The deal has been in the works since Ch. 5 pulled off the station to do top-rated WLW-AM last summer.
The odd man out is Randy Little. You could say this is the second time he has been bounced by Ch. 9. His 20-year TV career ended in 2001, when Ch. 9 dropped his contract. For three years, Little did morning drive news for B105 and sister WGRR-FM (103.5). He stayed with B105 when WGRR-FM was swapped to Cumulus for WYGY-FM (97.3), the country Wolf, in November.
Technically, Little works for the Metro Networks radio traffic/news folks. He was told last Friday that B105 no longer needed him, but Little hopes to continue working "behind the scenes" for Metro Networks. His day job is in the NKU communications department. Metro Networks still provides B105 with the "Traffic Twins" airborne traffic reports.
Starting Monday, Ch 9's John Matarese will start a weekly morning chat with Bill Whyte and Amanda Orlando, and Williams will do a health feature.
Ch. 9 also services WRRM-FM (WARM98), the new WMOJ-FM (MOJO 100.3), Christiasn WAKW-FM (93.3), WFTK-FM (SupertalkFM 96.5). Add up all their listeners, and Ch 9 reaches more on radio that Ch. 5 on WLW-AM. And Ch. 12 cut back on radio at the end of the year, no longer providing local news to Clear Channel's WKRC-AM (550).
Meanwhile, Ch 9 wants to expand to more radio stations. "I'd like to provide weather and news headlines to as many radio stations that we possibly can," says Bill Fee, Ch. 9 general manager.
Is this a good strategy for Ch 9? You tell me.