[El Scorcho]

I'm not a huge fan, but congrats to WLNI's The Sportsline on being picked up for syndication.

http://www.wset.com/news/stories/0906/358525.html

Area Talk Radio Sports Shows Goes Into Syndication

Tuesday September 05, 2006 11:32pm Reporter: Danner Evans Posted By: Webteam

Lynchburg, VA - A lot of you sports fans catch them Monday through Friday from 6:00 to 8:00pm on your radio. Now, Rich Roth and Larry Richmond's Sports Line is broadcasting to a broader audience. The Sportsline is now syndicated.

Starting Tuesday night, they're broadcasting in Blackstone, Bluefield, even Harrisonburg! Even though they're diversifying their audience, the guys say you won't hear any changes on their show.

You know them as "Double R" and "Larry the Legend." Now Larry and Rich, the voices behind The Sportsline are expanding their horizons.

Rich Roth, "The Sportsline" - "We kind of did some research, checked out what the possibilities were."

Larry Richmond, "The Sportsline" - "It just kind of seemed to fall together."

"It" is a chance at syndication, something that in their line of work is a little bit like getting a bigger job.

Larry - "You always want new challenges. In radio unfortunately it’s about moving to a bigger market, moving away, out of town, to some place you don't know."

Fortunately, the opportunity arose here.

Rich - "The great thing about our show is that it's always been a regional deal more than anything else. We have not focused on Lynchburg so it is something we don't have to change to put up on other stations."

And while the first night didn't go off without a hitch…

Larry - "You should have seen 5 minutes before show time when we had the engineer under the board trying to get everything straight."

Larry the Legend and Double R say you won't hear anything change on the airwaves.

Rich - "Believe me we don't have dreams of being nationally syndicated."

Danner - "But you would take the opportunity right?"

Rich - "No because then everything would have to change."

The Sportsline has been on the air in Lynchburg since 1993. Larry joined Rich in 1998 and the two have been paired ever since.

[Sly Fox]

Radio consolidation rears its ugly head once again. Local radio is a dying business.

[Purple Haize]

Good for Rich and Larry. I really enjoy their show but my travel schedule has precluded me from listening as much. I WAS hoping they would get out to the Richmond area (I mean great tie in right?) But even though he is short and the other sustains career ending injuries while golfing (I know, I was there) I am happy for them

[Flamesfanva]

Isn't one of those two guys actually an LU graduate? I listen to them when I'm driving around.

[LUconn]

Did they make up those nicknames and give them to themselves? They need work.

[bigsmooth]

larry richmond is an LU grad, and in my opinion he carries the show. rich roth is just not good. congrats on the syndication though.

[Rocketfan]

I really don't care for this show and know very few people who do.....but in this area all they have to compete with locally is Greg Roberts.....(he sucks), so i hope now with this promotion of sorts the show will improve.[/u]

[LUconn]

I guess this means we get to hear less about Liberty. So now instead of 2 potshots per year we'll be lucky if they give us 1. Maybe that's a good thing.

[El Scorcho]

I guess this means we get to hear less about Liberty. So now instead of 2 potshots per year we'll be lucky if they give us 1. Maybe that's a good thing.

That's exactly what I thought when I read:

Rich - "The great thing about our show is that it's always been a regional deal more than anything else. We have not focused on Lynchburg so it is something we don't have to change to put up on other stations."

[Sly Fox]

In other words, they have done a por job producing a local show. They just aspire to be a UVa/Tech show with general ramblings about the NFL etc. How could I possibly be living a complete life without this show?

If I'm not getting a local show, give me the Sporting News, ESPN or Fox guys.

[A.G.]

You have to admit, as difficult as it is for all of us, that LU athletics has been pretty much irrelevant (outside of the WBB team), for several years. They have to cater to their fans, and their fans are UVA and Tech--and now, they are the local Tech affiliate.

[jimflamesfan]

Larry actually goes to some LU games. I don't think he's against LU. Rich seems to take the shots at LU as a way of making fun of Larry.

As far as the show not talking about LU...a lot of the show isn't about sports.

It's sort of like the carguys show on public radio. They talk about nonsense, and then every so often sports. It's not that bad, although sometimes it gets dirty.

I participated in their song paroty contest...where every year before the uva/va tech game they have people do song parodies making fun of one of the teams.

It was really fun...although in recent years, it too has degraded and become pretty dirty.

I think it takes more talent to make a song funny without being dirty...but that's another subject.

[jimflamesfan]

BTW - I won a version of EA Sports Ice Hockey Game - can't remember the name or year as a prize in the contest...so I was happy with that!

[LUconn]

As far as the show not talking about LU...a lot of the show isn't about sports.

That's why I don't really like the show. It's more of just a man show. Talking about things that men like in general. I just think that gets boring. And their fantasy NASCAR stuff. I don't think anybody but the 5 other guys that are in the league with them want to hear about their fantasy NASCAR league. They cater their show too much to their "regulars" in my opinion. I don't really expect them to talk about LU on a regular basis but you'd think the only DI program within ~50 miles would garner a few more shout outs per year.

[givemethemic]

Well I am very close to this situation seeing that I produce this show during the week... Larry did graduate from LU and he also married my sister in the process!!! I brought this up about 2 months ago but never could talk about it, we have made a collective effort to get Liberty back in the talks over the last month or so, we have had Coach Rocco on 3 times since Big South Media Day, we interviewed Eddie Penigis as well a few ago and even did a live in game update during the 2nd quarter of the St.Paul's game...BTW if you see me tomorrow you will also see Larry as well... You will just have to find us

[El Scorcho]

Well, hopefully Coach Rocco and the Flames will give them something to talk about from here on out.

[Purple Haize]

While GMTH was probably in diapers when this happened...........
I was usally on the show once a week or so back in the day discussing LU. Having spent a lot of time with both of them, here is the problem as it was explained to me. It may have changed as this was the case about 2 or 3 years ago.
The first is the audience. While they do get a lot of LU listeners, most of the demographics are UVA/VT fans or alumni. These significantly outnumber the LU contingent. Secondly, and you see it even on this board, they ALWAYS take heat when they talk critically about LU. When the whole RD/HM thing went down they even had Borek on to talk about the situation. They got a ton of calls (comparatively) saying they ambushed him and they were just biased against LU. When they do talk about the team, at least recently, there isn't a lot of "positive" news, so why take the time? It makes sense to me. IF you DO talk about them and you get grief, then just DON'T talk about them and get less or no grief. Makes sense to me. Hopefully as we win more and have more "media friendly" coaching staff's this may change.

[Sly Fox]

When the only time you are talking about LU is when there is controversy, you are going to get heat.

As for the UVa/VT scenario, that's a bit of a crock. The audience will be interested in what you talk about (I have a little insight in my two decades in the business). If you are good you can talk about blue gill fishing in a creek and have an audience intrigued. Its just easier for these guys to regurgitate what they see in the paper and on message boards than to actually work it. If you're lazy and just want to mail it in then gabbing up the Hoos & Hokies is the easy way out. Just my two cents.

[LUconn]

ha. It just goes to show you how backwards we were at the time when we send the university president to talk about the basketball coaching situation.

[Purple Haize]

SLY I agree with you to some extent. If they spent the whole show talking about women's soccer and X games, they may not be on the air long however. They also got letters when they DID NOT criticize LU. I was no there to promote one game and they had calls and emails saying they were degrading LU but not having the head coach on. We were giving away a bunch of tickets and other stuff and coming up with trivia questions, but still they got letters and calls from LU people saying that it wasn't done in a proper environment. The one I remember was the one who was upset because LU's record last year and that year were brought up. THe writer said we were only bringing up negatives in regards to the W - L percentage, and were Bashing Jerry by saying we wanted attendance to grow thereby insinuating that attendance was bad. Go figure THAT logic!!
So why deal with that, when you can talk UVA VT and let it go with that? I personally wish they WOULD talk more LU

[PeterParker]

Seems that sometimes the view from some inside the bubble gets a bit skewed...will be nice when said people cease to operate in a parallel reality.