{"id":1580,"date":"2025-10-22T16:21:22","date_gmt":"2025-10-22T16:21:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/media\/?p=1580"},"modified":"2025-11-28T01:24:08","modified_gmt":"2025-11-28T01:24:08","slug":"major-media-shakeup-two-sports-talk-networks-combining","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/media\/sports-media\/major-media-shakeup-two-sports-talk-networks-combining\/","title":{"rendered":"Major Media Shakeup: Two Sports Talk Networks Combining"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Two syndicated sports talk radio networks announced Tuesday that they will combine into a single entity at the end of 2025.<\/p>\n<p>Cumulus Media, which owns Westwood One, and Audacy, which owns the Infinity Sports Network and BetMGM, will become Westwood One Sports beginning December 29.\u00a0 According to the <a  href=\"https:\/\/www.cumulusmedia.com\/2025\/10\/21\/cumulus-media-and-audacy-announce-the-launch-of-westwood-one-sports-24-7-programming\/\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">press release<\/a>, the merger will allow Cumulus to assume more control of the programming as well as the distribution of content.<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\">\n<p dir=\"ltr\" lang=\"en\">This just in\u2026CUMULUS MEDIA and AUDACY join forces to launch Westwood One Sports 24\/7 \u2014 a new era of around-the-clock sports programming begins December 29th! \ud83c\udfc8\ud83c\udf99\ufe0fLive coverage, expert analysis, nonstop action.<a  href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/hashtag\/WestwoodOneSports?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">#WestwoodOneSports<\/a> <a  href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/hashtag\/CumulusMedia?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">#CumulusMedia<\/a> <a  href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/hashtag\/Audacy?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">#Audacy<\/a> <a  href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/hashtag\/WestwoodOne?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">#WestwoodOne<\/a> <a  href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/hashtag\/SportsRadio?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">#SportsRadio<\/a>\u2026<\/p>\n<p>\u2014 Westwood One Sports (@westwood1sports) <a  href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/westwood1sports\/status\/1980714297576591724?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">October 21, 2025<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<p>\u201cAudacy and Westwood One have a long, storied history of collaboration, and today\u2019s evolution of our national sports partnership is that next chapter in our commitment to our hundreds of affiliates, their listeners, and our client partners,\u201d Chris Oliviero, Audacy&#8217;s Chief Business Officer said in the statement. \u201cBe it local or national, broadcast or digital, opinion content or play by play, we continue to smartly look at ways to enhance our leadership position in sports content.\u201d<\/p>\n<h2>Who&#8217;s In, Who Could Possibly Be Out?<\/h2>\n<h3>One sports talk legend already announced for new network<\/h3>\n<p>Already announced for the new network is <em>The Jim Rome Show<\/em>, as the sports talk icon will remain in afternoon drive on the east coast, airing from 3-6 pm eastern.\u00a0 Rome&#8217;s show had previously aired on Infinity Sports Network (formerly known as CBS Sports Radio) in the noon-3 pm eastern time slot from the network&#8217;s inception in January 2013 until moving to Westwood One in January 2025.<\/p>\n<p>Hear T.J. Rives and me discuss the Westwood One\/Cumulus merger and the ramifications for the network sports talk shows for both on our latest &#8220;Last Word on Sports Media&#8221; podcast by clicking play below,<\/p>\n<p><iframe style=\"width: 100%; max-width: 660px; overflow: hidden; border-radius: 10px;\" src=\"https:\/\/embed.podcasts.apple.com\/us\/podcast\/blue-jays-dodgers-world-series-nba-on-nbc-returns-great\/id1549396526?i=1000733009778\" height=\"175\" frameborder=\"0\" sandbox=\"allow-forms allow-popups allow-same-origin allow-scripts allow-storage-access-by-user-activation allow-top-navigation-by-user-activation\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>Cumulus also announced a pair of shows on the BetMGM Network will also make the jump, with <em>You Better You Bet<\/em> with Nick Kostos moving to 9 am-noon eastern, and <em>BetMGM Tonight<\/em> airing from 6-11 pm.<\/p>\n<p>The new network has not announced what plans are for morning drive from 6-9 am.\u00a0 Currently, Infinity Sports Network has <em>Maggie and Perloff<\/em>, with Maggie Gray and Andrew Perloff (formerly known as &#8220;McLovin'&#8221; from the Dan Patrick Show) from 6-10 am.\u00a0 BetMGM&#8217;s offering is <em>The Daily Tip<\/em>, with Michael Jenkins and Chelsa Messinger from 6-9 am.\u00a0 Either one could wind up hosting mornings for the new network.\u00a0 They also could be moved to the midday timeslot (noon-3 pm eastern), which is also currently unnamed.\u00a0 Other hosts that could make the jump are Infinity&#8217;s midday host Bill Reiter and afternoon drive host Zach Gelb, as well as BetMGM&#8217;s <em>Bet Sweats<\/em> with Joe Ostrowski and Sam Panayotovich.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Two syndicated sports talk radio networks announced Tuesday that they will combine into a single entity at the end of 2025. Cumulus Media, which owns Westwood One, and Audacy, which owns the Infinity Sports Network and BetMGM, will become Westwood One Sports beginning December 29.\u00a0 According to the press release, the merger will allow Cumulus [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5660,"featured_media":1581,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"no","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[265,238],"tags":[75,319],"class_list":["post-1580","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-press-releases","category-sports-media","tag-featured","tag-westwood-one"],"modified_by":"Michael Kovacs, ADMIN","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/media\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1580","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/media\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/media\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/media\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5660"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/media\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1580"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/media\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1580\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1593,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/media\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1580\/revisions\/1593"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/media\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1581"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/media\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1580"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/media\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1580"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/media\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1580"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}