If you think the troubles at WCCO-TV ends with the firing of weatherman Paul Douglas, you must live in a world where everyday is shiny skies and warm weather. If you needed any more proof that CBS in general is in deep doo-doo, read recent accounts out of New York about Katie Couric’s future. There was a lot of speculation earlier this week that the anchor would step away from the desk after the inauguration. If you ask me, it’s gonna be a lot sooner than that. The only problem is: Who will CBS turn to? Bob Schieffer will probably fill in again, but who’s next? Russ Mitchell? Anderson Cooper? Carrot Top?

CBS is gonna be forced to go after a big name -and that means big bucks on top of the $15 million a year Couric gets and will continue to get if she stays with the network.

So what does that have to do with those of us in WCCO Land? The local station is owned by the network and no matter how good the ratings are here, it’ll have to take its lumps. You know, for the team.

A couple scenarios:

1) Don Shelby, who has announced he plans not to renew his contract after it expires in a year and a half, steps away earlier than planned, possibly saving the station about $1 million a year. It seems fairly clear that Amelia & Frank are being primed to be the starting team, so why not start now? Of course, if Don is forced out, it would be a PR nightmare that would make the Douglas deal look like a walk in the park. I wouldn’t bet on this scenario, but you can’t rule it out.

2) The departure of at least one or two major players. Amelia & Frank are probably the safest, although I wouldn’t have dreamed Douglas was a candidate for the chopping block.

 You would think that Mark Rosen would be safe. If he left there would be only part-time Mike Max (Bob Rainey continues to be missing in action as he’s battling some serious illness).

But, mark my words, one of these days, a local station is going to experiment with eliminating sports from their news broadcast all together and because CBS has less major sports coverage than the competition, WCCO may be the most likely candidate to try it.

Insiders think Jeanette Trompeter is the most vulnerable, but can WCCO afford to lose one of their highest profile female anchors? Seems like an awful risk?

If you were running ‘CCO and HAD to make major cuts, what would you do (Besides contemplate jumping off the roof)?

(PS: Spoke Friday morning with John Reger, who asked that I reiterate that he really wants to stay in the Twin Cities and is doing everything he can to remain in his hometown. That should get PR firms’ tongues wagging)Â

This entry was posted on Friday, April 11th, 2008 at 3:19 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.