Sports Stations, Team Flagships Score Big On PPM Days 1 and 2
April has always been a big month for professional sports, with the beginning of the Major League Baseball season and postseason activity for both NBA basketball and NHL hockey. The excitement for all three was reflected by share boosts for the flagship stations of teams in each of those leagues, ranked in the top five in eight of the 20 non-embedded PPM markets reporting on Days 1 and 2 in Nielsen’s April survey (covering April 2-29).
Together, eight baseball, basketball and/or hockey team flagship stations in Dallas, Philadelphia, Boston, Seattle, Detroit, Minneapolis, San Diego and St. Louis — seven of those with an all sports format, and one news/talk — saw a 10.1-share-point increase from Nielsen’s March survey. The largest of those gains were fueled by the NBA’s Pistons and MLB’s Tigers on Audacy sports “97.1 The Ticket” WXYT-FM Detroit (up 2.2), baseball’s Padres on Audacy’s “97.3 The Fan” KWFN (+2.1), and MLB’s Mariners on Bonneville’s “Seattle Sports 710” KIRO-AM (+1.7).
For Days 1 and 2 in these 20 markets, the leaderboard shows AC with five wins, news/talk and sports with three each, two each for urban AC and classic hits, and one each for news, adult alternative, hot AC, soft AC and classic rock.
Washington, DC (8)
FEB 26 MAR 26 APR 26
1 WTOP-FM News 15.2 14.3 12.9
2 WAMU-FM News/Talk 11.8 10.8 10.4
3 WGTS-FM Cont. Christ.
4 WHUR-FM Urban AC 7.0 5.8 5.4
5 WASH-FM Adult Cont.
Boston (10)
FEB 26 MAR 26 APR 26
1 WBUR-FM News/Talk 5.2 5.6 6.6
2 WXKS-FM CHR 4.9 5.2 5.9
3 WBZ-FM Sports 5.3 5.1 5.9
4 WMJX-FM Adult Cont.
5 WROR-FM Classic Hits 5.7 5.3 5.6
Miami-Ft. Lauderdale-Hollywood (11)
FEB 26 MAR 26 APR 26
1 WLYF-FM Adult Cont. 6.3 6.0 7.1
2 WCMQ-FM Classic Hits 5.1 5.5 6.1
3 WFEZ-FM Soft AC 7.0 6.3 5.8
4 WHQT-FM Urban AC 7.2 6.7 5.7
5 WMIA-FM Adult Cont.
Seattle-Tacoma (12)
FEB 26 MAR 26 APR 26
1 KUOW-FM News/Talk 9.5 8.4 10.6
2 KIRO-AM Sports 3.8 4.7 6.4
3 KISW-FM Rock 5.1 4.7 5.3
4 KJEB-FM Classic Hits 5.6 5.6 5.3
5 KCMS-FM Cont. Christ.
Phoenix (13)
FEB 26 MAR 26 APR 26
1 KESZ-FM Adult Cont. 8.0 6.7 6.9
2 KSLX-FM Classic Rock 6.8 6.6 6.4
3 KNIX-FM Country 4.5 4.6 5.2
4 KFYI-AM Talk 4.6 5.0 4.8
5 KJZZ-FM News/Talk 3.3 3.9 4.5
6 KOOL-FM Classic Hits 4.5 5.9 4.5
Detroit (14)
FEB 26 MAR 26 APR 26
1 WXYT-FM Sports 8.6 9.0 11.2
2 WNIC-FM Adult Cont. 6.3 7.0 7.5
3 WOMC-FM Classic Hits 7.7 7.3 7.3
4 WYCD-FM Country 5.5 6.3 6.0
5 WMXD-FM Urban AC 6.1 5.9 6.0
Minneapolis-St. Paul (15)
FEB 26 MAR 26 APR 26
1 KFXN-FM Sports 7.3 7.3 8.2
2 KNOW-FM News/Talk 7.7 7.2 8.1
3 KEEY-FM Country 5.8 6.3 7.2
4 KQQL-FM Classic Hits 7.2 6.9 7.0
5 KSTP-FM Hot AC 7.1 6.6 6.8
Tampa-St. Petersburg-Clearwater (16)
FEB 26 MAR 26 APR 26
1 WDUV-FM Soft AC 8.6 9.8 9.7
2 WCIE-FM Cont. Christ. 7.3 7.0 7.2
3 WXGL-FM Classic Rock 6.5 6.5 6.0
4 WRBQ-FM Classic Hits 5.5 5.9 5.8
5 WWRM-FM Adult Cont.
Denver-Boulder (18)
FEB 26 MAR 26 APR 26
1 KQMT-FM Classic Rock 7.0 7.1 6.8
2 KOSI-FM Adult Cont. 6.7 7.0 6.5
3 KBCO-FM Adult Alt. 4.3 4.2 5.5
4 KALC-FM Hot AC 5.1 5.0 5.2
5 KTCL-FM Mod/Alt Rock 4.6 4.2 5.2
San Diego (19)
FEB 26 MAR 26 APR 26
1 KXSN-FM Classic Hits 7.7 7.4 7.4
2 KPBS-FM News/Talk 8.1 7.6 7.3
3 XHRM-FM Hot AC 6.7 7.9 6.7
4 KYXY-FM Adult Cont. 6.3 6.0 6.0
5 KWFN-FM Sports 2.9 3.2 5.3
Baltimore (23)
FEB 26 MAR 26 APR 26
1 WWIN-FM Urban AC 8.9 8.4 8.3
2 WLIF-FM Adult Cont. 4.7 6.0 6.7
3 WPOC-FM Country 5.3 5.6 6.2
4 WWMX-FM Hot AC 5.4 6.0 5.4
5 WRBS-FM Cont. Christ.
St. Louis (25)
FEB 26 MAR 26 APR 26
1 KLOU-FM Classic Hits 7.5 8.3 9.3
2 KSHE-FM Rock 8.4 8.4 8.7
3 KEZK-FM Adult Cont.
4 KLJY-FM Cont. Christ. 8.1 6.5 6.2
5 KMOX-FM News/Talk 3.9 4.7 5.9
