Rusty Muck

Nexstar may have been willing to sacrifice their existing CW affiliations in Phoenix and Tucson if it meant signing with WMYD (and re-signing with WSFL?). Scripps controlled each and every aspect of these talks.

This indeed is the case, WKBD will simulcast CBS News Detroit at 7am starting Labor Day. I could see more simulcasts in the weeks to come as the fall season gets underway.

Not to be pedantic, but 11pm (after SportsCentral) or 7pm (before the news block) could be considered “prime time”.

Or reair the 8pm hour at 10pm.

They have a dynamic open with the date, time and temp inserted in? Can't say I've seen that before!

The KGBT-KVEO swap and sale happened as a settlement from Tribune’s breach of contract lawsuit against Sinclair after their failed merger, Nexstar was the beneficiary.

There’s a very good chance that Tegna stands pat. Standard General was the only party really driving a sale (yes, Byron tried to crash the party but the odds were stacked up against him). The L taken by Standard General is such that they may have to sell off their measly four stations to Tegna.

I’ll believe THAT when I see it. The story is largely sourced from a staffer present at a meeting in which the McKimmons didn’t even say a word. This feels like spin to hide a massive bloodletting at KUSI and merger at the KSWB building. Nexstar’s purely a bottom line company and there’s no reason for them to maintain two distinct news departments like this. At the same time, they can’t have everyone at KUSI quit in protest over the actual plans.

KSWB is already a U so the “Discount” sham is equally applied to KUSI, so Nexstar is not really affected cap-wise here. It IS very possible that Nexstar paid the McKinnons $35 million to take out a competitor to KSWB.

As @Samanthapointed out to me, this outright eliminates KSWB's main competitor, there are no newscasts on KUSI that don't overlap with KSWB. Because of that, the chances KUSI maintains any sort of separate operations is very, very small; in the case of Indianapolis, WTTV and WXIN have to have separate news ops because of the nature of their affiliations. Of note, KFMB-DT2's contract with the CW (reupped in 2021) runs through September 2026. So either Nexstar said what they said under the impression Tegna is planning to opt-out of their CW contracts, or they are forcing the issue for Tegna. Otherwise I cannot understand why Nexstar just turned KFMB-DT2 into a lame-duck CW affiliate for three years.

CBS and Gray (WPCH) will no doubt be bidding aggressively for all of those teams. Plus there’s nothing stopping CBS from moving an indie WUPA to a .2 (and buy WTBS-LD to put it on a ceremonial 6.1) if they do choose to take the network affiliation in-house. The possibilities of in-market realignments are endless tbh. If Gray winds up securing one or two teams, then they become a sports heavyweight and may want to make WANF (for lack of a better description) the WHDH for the South. CBS gets an O&O and possibly a sports-leaning indie that’ll be having Paramount’s content library opened up. This could be really fun to watch unfold.

CBS would want something in return for selling a station in a top 10 market. The only thing Cox can offer is KIRO (which at least pairs up with KSTW).

CBS getting WSB in an asset swap would be the most insane thing ever and I can totally see it happening.

They’d probably be penalized tax-wise for selling them and in the case of KSTW, there’s no one to sell it to. Ditto with WUPA.

This is also a situation that is highly in flux. Long term, I just can’t exactly see Paramount operating stand-alone indies in markets like Tampa and Seattle. It IS possible that Paramount conducts an asset swap or two to better align things… say, giving WTOG and WBXI-LD to Tegna, Tegna gives CBS KHOU/KTBU and gives WFAA and KVUE to Cox, while Cox gives CBS KIRO-TV… or some level of horse trading to that effect. Simply selling them feels like a non-starter because taxes, plus Atlanta and Seattle are not easy to find a buyer for. Even if they run out this fall, for the short term, plugging in movies in primetime and reruns of Paramount Network and Paramount+ shows seems like a good enough concept. Supplement it with sports play-by-play, the CBS News Now hybrid and local renditions of KMAX’s Good Day. This can include Atlanta, even if CBS takes the affiliation in-house at channel 69. Nothing stopping them from buying a WTBS-LD and moving the new indie format to 6.1 and 69.2