WBZ Veterans Say Goodbye
My favorite memories of Bob Lobel are from WBZ’s coverage of the Boston Marathon. Watching the barely-awake sports reporter make small talk with jittery runners is just as much a part of Patriot’s Day for me as drinking on my friend’s stoop in Brookline.
This year’s Marathon Monday will be bittersweet. While we’ll still have the marathon and the Red Sox game, we won’t have Lobel to keep us entertained as the day goes on.
The rumors were flying around Boston Daily HQ yesterday afternoon and were confirmed this morning by the Herald and Globe. Longtime entertainment reporter Joyce Kulhawik was also offered a contract buyout, and TV 38 anchor and ‘BZ reporter Scott Wahle will go too.
Boston’s CBS affiliate isn’t the only one being hit with massive layoffs, but it did lay off the most employees. The New York Times reports that the broadcast needs to trim jobs nationwide. Dan Kennedy expressed his surprise that an affiliate with two local stations and a powerful talk radio station was unable to whether the storm, but the Times reports that the number of layoffs was proportionate to a station’s performance.
The cuts at the local stations owned by CBS were related to the financial performance of the station group in the first quarter of 2008, a CBS station executive said.
This is the latest in another dark day on the Boston media scene, but let’s try to remember the good times, shall we? Here’s a 20-year-old commercial featuring a young and hungry Lobel doing what he does best. At the end of this clip, we see Kulhawik rocking some serious 80s hair.
April 2nd, 2008 at 11:28 am
If the newscasters would stop treating us like we’re so stupid, they’d probably have more viewers. I know a lot of people who don’t watch the news because it’s so sensationalized. I just go to the internet if I want the weather. I don’t need to listen to all the hype.
April 2nd, 2008 at 4:03 pm
I agree with Jeff. It’s so bad now, I just watch the weather. That too can try one’s patience!
Too many car chases in LA or ‘gator intrusions in FLA. This is not news. There has to be stories that are local that people will watch.
I guess it’s 30 minutes of my life I can get back. Too bad.
April 2nd, 2008 at 6:50 pm
yes, the bottom line prevails (makes sense) and due to economics, gone are the Cronkite’s of the world. Soon to come, wireless internet std. in all cars…thus we will watch/read news/sports/weather via the internet…..owned by the majors…thus just as exagerated and ineloquent as now
April 2nd, 2008 at 8:18 pm
Jeff is so right. Bring back the days when the reporter would sit at a desk, and do the news. Now, they try to be so glitzy. They should report the news, not try to make the news. Finally, Do you realize that Channel 4 (wbz) news in the A.M. is approx. 37% commercials.
April 2nd, 2008 at 10:29 pm
Do we know that Lobel is leaving the air before Patriot’s Day? I thought a date was not set yet.
April 4th, 2008 at 7:46 am
I am so glad to see other people do not watch the news because they try to make it so glamorized. It is ironic, they (the news stations) glamorize the “news” to get viewers and less and less people are watching. You would think they would put 2+2 together and realize they are part of the problem. I don’t even watch for the weather anymore, it is never right anyway.
April 5th, 2008 at 1:36 pm
I guess it’s a sign of our Internet times. I’ve always lived Connecticut, but I grew up watching the Boston stations, and back in the good ol’ days, the on-air talent on the Boston newscasts stayed with their stations for decades, until they retired (Jack Chase, Don Kent, Bruce Schwoegler, Natalie Jacobson, etc.), but those were the pre-Internet days. (Remember how accurate Don Kent’s weather forecasts were? And that was LONG before computers and Doppler radar!)
I live in northeastern Connecticut. I still watch my local newscast (Channel 8, New Haven, ABC affiliate) because I like the people and the coverage, and I watch “ABC World News Tonight” for the same reasons. I can’t imagine not watching newscasts in the evenings, although admittedly, by the time they come on at night, I’ve already read a good bit of the day’s news on the Internet. (BTW, Channel 8’s forecasts are QUITE accurate!)
It’s sad to see long-familiar faces leave a local newscast, especially via the pink-slip route, but, I guess that’s just the brave, new high-tech world we live in these days. There are just so many more options for people to get their news fixes now.