The Josh Innes Show - 97.5 The Fanatic Job Update

Episode Date: May 5, 2025

I have applied for the 97.5 The Fanatic Philly job. I'm telling you now that I have a 0.0% chance of getting the job. Actually, I have a 0.3% chance of getting a return phone call. Would Mike Missanelli, the guy I competed with in Philly, even allow me to work on the same station? He already derailed that quest before. I truly believe I'm the only person they could hire to make any sort of noise. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

All righty kiddos, so I have been getting a lot of feedback from people about that 97.5 job in Philadelphia as you know, I have applied I posted that on Friday that I actually applied for the job I have emailed and called the program director now. I am 100% confident. I have zero chance at getting this job and I know you're saying Josh, that's absurd Why would you feel that way? Look at this reaction You're getting from people about whether or not you should apply and I know that in the grand scheme these numbers aren't huge But 700 people are so liked to post and you get a couple hundred comments And that's something for someone who hasn't been in a city in ten years nine years

I guess technically but still still getting talked about, still referenced in stories, you know how the thing goes. So I'd say that if I were a program director I would at least look into it, I would at least do the due diligence and go all right let me just make sure, let me take a look here, I'll at least talk with the guy and see if he's still a wacko or what the situation is. And I know this program director's name is Scott Masteller and I've talked with him many times used to be a big time at ESPN was in Baltimore recently. still in Baltimore under old management there and now they've got him and he's there and he's been there for a while and I've reached out, I have emailed, all I have received in return is we've got like a hundred applications so like I assume you got a lot of applications.

I'm also going to assume that the people who've applied for that job do not or I would guess that most of them do not have the resume that I have. Now again, I know there's a lot of baggage with me and I'm getting that again. I'm not expecting to get the job but if your intention is to truly try to compete with WIP, I am probably the only person you can put on that will make any waves whatsoever. Like you brought back Mike Missinelli, that's cool. He left, you fired him before, you brought him back again to do mid-days instead of afternoons. Maybe they'll just move him back to afternoons. I would assume that would be what they do unless

he likes doing mid-days, I don't know. Maybe they'll move him back to afternoon drive and hire someone to do the mid-days. I don't know what they're going to do. But you brought him back and it really hasn't given you any sort of pop. Morning show ain't giving you any pop and afternoons ain't giving you any pop. That's not me ripping those people. That is facts. That is me reading facts. So not trying to rip anybody, have nothing against them personally, not trying to start a war with any of those people. But the only hope you would have, name another person, that's what I would ask you to do. If you are truly trying to get any sort of

pop, any sort of attention, any sort of, hey, let's write about 97.5, the fanatic, instead of WIP. Hey, we got an interview request. We want to talk to this guy from your station. We want to run a story in the paper. We want to do a news story. I am the only person you could hire that that would happen. That is not me being arrogant. That is me telling you from a radio standpoint. I have been told by people at 97.5 and a previous regime that they asked people now granted this was back in 2019. So I'd only been gone for

a couple years at that point, But they asked people in the building who they could hire at 97.5 that would give them a boost. And at the time they said two names. They said Craig Carton and at the time he was either in jail or they didn't know if he was going to go to jail and me. Those are the two names. There is no one else you could put on that radio station that's going to get you that attention. Now, let me play a couple commercials. All right, if you're ready to win some real cash during the basketball

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Limited time offer. See terms at pick6.draftkings.com slash promos. So as we will continue. The following was recorded from inside an ice plunge. Ah! Woo! Okay, all right. When a core's light is cold enough,

the mountains on the can turn blue. So the next time you want a cold lager, cold filter, cold package, core's light, just wait until those glorious mountains on the can turn blue. Woo! It's easy to say that fast when you're freezing gold. Coors light, just wait until those glorious mountains on the can turn blue. It's easy to say that fast when you're freezing gold. And I'm not saying any of this because I'm some arrogant asshole, right? Like it sounds like that because you're saying it about yourself.

I'm racking my brain trying to find somebody you could hire. That would get you this attention. You could hire the WIP morning show. If their contracts were up and 97.5 said we want to pay you double what you're making at WIP to come do mornings over at 97.5, it would not make an impact. You know who would win no offense to the dudes that do morning at WIP but they're not big dudes, they're not stars, they're not Angelo. Now if you would have taken Angelo and put him over at 97.5 in his heyday, maybe. If you were to take Howard in his heyday and put him at 97.5, sure give it a shot. I mean Missanelli proved it, he left WIP, went over to 97.5, had success. There's nobody on that radio station right now. That's not a knock, that's reality. There is nobody on that radio station right now that if you took

them from WIP and put them on 97.5, it would make any impact. The closest you had was the Cuzz and he didn't make any impact when you moved from WIP to 97.5. It made a tick for a little bit and then fell off because, if we're being honest, it's just fucking lazy. Bless his heart, he's a lazy son of a bitch when it comes to doing content and he always has been. So eventually it just kind of tails off and people lose interest. Who could you put on there? I'm racking my brain. Put Donovan McNabb on to do four hours. I don't think people would give a shit. I'm just trying to think of people. Put Tony Romo and Donovan McNabb as co-hosts of a show. What are they going to do? You know,

you've tried it all, right? So it's kind of an unenviable spot because again, are you going in it to try to win or you going in it to try to compete? And I think they can compete. I do not believe they could win. Like I'm telling you this about me. I could not more than likely could not win there. That is not being negative. That is being realistic because you're at a giant disadvantage for many reasons but most notably you've let the station erode to a point now that people just don't even consider it an option when you're getting a 2.5 among men on a

sports station where the competition has an 18 or whatever it is, you're dead, right? So again, as we said the other day, your best bet is to try to slice a couple of shares from WIP and try to gain a couple slices for yourself and instead of being down 18 to 2, you're down 14 to 7. That's kind of what your hope is. Maybe you catch lightning in a bottle. Maybe you get the right meter. Maybe it's just the perfect storm and all of a sudden you win a book or something. That's kind of what your hope is. Maybe you catch lightning in a bottle. Maybe you get the right meter. Maybe it's just the perfect storm and all of a sudden you win a book or something. That's not impossible. It's highly

unlikely, but that's not the expectation. I'm going to guess and I'm first of all, I'm assuming that I'm never going to speak with these people. They're never going to call me back and that's okay. I'm not trying to rip what they're doing. I'm trying to look at this from the perspective of what should be done or what could be done to be successful at the radio station. And I believe that I am the only human you could hire for that radio station

that would get you any attention. Everything else is a fart in the wind. Poof, gone. At least hiring me would get people going, oh shit, that motherfucker's back. Hell, he was a racist. He was this. He was a piece of shit. He hated Philadelphia. But they tune in and there'd be a curiosity. Then it would be incumbent upon me to try to do something interesting that people wanted to listen to. Granted, the world has changed a lot since I was

there. Like I probably wouldn't be going in there doing guns blazing, trying to tear down WIP or whatever. Like who gives a shit? I have to find a way to be interesting enough to get people to listen to where we take something away from them and we have to build a loyal army of people. As I told you the last time we talked about this, that is the objective. That is what you must do. You must get a hardcore group of people that live and die with you. And if it just so happens that enough of those people get those little things,

the little meters, your numbers go up and you look like a genius. You've got to have people. And those type of people, you know what else they'll do? They'll spend money at bars that advertise with you. They'll spend money at your clients and everybody's happy. That's all this is about. That's how you stay employed. You're never going to be Preston and Steve. Preston and Steve 20 share in the morning, you're never going to be that. You're never going to be WIP in the middle

of a Super Bowl run. But the fact that in a book that included a Super Bowl run has WIP at like a 20 in the morning and you have like a three, you're a non-factor. You're not even enough to take from them. Like I used to think that 97.5 existed, just so they could take a sliver away from WIP to keep Angelo from always being on top of Preston and Steve. Like that's truly what I thought they existed for.

But now I don't know if they take enough away from WIP to even do that. Like Preston and Steve is the bell cow over there. They are the breadwinner. They are the biggest thing, right? They're the biggest morning show in Philadelphia. They're extremely successful and I would have to assume they are the highest revenue generating morning show at least in the Beasley Cluster, maybe in all the city, right?

With the ratings they have, it wouldn't be shocking. So they're a huge show. They make a lot of money. I don't know what they make, but they generate a shit ton of money for them. Every other morning show they have in that building, and this is no knock on those other shows. I bet those shows don't even combine to generate the revenue of Preston and Steve. That includes the morning show on

Fanatic. That includes the country morning show. That includes the classic rock morning Show. They have decided to just go out and eliminate a lot of positions there and spend a lot less money on talent there. So that's another factor is I don't even know how much this job would pay, but who knows? But they've decided. Here's actually here's a thing. This is what I find interesting. This Tyrone who got whacked at this job. Tyrone says he's known for a while that they were going in a different

direction. Now is that the station going in a different direction? Obviously they're staying sports because they wouldn't post a hey come be a sports talk host job posting if they weren't going to stay sports. But what is the plan? How can you be different than I'm not trying to go all Eric Bischoff on you here, but how can you be different than right now there is nothing different about the two stations. Nothing stands out. It's just basically people who've worked on both of the fucking stations is all this is they just flip-flop like and there's no content that's

different. It's just there's nothing that stands out. There's nothing that makes you go, hey, I'm going to flip over to Miss Sinelli instead of Hugh Douglas. There's nothing. It doesn't pop. Now, one of the things people have talked to me about, they say, well, how the hell, like you say that Miss Sinelli would have to accept you there. Well, why would he even do that? Oh, he won't. I know he won't. That is why I'm telling you it's

a 100% chance that this doesn't happen. I'm going to say it's 100% likely that there is a 0% chance that this happens. It's not going to happen. It has no chance of happening. I will not get this job. I would give it very low odds that I even get a call back about the job, okay, which I think is short-sighted. But I don't think it's gonna happen. My argument I would make, and this goes back to a wrestling thing, this is an NWO, WCW, WWF type of thing. Eric Bischoff wanted to end WWF, went on

television, talked about Vince McMahon, they wanted to put them out of business, all that shit. And by the way, WWF was almost out of business. WWF was struggling. WWF couldn't fill up the water coolers in the building. Like it was, they were on their last legs. They were truly struggling. Then they rebounded and put WCW out of business and Vince McMahon buys WCW. I guess it would have been a year or two after that, maybe even shorter.

Eric Bischoff shows up on WWF. And you'd go, well, why the hell would Vince McMahon want to put Eric Bischoff, the guy that talked all this shit, why would he put him on WWF? Because it was good for business and it drew interest. And that's ultimately the name of the game. Vince McMahon, despite the fact that Eric Bischoff tried to put him out of business, knew that what was better for his business at that moment in time

was to take this guy who tried to ruin him and turn him into a character on his television show and it was huge. I think the problem you run into with a lot of sports media people and sports radio dweebs is they don't have that kind of foresight and that's why they are sports radio dweebs. If you're Mike and you're trying to make one last run at being cock of the walk, which you're not right now, maybe he can convince himself he is and maybe they're convincing him that he is and maybe they are and I'm not

saying he doesn't generate money for them. He may I have no their financials. I know nothing about this is just speculation here. But if you're Mike and you're in your 60s and you've already been whacked once and now you're back and you're doing this show, you've been on top before. What do you want to do? Do you want to go out at this fledgling station with a three share while your competitions got a 15 and just accept defeat and say I guess this is it. Or do you want to do

something that will generate the kind of pop that will truly have all boats rise with the tide? The Eagles won a Super Bowl. You know what didn't happen? All boats didn't rise with the tide. The WIP boat rose with the tide because people when they want to talk about the Eagles in the Super Bowl, they go to WIP, they don't go to you. So what can you do to make all boats rise with the tide? What can you do to make something happen that is truly just

affecting you, that makes people tune into you and not foot flop between the two stations? You have to do something big, something bold. Big and bold is, oh, let's take this guy who arguably was like the last, you know, big fire brand radio guy in town that made news and see what the fuck do you have to lose. But they're not going to do that. And I think a lot of it's because everything is short-sighted. They were short-sighted five years ago and they could have hired me there too. But they were short-sighted because Mike didn't want to do it. And look, he has every right to not want to do it. I don't know that he carries the same cache and weight that he carried five years ago with them. So I don't know if he could just say

fuck you know, and then they wouldn't do it or if they'd say no, we're going to do this and fucking deal with it. Don't forget that eventually W Y SP hired John DiBella to work with Howard Stern. Even though DiBella and Stern went at each other forever in the 80s, you know what I'm saying early 90s. Even though Stern basically led to this guy's divorce, like they ended up on the same radio stage. World's a different place. But I say all this to tell you that I appreciate all the people who are sending me like CCs of the emails they're sending to the program director, like thanks to Matt who sent an email that's nice of you, sent that to Scott Masseller who's on vacation. So

it's got to be great that he's getting emails from people that are like Jesus. He's like I'm on vacation and all these people want to talk about is this Josh fucking in us. But if you do email, let me know. This is great. Let me see here. Matt. I got a Matt sent that. Let's see. Boy, that's nice. It's nice that people are willing to do that. I got a guy on, hold on, let me go to Instagram here and see what I got. I've got a guy that posted a video. Guy's been listening forever and he posted a video about putting me on 97 file. Let me see if I can get that here

Let's see, let's turn up the volume on this and play this audio Sports radio is absolutely insufferable The best they have to offer is a 70 year old cranky liberal Lesbian named Mike Missanelli and his idiot co-host who goes like Siri Yanni knows how to coach it's fucking awful and we're tortured Philadelphia's a great sports town and our sports radio hosts are absolute douchebags now 97.5 has an opening they have an opportunity here to bring back the legend himself Josh Ennis bring that Ennis, make radio great again in Philadelphia.

Fuck Missinelli, who cares what he says? The ratings stink, he's doing horrible. Bring back Ennis, make Philadelphia sports radio entertaining again. Please, for the love of God, we've been tortured. We Tyrone. They got rid of him. Time to bring back the big guns make radio great again bring back ns-975 do the right thing there you go you see i have a fan that's people posting

videos people are emailing the program director so look i appreciate that i'm just letting you know there's a zero percent chance it happens 0.0. But I appreciate all of you doing that. All I know is that if they wanted to fuck shit up a little bit, they would do it. They would give it a shot at least. They'd at least have a phone call. But I'll keep you guys posted, but I am almost guaranteeing you that I don't get a phone call from them. If I do, I'll let you know. But I am almost guaranteeing you that I'm not going to get a phone call from them, which I think is short-sighted, especially when I know the guy doing it, which is absurd. But anyway, more to come.