Scott Pfeifer is radio editor-in-chief for E.W. Scripps Company’s WTMJ(AM) andWKTI(FM) in Milwaukee. He wrote in to share a story about a successful sports remote broadcast and the gear that helped make it happen.
Thought I’d pass along a Cradlepoint/Comrex BRIC success story unfolding as I type this.
The Milwaukee Brewers baseball team just won the national League Central Division championship in an exciting one game playoff at Wrigley Field. The two teams were tied at the end of the regular season and needed to play this game today to determine the winner of the division.
As the flagship station for the Brewers, obviously we wanted to make the most of this big sporting event. We didn’t know until Sunday night what the situation was and scrambled to make plans to broadcast from strategic locations in Chicago to capture the spirit of the event.
Cradle Point/Comrex BRIC combo kits to the rescue! I’ve affectionately named these kits after their most likely users — the “MatzeKit” after Greg Matzek and the “Doug RussCell” after Doug Russell.
A digital mirrorball greets delegates at IBC2018.
Delegates register for IBC2018.
The RAI Amsterdam Convention Center, home of IBC2018.
Early Monday morning I set up these two kits to persistently connect to their respective codecs at the station. The kits contain a cradle point cellular router, Comrex BRIC, small mixer and a couple headsets. All the gear is contained in a small briefcase and simply requires plugging in and waiting a couple minutes for the Cradle Point to establish network connectivity and wallah, they’re on the air!
Two of our sports announcers headed down to Chicago early Monday morning with kits in hand. One destined for a local sports bar near Wrigley Field for the pre and post game broadcasts, and the other to Wrigley Field itself where the kit would provide clubhouse celebration connectivity.
As designed, both kits established connectivity within a couple minutes, which was particularly important for the clubhouse setup as the media is not granted access to the clubhouse until after the game (no opportunity for pre-check).
Both kits performed well and provided excellent audio to bring the excitement of the team’s success to their fans.
The flexibility and opportunities these technologies provide is like nothing we’ve ever had in the radio industry, and using them to the fullest, like we did today, really helps give our radio stations that live and local experience that our fans have come to expect from us.
Do you have your own sports remote story to share as football season gears up and baseball winds down? Email [email protected] and you may see it featured online and in the Radio Magazine Today newsletter.
