By David Scott
Boston Sports Media Watch

REMINDER: Shots will be putting in time with the good folks at CSTV.com beginning on Wednesday afternoon and lasting through Friday morning. You can find our NYC-based NBA Draft ramblings at the award-deserving Hang Time blog. Should be fun for the whole family, so do stop on by!

A non-statement statement from Entercom’s vice president of AM Programming and Operations, the usually silent Jason Wolfe, brings little clarity and even fewer answers to the extended absence of WEEI 850 AM morning host, Gerry Callahan.

“We appreciate everyone’s interest in Gerry Callahan’s health,” said Wolfe in a release dropped via email at 4 p.m. Monday by Regan Communications. “Julie Kahn and I had lunch with Gerry last Friday and we are glad to report that he is making progress. He is talking, but his voice is still relatively weak and hoarse. We fully expect him to be back to his cranky old self soon, but he is not ready to return to work at this point. As we said from the day he went in for the procedure, we have no specific timetable for his return, but we are very hopeful, as is he, that he’ll be back on the air soon.”

That’s it - 102 words on Callahan’s throat procedure that is still being called “minor” by Regan’s Christian Megliola, despite the fact that Callahan has now been away form the microphone since the end of April. (Gotta love the smarm of the “cranky” line - the guy, according to BSMW sources has serious, possibly long term throat issues, and Wolfe tries to get all cute.) It would seem that “minor” is shifting toward “major” as Callahan finishes his second full month of recuperation.

Strangely absent from the weak attempt at clarity by the Entercom people is a line or two from Callahan himself. We know he’s having trouble talking, but would two lines of typed copy from Callahan (he’s still writing for the Herald, remember) have been too much to ask for? Wouldn’t that really have gone a longer way in putting some of the whispers and rumors to rest?

Callahan, according to Christian Megliola, Regan’s Senior Vice President/Chief Sports Strategist, is not available for comment.

The Wolfe words also do little to dispel the increasingly loud whispers that John Dennis and Callahan are not going to be renewed by Entercom. The duo’s contract is thought to expire in the next several weeks.

Once again the weasly, squirrelly Wolfe is attempting - poorly - to control his station’s message by not saying anything and blowing smoke. It’s how we’ve come to expect Wolfe and Entercom to operate in their role as the market’s big, bad, sports radio station that sees itself as invincible.

At some point, you’d think the listening public would finally get fed up. But then again, when your listening public adores Meaty men and DeAwful denizens, it’s not the most discerning community.

As the Track Gals will surely say tomorrow, “Do stay tuned!”

. . . Also simmering around the ‘EEI building is word out of Bruins world that Dale Arnold will not be asked back for Bruins broadcast duties on NESN. That move, too, will play itself out over the next several weeks, Shots has been told.



David Scott writes from a seaside shanty on the shores of Hull, 
Mass. and can be reached at shotsATbostonsportsmedDOTcom

You can listen to Scott every Saturday morning from 9 to 11 a.m. as he co-hosts the Boston Sports Review Show on ESPN Radio 890 AM with ESPN’s new All-Sports Reporter, Mike Salk.