WNSR

Infobox Radio station
name = WNSR


city = Brentwood, Tennessee
area = Nashville, Tennessee
branding = SportsRadio
slogan =
airdate =
frequency = 560 kHz
format = Sports radio, Talk radio
power = 4500 Watts (daytime)
75 Watts (nighttime)
erp =
class = Class D
callsign_meaning = Nashville's SportsRadio
former_callsigns =
owner = Southern Wabash Communications of Middle Tennessee, Inc.
licensee =
sister_stations =
webcast = [http://stream.wnsr.com stream.wnsr.com]
website = [http://www.wnsr.com www.wnsr.com]
affiliations =

WNSR is a Nashville-area Class D radio station operating on the AM frequency of 560 kHz. WNSR's majority owner is Randolph Victor Bell, and the station's general manager is former WSM personality Ted Johnson.

The station began its current format under the call letters WYOR in Brentwood, Tennessee in 1996.

WNSR converted to its current format in 1996, when all-sports programming began its meteoric rise in the North American radio market, particularly on AM stations. It was previously affiliated with ESPN Radio; however, in 2005, ESPN moved its affiliation to WNFN (then WNPL), an FM station. WNSR is currently affiliated with the Spoting News Radio Network (formerly One-On-One Sports).

WNSR broadcasts a mixture of local and national sports events and local and national sports talk shows. It once served as the "backup" affiliate of the Nashville Predators NHL team, originating their games when the primary affiliate, WGFX-FM, has a conflicting commitment to the Vanderbilt University sports network.

WNSR has employed a number of on-air personalities from the affable if slovenly Chip Ramsey (1996-2000) to Tennessee sports writing legend Joe Biddle (2006-present). In between, there have been a plethora of Middle Tennessee sports journalists including the great duo of Greg Pogue and David Coleman (a pair which has anchored the morning show since 2002), Greg Ruff, Don West and Tim Swift (stalwarts in the mid-day slot from 2003 until September of 2008), Bill King (a man who would be inducted into a Middle Tennessee sports talk radio Hall of Fame if there was such a thing), Eric Yutzy and Bob McClellan. The station has also aired a number of national and regional shows, including the Dan Patrick-Rob Dibble and Tony Kornheiser shows from their ESPN days, and the Tim Brando and the awful Two Live Stews shows from their current Sporting News Radio affiliation as well as the quirky-yet-lovable Maxed Out Show starring the folksy ex-coach Max Howell.

Greg Pogue and David Coleman, in particular, have gained a loyal following which has allowed Pogue to make Milwaukee Brewer and Western Kentucky Hilltopper fans of thousands of Middle Tennesseans and which has given Coleman an lucrative outlet for his fabulous line of barbecue seasonings (Coleman's Dynamic Rib Rub and Rib Nuts) and a platform for his shameless promotion of the Arkansas Razorbacks and their former coach, the hilariously-named Houston Nutt (it is heavily debated in Nashville whether or not Nutt has a stake in Coleman's Rib Nuts or if the Rib Nut name is simply a reference to Coleman's Nuts and nothing more). Pogue and Coleman were both raised in the rural South. They tend to engage in wonderful reparte which often strays far from the subject matter at hand.

The most calamitous development in the history of WNSR (apart from the loss of the Armada Vans advertising contract when Thrify Rental Car bought out Armada) was the canceling of the wildly popular early-afternoon show starring former late-night home-shopping network legend and TNA Wrestling announcer Don West and his lovable sidekick Tim Swift. West and Swift (and their weekly guests Bob McClellan, Eric Yutzy, Greg Ruff and others) were replaced by an obnoxious duo from the Sporting News Radio network calling themselves the Two Live Stews. West and Swift were noted for their shameless allegiance to Titans quarterback Vince Young even AFTER he went nuts and became the NFL's favorite infant but their show was enjoyed by many in the Middle Tennessee area.

Bill King, the drive-time host since 2003 (joined by Joe Biddle in 2006) has been a fixture on Nashville sports talk radio since the mid-1980's and his candid assessments of the University of Tennessee and Tennessee Titans have won him a loyal listenership for more than two decades. King has also made it a tradition of reading emails on-air, including engaging missives from such listeners as Gator Jay, the Bull Gator and the wonderful Flashy Bull. King has also attracted and brilliantly cultivated such callers as Small Mike, giving his show an unparalleled menagerie of talk-radio gold: nutty yet interesting callers. Biddle first enjoyed talk radio fame as a side-item on Nashville's sports talk ratings juggernaut "Sports Night" with George Plaster. He joined King in 2006 after an unsuccessful radio bid with the execrable Blake Fulton after Biddle acrimoniously split with Plaster.

WNSR has attracted an array of odd callers from the late Jay Rosen (who called himself Gator Jay on air and who tormented Tennessee Vol fans for years) to the ubiquitous Small Mike who torments EVERYONE whether calling from his East Tennessee estate or from his Charleston, SC beach house.

WNSR is licensed to the Nashville suburb of Brentwood, Tennessee in adjoining Williamson County. Its 4,500-watt daytime signal is transmitted from a four-tower antenna in eastern Williamson County in a north-northeast/south-southeast directional pattern; this is due in part to the 5,000-watt daytime signal of a much older Class B 560 kHz station, WHBQ, just under 200 airline miles away in Memphis. As a result, WNSR's signal can be very difficult to receive in Nashville's eastern and especially western suburbs, but the station can be heard clearly from as far away as South Central Kentucky and North Alabama between sunrise and sunset. At night, when WHBQ has a 1,000-watt signal, WNSR broadcasts at an even more limited level of power (75 watts) from a nondirectional, one-tower antenna just southeast of downtown Nashville. Thus, the station's nighttime signal does not fully encompass the entire metropolitan area.

ee also

*List of Nashville media

External links

* [http://www.wnsr.com Official station website]
*amq|WNSR