It’s going to be fascinating going forward to discover how Shertenlieb’s show fares ratings-wise compared with “Toucher and Hardy” and WEEI’s “The Greg Hill Show.”
Sometimes when you move to a new home, you’ll bring something with you that you thought you’d left behind.
Rich Shertenlieb, whose eponymous new morning-drive program debuted Monday on WZLX, a little more than six months after he left 98.5 The Sports Hub, remembered his address at iHeartMedia studios in Medford just fine.
But the new phone number? Amusingly and completely understandably, that was a different story.
In the third hour of the program, Shertenlieb gave out the phone number to his old workplace, one that he probably said hundreds of times during his nearly 15 years at the Sports Hub, rather than the number for callers to reach his new show.
Ted Johnson, who cohosted Monday along with Michael Hurley, immediately alerted Shertenlieb to his gaffe.
“Oh yeah, don’t call that one,” said Shertenlieb with a laugh. “It’s muscle memory, man. But I’m damn glad to be here.”
During the next commercial break, Shertenlieb chuckled off-air about giving out the old digits. “I’ll do it probably every morning for at least a month,” he said.
That’s how it goes with any new show, which is one reason why it’s wise to give changes in radio programming or personnel a little time to take shape before assessing how they are working out.
Case in point, coincidentally: The Sports Hub’s “Toucher and Hardy” program. Rob “Hardy” Poole replaced Shertenlieb as Fred Toucher’s co-host. Their pairing wasn’t as seamless as I expected, but the show has steadily improved — while maintaining excellent ratings — since Hardy’s official debut Jan. 4.
No grand conclusions can be drawn from opening day of Shertenlieb’s show, but it did manage to sound both familiar and new. Hurley, who will cohost daily, and Johnson were frequent contributors to “Toucher and Rich,” and that was evident in the ease of their conversation, whether talking about the Celtics, Johnson’s appreciation for bands that emerged in the grunge era, or assorted other topics.
Shertenlieb, as expected, brought some of his more popular bits from the Sports Hub with him, including “Brookline 911,” when he and his cohosts riff on frivolous calls people make to emergency assistance services in various — and almost always affluent — Massachusetts towns and cities.
Early in the show, Shertenlieb was extra amped, which pushed Hurley and Johnson into the background a bit. It’s something Shertenlieb mentioned might happen when I talked to him last week, and he addressed it again Monday. “Just know that I’m always going to be scattered,” he said.
What’s new? Hurley, a relative radio novice whose dry sense of humor will grow on the audience, handles the sports updates, which are being called “Front and Center.” Those had a glitch or two, which, again, it’s day one. It happens. Mostly, the show felt much like the ones when Toucher would be absent and Shertenlieb would be in the No. 1 chair at the Sports Hub.
Shertenlieb has chosen not to counter the jabs Toucher and other Sports Hub hosts have occasionally taken at him since his departure, and he remained resolute in that regard Monday.
“This perception that you have to hate the place that you used to work, that’s really not true,’’ he said.
But he did acknowledge one frustration with his old place of employment from late in his time there: A battle over social media accounts Shertenlieb operated there — ones he said he set up himself years before working at the company, with an archive of meaningful personal messages — resulted in him spending “five figures” with a trademark attorney before deciding to give up the fight and cede the accounts to the company.
“I have to be honest, that did rub me the wrong way,” he said. “I did feel that it was something that was not only unnecessary, but it affected my relationship with you, the listener.”
He said he will donate $10,000 to the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute when the number of followers on his new X.com account, @heyrichhey, matches the 150,000 he had on the “Toucher and Rich” account.
It’s going to be fascinating going forward to discover how Shertenlieb’s show fares ratings-wise compared with “Toucher and Hardy” and WEEI’s “The Greg Hill Show.”
I’m honestly not sure what to expect. That’s a story for the weeks and months to come.
Monday was about Day 1, a new beginning, and yet a familiar vibe. After six months off the air while keeping a low profile, Shertenlieb returned Monday and reconnected with his listeners — even if the phone number wasn’t always right.
