Media Notes

MARINERS' RADIO DEAL: In Seattle, Kossen & Bowermaster report the Mariners' new six-year radio rights deal with KOMO-AM is "believed to be the richest in baseball history — more than $10 million a year" (SEATTLE TIMES, 4/25). Steve Oshin, VP & Marker Manager of Entercom, parent of former right's holder KIRO-AM, said that he is "disappointed over the loss of the Mariners, but KIRO offered more than the radio packages" of the Yankees and Dodgers, "only to be told [KOMO] was offering still more" (SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER, 4/25). Meanwhile, the Mariners are "working out a deal to have home games broadcast in Spanish next season." Seattle's KKMO-AM would serve as flagship for affils in WA, OR and ID (SEATTLE TIMES, 4/25).

NOTES: Game Four Tuesday night of Avalanche-Kings earned an 11.9/ (164,000 HHs) Nielsen cable rating on FSN Rocky Mountain, making it the third most-watched sporting event ever to air on the net. The 11.13 two-game average for the Games One and Four is a 55% increase over the comparable '01 Avalanche-Canucks first-round series (FSN)....In Atlanta, Mike Tierney notes that since its debut in April '97, all-sports WQXI-AM The Zone "has grown into a 53-person operation" that has "elbowed its way onto the car radio push-buttons of males in greater Atlanta." Tierney: "If The Zone rises above the airwaves clutter, it's with interview guests" (ATLANTA CONSTITUTION, 4/25).