It's not a boy-who-cried-wolf; it's been a station constant, only this time the volcano is about to BLOW UP!
*How does KTVU make it these days? On pins and needles and constant crisis alerts.
Where's The Firm? Never mind.
Starrantino is not respected at PIX, I'm told, they only acknowledge her because she works there, for now.
*YOU WONDER how these supposed people in power at the local stations get away with it. Are they in denial? Do they ever visit outside their own bubble? Are they accountable? Do they ever check the outside meter? God, if so, are they teetering on the abyss.
*Egg shells: Justine Waldman, KRON.
*Clint Reilly owns the Examiner and has been out of sight and out of mind lately and I'm told there's a reason: "He's not well, " said someone who knows.
*Nexstar will retain Ken Wayne at KRON as an insurance deal, hardly a vote of confidence for Wayne.
*I LIKE Kim Vestal, the PM drive traffic anchor on KCBS, quite a bit in fact.
Vestal knows her geography and she demonstrates that practice on a daily (Mon-Fri) basis. Her traffic accumen is steller. And she has a great voice, a pleasant personality and wry sense of humor to boot. She's a major reason I listen to KCBS during the weekday PM drive.
Amanda Starrantino....does the carpet match the drapes? Hmm...
ReplyDeleteYou should see her without makeup. She’s not even recognizable or even the least bit attractive. Globs of makeup and some studio lighting can work miracles.
DeleteHer and Kristen Sze look unrecognizable without makeup
DeleteI don't think it does.
DeleteThe sad thing is alot of these young weathercasters and anchors nowadays are lacking carpet. All hardwood floors. Sad reality. Can we go back to the days of Christine's era where everyone had shag carpeting?
That's what I ask about Katie Nielsen. Is any part on her not plastic?
DeleteEverything about Nielsen is fake. She even buys fake Instagram followers and likes just to give the illusion that people give a damn about her.
DeleteIt’s actually a sad way to live where everything about you and what people know about you is a facade.
Tim, this isn’t Carrows. Start paying for your meals in my house.
DeleteGrandma
Considering Amanda's appearance, sans makeup, it is shocking how old she is. Or should I say, isn't. And I've gotten the impression that she seems cavalier about the inordinate amount of time off that she takes. So Rich's comments, in this entry, don't surprise me.
Delete3:54 you’re absolutely right. One of the big problems is that KPIX touted their hiring of Starantino as though she was the second coming of Christ … the answer to all that plagues them. They committed to her that they would build the entire morning show around her. As an example, KPIX wouldn’t hire the LT unless Starantino, along with others in management, approved the hire.
DeleteSo now she feels like she has them over a barrel, like kpix needs her more than KPIX. Because of this she feels she calls the shots and can get away with anything, including missing 80-85% of her work shifts and boasting about it on social media
Amanda is clearly buying IG followers like Jessica Burch. It's so tacky and pathetic. Matches their on-air skills.
DeleteAmanda & Kristen are Coyote Ugly if you are unfortunate to see them sans make-up. Yikes! How much to haunt a house?
DeleteInteresting, and credible, 4:53.
DeleteI interpret that as a situation where Amanda is assuming that she has some leverage, i.e. she has taken the liberty to "take advantage." This, IMO, reflects very poorly on her character. And it is especially galling, given her middling talent and performance levels.
@4:53 PM Bingo.
Delete5:36 - you’re spot on. Katie Nielson started the trend of buying followers and likes. The LT followed suit and now Starantino has caught on and is trying to play catch up.
DeleteI will say however that it seems like the LT has let her foot off the gas pedal ever since people on this blog began exposing her fakeness. It could just be coincidence. Perhaps she ran out of money and is waiting for her next paycheck…or next sugar daddy. Regardless, when her pathetic behavior first came to light a few weeks ago I went to her page and noticed she was gaining about 1,000 followers daily, 99.5% of which were Arabic-language or Pakistan-based accounts with one photo and following 7,500 accounts. Then as more people took notice issued comments and became more vocal, it all of a sudden stopped at 109k, and now it’s dropping again (Probably as Instagram finds and deactivates these fake accounts)
This is what happens when you hire talentless bimbos more concerned about pretending to be important, than excelling at what they were hired to do.
Further proof of what happens when you have absentee and utterly incompetent management incapable of running a lemonade stand, much less a news operation:
DeleteYou end up with situations like Starantino and the LT, and the entire shitshow otherwise known as ktvu.
Normally I’m not to judge but when Burch came along, first 2 days was confused if that was Amanda or someone else. Then started thinking they would automatically be best friends. Thats not a bad thing but really what involvement would Starrantino have on a new meteorologist hire? What if the next AM meteorologist is a black, Asian or hispanic? Management should only have a say.
DeleteBesides, I have seen she has taken vacation after vacation recently via IG stories, but the reality is I care less about her as I’m not a big fan of Starrantino so her absence isn’t a big deal to me and the morning team is surviving well without her presence.
It’s a bit more of a problem on the meteorology, sports side and also the solo anchoring time slots. They need at least 1 more meteorologist at least on a weekend morning & probably Mary Lee should fill in if she is available (maybe not in the AM).
She has her own website outside of PIX's. It's pretty awful, but the video page really makes me scratch my head. http://www.amandastarrantino.com/video.html
DeleteI don't get the whole top part, that's all text. Then a few links to stuff you can find on YouTube.
???
And she sounds like she just learned how to read last week.
I need to begin this comment by acknowledging I may very likely be the least attractive man on this planet. Partly self-deprecating but mostly true. Regardless, I’m in zero position to insult the way someone looks.
DeleteThat said, I will say I went to Amanda’s Instagram after reading these comments. I wanted to see what all the fuss was about.
All I’m going to say is, wow. I had to triple check to make sure I clicked on the right Amanda. She looks nothing remotely like her TV self. Nothing. I thought it was a different person.
Not an insult. Just an observation.
I agree with all of the comments above mine, especially 4:53pm.
DeleteI remember all the commercials KPIX ran about Starrantino’s arrival when she was first hired. It was nonstop. Nauseating. I’d never seen anything like it, much less for a local morning anchor. They even had Len Kiese embarrass himself by making those strange commercials where he gushed about how excited he was to work with her. We quickly learned just how phony those commercials were when he high-tailed it out of there the first chance he got without even having another job lined up. Or, as KPIX said, he wanted to “spend more time with his family.” (Yeah, they had the nerve to say that.)
Amanda S. is precisely what can go wrong when you give someone too much power, or even the illusion of too much power. Some people will use that power responsibly. Others, like Starrantino, will take advantage of it, abuse it, move on, and leave you to deal with the fallout. And very often the fallout includes losing good employees who don’t want to work in a toxic, demoralizing workplace.
You can bet The LT and Amanda have pretty solid 2 or 3 year contracts that were negotiated by top talent agents.
Delete7:50 - I actually noticed this too. In fact when you go the section on a profile where they’re tagged, I was a little shocked when I saw some Arabic followers putting photos of themselves and tagging random people. I think one Indian did that too and I was like wtf.
DeleteI don’t know where you’re getting onto in terms of “sugar daddy”. Chances are we do not know what is happening in her personal and dating life. Not to say that her current boyfriend is a sugar daddy, maybe he isn’t. No point in judging unless there is strong evidence indicating so.
Besides Burch is out this whole week, it’s day 4 with Peck and I know Burch will not be back tomorrow and likely next week. While Peck just says he’s happy to be on the AM show, his ego makes it feel he doesn’t want to be on…He was more comfortable on weekends (morning & evening) and weekday evenings filling in.
I suspect the lack of posts on LT’s page means she went on vacation to enjoy Fall colors in the Northeast as she indicated a few times over the last few months.
If thats what she expects when dating, then I would never date her or someone like that in a heartbeat.
7:53 - Are you trying to say Burch is going to wind up like Starrantino being absent on a continuous basis & straining Peck where he has to wake up every morning? Mary Lee was a great meteorologist but often took too much time off. Sounds like they can’t have a stable enough weekday morning meteorologist. Taking off is fine but too much unless its personal is another matter. Does this explain why there’s a job posting for weekday AM/noon meteorologist?
Let’s not forget LT Burch is also the same person who had (maybe still has?) a Let’s Go Brandon image as the background on her work computer, and also some Let’s Go Brandon trinkets on her desk at work.
DeletePeople are free to support whoever they want, and granted she does whether not political reporting, but Let’s Go Brandon is associated with ‘Ultra Maga’ beliefs including white supremacy and anti-LGBTQ. I’m not saying the LT is a white supremecist or anti-gay, but it’s just not a good look to have that stuff at your place of work, especially when you’re a member of the news operation at a nationally-affiliated station.
Some needs to remind Mibach that you’re not supposed to grin and smile as your co-anchor is reading a story about a child who died or someone who was murdered.
ReplyDeleteIt’s like he was told to smile more instead of looking like he’s in a constant state of constipation, and now he’s taken it to the extreme.
Julie Haener needs to start showing up to work again and teach him how to show disingenuous, phony emotion when reading a story you really don’t give a shit about.
Don't know where you're coming from. Julie's been on air regularly for the past month. It hasn't helped Mibach any.
Delete1:34, exactly. I’m pretty sure she’s only missed one day of work ever since Rich put her on blast last month and exposed how dramatic and entitled she is. Mibach hasn’t improved one iota. Though it’s kind of hard to learn anything other than bad habits from someone who doesn’t even want to be there anymore.
DeleteEverything you said, up until the Waldman part is representative of the current administration in this country and the angst of its citizens in a nutshell. All problems have solutions. I could fix all of this and not miss my tee time. However, you may not like the results.
ReplyDeleteSo then basically you’re saying Eikel is at Nordstrom 9-5, Monday-Friday.
ReplyDeleteMaybe Amanda wants to start a family having a baby and don’t give a crap about her job. When did KPIX hired a hooker look a like, I saw this reporter last night and turn to another station, the previous one is off.
ReplyDeleteI saw that on the Morning Mix. It turned off some people and even Darren Peck was sitting there wondering what the hell is going on but he did speak a bit on the connection to the job.
DeleteSome AM mix shows are good others not so much.
As grossly incompetent as Amber is, from The Firm’s perspective there is no issue so long as ktvu abides by all of The Firm’s rules including branding, running all network programming and sports, and running newscasts with 75% stories from Fox News and Fox Business.
ReplyDeleteBasically an overall “foxification” of ktvu.
I know some female employees had issues with Mibach when he was doing mornings, but it’s disappointing to hear he’s still continuing his behavior.
ReplyDeleteEven if he’s toned down the jokes and flirty innuendos since going prime time, he’s already made his bed with those he’s subjected to his odd statements and bizarre humor. Simply put, too much has occurred for him to shake that image and expect people to forget how he made them feel.
Imagine if local news were like professional sports, where anchors could be traded to another station.
ReplyDeleteThe possibilities!
So for example, you could have a blockbuster trade involving the likes of Dan Ashley, Juliette Goodrich, or maybe even a Heather Holmes.
And on the flipside, you might trade Frank Mallipoop or Ryan Yamamoto for a roll of 1-ply toilet paper.
I’m pretty sure KPIX would pay someone (likely very good money) to take Yamamoto off their hands.
DeleteGave up local TV when streaming got popular so don't know who's who anymore nor do I care.
ReplyDeleteYet you care enough to visit a blog dedicated to local tv and take time out of your life to tell everyone, anonymously, that you don't care lol
ReplyDeleteI agree with you Rich, KCBS Kim Vestal PM drive is very good and I'll take the consistency of Patti Reising and Bret Burkhart.
ReplyDeleteKCBS really needs to update their "New Staff" webpage. They have a lot of retired folks or no longer there listed.
Rich, have you noticed KPIX has now firmly joined KTVU with all promotional shit and almost no news? Since the change of guard it's become horribly prominent. If they're not doing softball stories they're pimping either what's coming later in their newscast or the CBS Evening Snoozefest with The Ice Queen, aka, Nora O'Donnell. They spend more time pimping than actually delivering news, unless you count a feature on the latest Marvel superhero movie or a story about a taqueria that's opening or closing to be "news." (I don't.)
ReplyDeleteI’ve noticed the exact same thing. I’m not as familiar with KPIX but what I’ve gathered is ktvu has officially thrown in the towel on actual journalism which involves finding impactful stories and telling those stories fair and impartially. They’ve given up. Done. Finito. No interest.
DeleteNext time you watch you’ll notice all of their stories are mostly Fox News or Fox Business stories, OR local stories that basically involve them repeating a press release they received and/or promoting a business that is desperate for publicity. So whether it’s a press statement from the Hercules fire dept that an abandoned building burned down, or a local business so desperate for publicity that they sent out a mass message to every media outlet imaginable regarding a grand opening, closing, or some other special event going on. That’s why you see crap about random shit isn’t even news. Shit that belongs on a ‘things to do’ list on the entertainment section of a website.
They sit back and wait to receive press releases and messages from attention seekers. You think I’m joking. I’m not.
But as if that isn’t bad enough, KTVU has now stooped so low as to begin running stories about businesses having a big weekend sale or one that is cutting their menu prices by 10% (because they were overpriced to begin with). Yeah, they really did a 4 minute segment on that recently.
A few years ago I saw Mike Mibach sitting on a bench with his children at the outdoor shopping center in Marin. They were sitting right outside a women’s boutique and it was obvious they were waiting for his wife. Right as I noticed him, two incredibly attractive college-aged girls with great bodies walked by.
ReplyDeleteLet’s put it this way, he gave new meaning to ‘keeping your head on a swivel.’
Rich, I have been a fan of Andrea Nakano anchoring at 11:00 pm. Now, I see Reed Cowan. WTF? I switched from KGO now if the suits make Cowan the anchor, I’ll switch back to KGO.
ReplyDelete11:20 - I’m thinking if this is still open mic for the 11PM newscast. Nakano was on the field last night.
DeleteWould like it if she comes back and takes care of the 11pm news. I don’t mind Cowan but Nakano, Choi, Fehely, Goodrich, and Hackney are miles better and if I had to pick, it would be someone besides Cowan for sure. Donchey is back on the field, I don’t expect her to turn up for the 11pm newscast anytime soon.
Donchey is better than Cowan, but I want Andrea Nakano.
DeleteWell Nakano came back last night and it was great to see her again albeit anchoring and doing sports. Think she'll be back as a regular from Monday-Friday evenings, lets wait and watch.
DeleteKim Vestal is decent but Cheryl Raines was better. Too bad she was let go
ReplyDeleteYou know these are real people, right? With actual feelings and loved ones that read your loser comments. Would you say this to their face? You guys must not be parents, or have a heart.
ReplyDeleteDaily reminder of how pathetic is: This morning Frank Mallicoat was doing a read about Covid and literally couldn’t pronounce ‘immuno-compromised.’ he stumbled over it three times and then in the background you hear Claudine pronounce it correctly for him.
ReplyDeleteHow in the hell do does an anchor not know that word 2.5 years into Covid?
Rich, can you fill us in on this?
ReplyDeleteIs Jessica Burch (LT) away from KPIX forever? There are 3 reasons I ask this…On a noon newscast a few days ago, Peck told Liz & Ryan that he’s on the morning show now. Second reason is today morning Paul Heggen is filling in for Peck, and I think Hackney will take over the rest of the weekend even without Jules. Third is obvious, job posting related.
I wouldn’t be surprised if things became even more uncomfortable for her at work when the entire station was informed that she’s buying fake follower and likes in order to upstage them all.
DeleteI have a feeling Hackney is going to cover the weather this evening and the rest of this weekend, in addition to being all by himself. It will turn out just like early March to mid May where many weekends they had Heggen cover Saturday morning and Hackney cover the rest of the weekend including Sunday morning. Both of them are great meteorologists, but I do miss the weekend morning interaction with Devin that's involved and the live views that is shown that even Darren Peck and even Mary Lee have done and Devin throwing some curveball questions and comments. That's lacking with Heggen & Hackney. I know none of those details matter and we get the info we need, but it was one of those things that made the weekend morning news more fun....I don't wake up early but I do watch my DVR recordings of it.
DeleteThis is where I want Rich to explore more and give us more information. But at the same time also confusing because even the first day they didn't say "Peck in for Jessica" like the last time he subbed.
One more question, if Heggen covers Saturday morning, does he stay overnight in the studio and cover it during the overnight and goes home? Unlike before, I (and probably many others) can't stand the fact he's dressing too casual too often, especially Fridays. He would always used to wear a tie. I have not seen anyone else anchoring or doing the weather wear casual. Help me understand please what's going on.
Maybe the LT is on her required training days. That's part of being in the National Guard.
ReplyDeleteAs much as I respect that and the fact she served our country (like many others), it's very unheard of that any meteorologist is literally doing 2 jobs at the same time (working at a news station and the other being part of the National Guard). Correct me if I am wrong so I understand how the balance works. Everything is respected, but they can't even have a stable or even enough meteorologists to cover...in that case, they need 2 more meteorologists to cover instead of just putting all the work to Darren's head. Even other stations have at least a few meteorologists and backups (more than KPIX for sure) like KNTV and likely KRON.
DeleteIt is respectable, but I feel she is almost turning into Mary Lee on the absenteeism and putting all the work on Darren's head. Why can't they hand the morning work to Hackney and put Darren back on the weekend? It's been 3 years since Hackney has been on the morning show. Some weekends there are fill in anchors for the evening anyway. I don't think Darren really enjoys being on the morning show and only claims so when he's live on TV just to be nice to the AM anchors' face. He seems bored during the Morning Mix part and really doesn't participate as much compared to say Jessica Burch...Mary Lee would always smile and participate finding things relatable. Same goes when the whole morning team is congregating in the Weather Center; others are more excited. Darren is more comfortable on the weekends talking to Devin and Brian, that's at least what I've observed as well as if he has to fill in for Paul Heggen and talks to Reed, Ryan, Liz, Andrea, Sara, etc.
With all due respect to the craft...
DeleteAll the weather info still come pretty much from the name source.
The National Weather Service.
Ya Ya I know NBC has a little network of wx radars. Yup I'm well aware of Accuweather and those other commercial "services".
It's NWS and that lame "Euro Model" that they are trying to get us all to love and accept (cuz Euro is cool).
LT isn't trying to be something she is not. She is nice, and enjoyable to watch.
Too many uneducated "critics" criticizing a business that is completely controlled by the advertisers. The ad people decide...NOT YOU!
LT is fine in my opinion from a weather anchor point of view. Lots of people above were bringing up her personal and social life and the impact.
DeleteI feel she will return this week & Peck will go back to weekends. Otherwise it is a more serious concern.
The industry is lost because the sales people are the ones that are promoted to the general manager position. Present day leadership inherited a mature business and have no idea how the nuts and bolts of tv station really functions. They are market driven and cannot be controlled remotely with the belief all markets are the same. They are not!
ReplyDeleteHi Rich, did you hear what gasia said on air about underpants? They ran a story that Victoria’s Secret profits and net income are down 50%. After the story they did brief chit chat as they sent it to Steve for weather.
ReplyDeleteGasia said “I don’t need anything fancy. I just look for the cheapest cotton underwear. They haven’t let me down yet.”