Saga Communications isn’t simply filling an executive vacancy.
It’s handing the programming keys to two people who already know where every curve in the road is.
With Senior Vice President of Content Pat Paxton preparing to depart Saga at the end of August, the company has officially named Scott Chase and Ryan Ploeckelman Directors of Group Programming, putting the pair in position to help steer programming strategy across Saga’s portfolio.
And the more you look at these two résumés, the more this decision makes sense.
One has already held a version of this job.
The other literally grew up professionally inside Saga.
This isn’t throwing two names at an organizational chart. Saga went straight to the bench and promoted people who know how its stations actually work.
Scott Chase Has Basically Been Here Before
Let’s start with Chase, because there’s an important piece of history attached to this appointment.
Before Paxton arrived at Saga in 2023, Chase had already served in a group programming leadership position beginning in 2020.
So Saga isn’t asking somebody to suddenly figure out how to oversee programming across multiple markets.
Chase knows the assignment.
He knows the company.
He knows the stations.
He knows the programmers.
He knows the culture.
And perhaps most importantly, he understands the difference between programming a group of stations and trying to make a group of stations all sound the same.
Those are not the same thing.
And Chase Has Done a Little Bit of Everything
His programming résumé stretches through an impressive collection of markets and formats.
There has been Nashville.
Tampa.
Rockford.
Melbourne.
Scranton.
Sarasota.
And a substantial history inside Saga itself, including leadership in Clarksville, Tennessee, before his current responsibilities overseeing the company’s Ocala, Florida operation.
That matters because great group programmers aren’t supposed to walk into every market carrying the same cookie cutter.
What works in Nashville may not work in Ocala.
What works in Clarksville may fall completely flat somewhere else.
A group programmer should be asking:
What makes THIS station special?
Then figure out how to make more people notice it.
Chase has spent enough time in enough different radio environments to understand that distinction.
Then There Is Ryan Ploeckelman
And this might be the part of the announcement we like most.
Ploeckelman’s Saga story goes all the way back to 2005.
He didn’t arrive at corporate headquarters with an executive title and a suitcase full of PowerPoints.
He started as a morning-show co-host at Q108 WCVQ in Clarksville.
Then he grew.
More responsibility.
Programming duties.
Leadership.
Eventually Operations Manager.
And now:
Director of Group Programming.
That’s how radio is supposed to develop people.
Give somebody a microphone.
Discover they can do more.
Give them something else.
Let them learn.
Let them lead.
Let them screw something up occasionally.
Let them fix it.
Give them another responsibility.
And twenty-one years later, that person understands the company from the studio all the way to the executive level.
THAT is institutional knowledge.
There’s Something Refreshingly Old School About This
And we mean that as a compliment.
Radio used to be full of stories like this.
The overnight personality became the night personality.
The night personality became afternoons.
Afternoons became Music Director.
Music Director became APD.
APD became Program Director.
Program Director became Operations Manager.
Operations Manager became Market Manager or corporate programmer.
You learned the business by doing the business.
Somewhere along the way, consolidation and shrinking staffs made that ladder considerably harder to climb.
That’s why Ploeckelman’s story deserves attention.
Saga developed somebody internally for more than two decades and is now entrusting him with broader responsibility across the company.
Good.
More of that, please.
And Pairing These Two Could Be the Smartest Part
Because Chase and Ploeckelman bring different perspectives to the table.
Chase brings the broader multi-market résumé and, critically, previous experience operating at the group programming level.
Ploeckelman brings more than two decades of Saga DNA and the perspective of somebody who climbed through the organization from morning radio into operations leadership.
Put those together and you’ve got something interesting.
Experience plus continuity.
And instead of replacing Paxton’s role with another singular programming executive, Saga is spreading the responsibility between two established operators.
That could create more direct access for local programmers.
More coaching.
More ears.
More perspectives.
And potentially less of the dreaded corporate-radio phenomenon where one person 700 miles away suddenly decides every station needs the exact same clock by Thursday.
But Here’s What We Really Hope Saga Does
Let them program.
Seriously.
Don’t make them spreadsheet administrators.
Don’t bury them in meetings until they forget what a radio studio looks like.
Don’t turn two programmers into professional conference-call attendees.
Let them listen to stations.
Let them coach personalities.
Let them work with morning shows.
Let them discover talent.
Let them challenge programmers.
Let them argue about music.
Let them help struggling brands.
Let them celebrate the stations that are kicking everybody’s rear ends.
And most importantly:
Let local stations remain local.
Because that is where Saga has an opportunity to distinguish itself.
Radio Does Not Need Another Factory
The easiest thing in corporate programming is standardization.
Same clock.
Same imaging philosophy.
Same playlist philosophy.
Same contests.
Same syndicated talent.
Same voice.
Same everything.
Congratulations.
You’ve achieved operational efficiency.
You’ve also potentially created 40 radio stations nobody could identify without hearing the legal ID.
Saga’s strength has historically been its focus on individual markets and local execution.
Chase and Ploeckelman should protect that like it’s sitting behind bulletproof glass.
Give programmers resources.
Give them guidance.
Give them data.
Give them coaching.
But allow Ocala to sound like Ocala.
Allow Clarksville to sound like Clarksville.
Allow each Saga market to have some fingerprints of its own.
That’s how local radio fights back against infinite audio choice.
Because Spotify Cannot Beat Radio at Being Clarksville
Spotify can play the song.
So can Apple Music.
So can YouTube.
So can approximately 9,000 other platforms.
They cannot easily recreate a personality who has lived in the market for fifteen years and knows why everybody in town is talking about what happened yesterday.
That’s radio’s advantage.
And group programming leadership in 2026 should be obsessed with protecting it.
The question isn’t simply:
How do we make the stations more efficient?
It’s:
How do we make them impossible to replace?
That’s a much more interesting assignment.
And Pat Paxton Leaves Behind a Serious Chair
None of this diminishes the significance of Paxton’s departure.
Paxton brought decades of major-market, multi-format and corporate programming experience into Saga when he arrived in 2023.
Replacing that experience isn’t something accomplished by changing two titles in an email signature.
But Saga appears to be approaching the transition differently.
Instead of trying to find another Pat Paxton, it’s building the next structure around Scott Chase and Ryan Ploeckelman.
That’s probably the right approach.
Don’t recreate yesterday.
Build tomorrow.
This Is Also a Message to Saga’s Programmers
Your new group programming leaders understand the job you’re doing.
That’s important.
Chase is currently operating in Ocala.
Ploeckelman has spent years running Clarksville.
They understand what happens when somebody calls out sick.
They understand ratings morning.
They understand the promotion that looked fantastic on paper and became a complete disaster at the event.
They understand the salesperson who wants a six-minute client interview at 7:40 tomorrow morning.
They understand the air personality who absolutely swears the mic was off.
It was not off.
They’ve lived radio.
That should matter to the people they’ll now be helping lead.
An On The Dial Perspective
Saga’s decision to elevate Scott Chase and Ryan Ploeckelman feels less like an emergency replacement for Pat Paxton and more like a deliberate bet on people who already understand the company. Chase brings previous group programming experience and a résumé built across multiple markets, while Ploeckelman represents something radio desperately needs to preserve: internal talent development. He joined Saga as a morning personality in 2005 and has worked his way into companywide programming leadership. That’s not just a promotion. That’s what a career path in radio is supposed to look like.
Now comes the fun part.
Scott Chase has been around this block before.
Ryan Ploeckelman has spent more than two decades climbing through Saga.
Pat Paxton is preparing to hand over the programming responsibilities.
And Saga has essentially told two of its own:
You guys have the wheel.
So drive.
Take chances.
Find talent.
Coach the hell out of people.
Protect local radio.
Build personalities.
Make stations fun again.
And every once in a while, give the research a day off and do something completely ridiculous simply because listeners might actually remember it.
Because radio doesn’t need more perfectly efficient audio appliances.
It needs radio stations people give a damn about.
Congratulations, Scott Chase and Ryan Ploeckelman.
Now turn it up.
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