There is a fundamental question every News Talk programmer eventually has to answer, particularly when a meaningful local daypart opens up: do you fill those hours with another nationally available voice talking about the same stories everybody else is talking about, or do you invest in people who can actually walk outside the studio and recognize the city they’re broadcasting to? 93.1 WIBC is choosing the second path. Johnette Cruz and Brian Baker will take control of the station’s 9 a.m. to noon block beginning October 5, pairing a journalist already working inside WIBC’s Indianapolis newsroom with a familiar station personality returning home to Indiana after time in Atlanta. And perhaps the most important thing about the new show isn’t who is sitting behind the microphones. It’s what WIBC wants those microphones pointed toward: Indianapolis.
That’s worth talking about.
Because local News Talk should actually be…
LOCAL.
Crazy concept.
😂
WIBC Had A Hole To Fill
The 9-to-noon period has been operating without a permanent identity, with WIBC rotating personalities through the slot while management worked through what came next. The station’s podcast archive shows just how active that audition process became, with different hosts and combinations occupying the program during September.
And here’s the important part.
Cruz and Baker have already done the show together.
They filled in as a team earlier this month.
That means this isn’t necessarily two résumés being stapled together because somebody decided they looked compatible on paper.
WIBC got to hear them.
The audience got to hear them.
Management got to evaluate what happened when the microphones opened.
Then the station made its choice.
That’s how you build a show.
Johnette Cruz Is An Interesting Choice For Talk Radio
Cruz brings something to the table that traditional News Talk could use more of:
A different road into the format.
She’s currently a news anchor and multimedia content producer for WIBC, where her work already ranges across Indianapolis and Indiana news. In recent days alone, her reporting for the station has included state economic development and local community stories.
But her résumé isn’t confined to a newsroom.
She has Rock radio in her background from 103X WRZX.
She worked within the Christian AC world at Shine FM.
She spent time at AAA 92.3 WTTS.
She’s worked in promotions.
She’s worked on air.
She’s created digital content.
And she’s developed her own podcasting work around news, culture, society and lifestyle. Her own biography describes a career that has also included television reporting, communications and social strategy.
That’s a pretty unusual toolbox for News Talk.
Good.
Because News Talk Does Not Need Another Carbon Copy
The format has occasionally fallen into the trap of believing there is only one way a talk-radio personality is supposed to sound.
There isn’t.
Great talk radio is storytelling.
It’s curiosity.
It’s preparation.
It’s conversation.
It’s knowing when to challenge somebody.
It’s knowing when to shut up and let somebody tell their story.
It’s understanding that the person calling from Speedway may occasionally be more interesting than the national pundit waiting on Line 3.
And perhaps most importantly, it’s having something resembling a life outside politics.
Indianapolis listeners don’t spend every waking moment arguing about Washington.
They have jobs.
Families.
Neighborhoods.
Schools.
Sports.
Restaurants.
Road construction.
Crime.
Taxes.
Weather.
Culture.
People doing extraordinary things.
People doing extraordinarily stupid things.
😂
That’s a talk show.
Then Brian Baker Comes Home
Baker brings a different kind of familiarity.
He’s worked at WIBC before.
Now, after his most recent chapter in Atlanta, he’s heading back to Indiana for another run behind a WIBC microphone. The station’s own announcement makes clear that his background stretches beyond conventional talk radio, including financial programming and even work as a television stunt driver.
Wait.
A stunt driver?
Okay.
NOW I HAVE QUESTIONS.
😂
And that’s exactly the kind of résumé wrinkle that can make somebody interesting on the radio.
Life experience matters.
The best talk personalities aren’t necessarily people who spent their entire adult lives moving from radio station to radio station.
Sometimes the most interesting broadcaster is the person who has actually done some stuff.
Baker has.
Now he’s coming home.
And Home Should Matter
This is the piece I like most.
The new program is being built around the idea that Indianapolis itself should drive the conversation.
That’s exactly where local News Talk has an advantage.
WIBC can talk about whatever everybody else is talking about nationally.
Of course it can.
But so can thousands of podcasts.
So can YouTube.
So can SiriusXM.
So can every national network.
So can your phone.
What those platforms cannot do nearly as well is wake up knowing what Indianapolis is talking about.
That’s WIBC’s turf.
Talk About The Damn City
What’s happening downtown?
What’s happening in Carmel?
What’s happening in Fishers?
What’s happening in Greenwood?
What’s happening with the Colts?
The Pacers?
Indiana?
Purdue?
The Statehouse?
Why is that road closed?
Why did that business disappear?
Who’s opening something?
Who’s closing something?
Who screwed something up?
Who quietly did something wonderful nobody else noticed?
TALK ABOUT IT.
That’s local radio.
Not three hours of nationally syndicated outrage with Indianapolis weather dropped into the breaks.
Indianapolis.
Indianapolis.
Indianapolis.
Then when the national story is big enough to matter?
Talk about that too.
But bring it home.
Cruz Gives The Show A Built In Reporting Advantage
This is where having an actual journalist behind one of the microphones can become extremely valuable.
Cruz isn’t merely consuming stories.
She’s producing them.
She’s interviewing people.
She’s writing.
She’s already working inside the WIBC news operation.
That creates opportunities most talk shows don’t use nearly enough.
Something breaks locally?
Go find out what happened.
Call somebody.
Bring the reporter into the room.
Ask another question.
Get the source.
Then discuss it.
That’s infinitely more compelling than reading somebody else’s article into a microphone and spending fifteen minutes becoming angry about it.
REPORT FIRST.
Then talk.
There’s a concept News Talk ought to rediscover.
Baker Can Give Her Something Equally Important
A partner.
Because two-person talk radio works differently.
Done correctly, the audience isn’t merely listening to two hosts.
They’re listening to a relationship.
Cruz doesn’t need Baker agreeing with everything she says.
Baker doesn’t need Cruz setting him up for his next opinion.
They need tension.
Curiosity.
Humor.
Surprises.
Moments where one says something and the other genuinely wasn’t expecting it.
They need stories about each other.
They need recurring arguments.
They need the audience eventually knowing which one is going to react before either of them does.
That’s chemistry.
And chemistry cannot be manufactured by memo.
It has to develop.
Thankfully WIBC Apparently Tested That Part
This is another reason I like the process.
Management didn’t simply select two names.
The station experimented with different people and different combinations before settling on Cruz and Baker, and the two had already occupied the 9-to-noon microphones together before being handed the permanent assignment.
Smart.
Because radio programmers can sometimes become fascinated with résumés.
Listeners don’t hear résumés.
THEY HEAR CHEMISTRY.
Nobody driving I-465 at 10:17 in the morning cares that Host A previously worked in Market X and Host B once won Award Y.
Are they interesting?
Do I like them?
Do they make me laugh?
Did they tell me something I didn’t know?
Do they understand my city?
Do I want to hear what they say next?
That’s the ratings book.
Everything else is biography.
There Is Another Interesting Detail
The show doesn’t even have a publicly announced name yet.
WIBC says that’s still coming.
I actually like that.
Don’t force it.
Let the personalities breathe.
Find the chemistry.
Figure out what the show really is.
Then name the damn thing.
Radio has occasionally done this backward.
Come up with an enormous logo.
Create imaging.
Design T-shirts.
Develop a clever show name.
Then discover the hosts have absolutely nothing to say to each other.
😂
Content first.
Logo later.
And This Is A Significant Daypart
Nine to noon isn’t filler.
Morning drive has established the day’s news.
Now the audience has time to react.
The workday has started.
Stories are developing.
Phones can open.
Interviews can breathe.
News can break during the program.
And at noon, the show hands the audience into Tony Katz Today, which WIBC currently schedules from noon to 3.
That gives Cruz and Baker an important role inside the station’s daily architecture.
They’re not warming up the transmitter.
They’re carrying the conversation.
On The Dial Perspective
Here’s what I hope WIBC does now.
Leave them alone long enough to become good.
Every new talk show needs time.
The first week will be weird.
The timing won’t always work.
They’ll step on each other.
A segment somebody thought was brilliant will die spectacularly at 9:37 on a Wednesday morning.
Welcome to radio.
😂
Don’t panic.
Let them develop language.
Let them develop benchmarks.
Let listeners learn their personalities.
Let Indianapolis become part of the show.
Let them disagree.
Let them be funny.
Let them occasionally get uncomfortable.
Let them tell stories.
And for the love of everything involving an antenna…
DON’T PROGRAM THE HUMANITY OUT OF THEM.
That’s the stuff people actually remember.
Indianapolis Gets Two Local Microphones Back
That’s ultimately why this move matters.
Johnette Cruz already has roots inside the WIBC newsroom and Indianapolis media.
Brian Baker already knows WIBC and is coming back to Indiana.
They’ve already tried the microphones together.
Now they get the room permanently.
Monday, October 5.
9 a.m.
Three hours.
Five days a week.
No announced show name yet.
That’s okay.
They already have the most important piece.
INDIANAPOLIS.
Make the city funny.
Make it angry.
Make it think.
Make it call.
Make it argue.
Make it laugh.
Tell its stories.
And when something happens that everybody in Central Indiana will be talking about at dinner that night?
Make damn sure they heard about it from Johnette Cruz and Brian Baker first.
That’s local talk radio.
And if WIBC lets these two build around that?
The name will take care of itself.
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