R&R Street Talk: Another Bird-Brained Radio Bit

And, since it involves our friend and Steel-town country PD Keith Clark, I feel fine about stealing the item. (However, since I do not possess the writing savoir faire of Kevin Carter, I have elected to lift it verbatim and hope for plagiarism grace from Radio & Records):

No one was more pleased than we were to see that this weekend’s AFC Championship game has helped to revive the spirit of those old-school, larger-than-life radio stunts, like, say, convincing your mayor to change his name to coincide with your favorite football team. Such was the case in Pittsburgh, where Mayor Luke Ravenstahl’s last name happens to carry the unfortunate stigma of containing the name of the Steelers’ hated AFC rivals, the Baltimore Ravens. To remedy that accident of birth, His Honor joined the morning show on CBS Hot AC WZPT (Star 100.7)/Pittsburgh yesterday and officially changed his name to “Steeler-stahl” (get it?).

“On behalf of the Steelers Nation ... nation ... nation [echo added in post-production], I’ve decided to remove the word ‘Ravens’ from my name just like the Steelers will remove them from the AFC Championship,” the newly anointed Steeler-stahl remarked during a press conference. The change will remain in effect until the Steelers (hopefully) beat the Ravens this Sunday — or until 60 Minutes starts, whichever comes first.

Steelers To Dine On Raven This Sunday: CBS/Pittsburgh VP of Programming Clark explains how this swell idea ignited: “We were sitting around brainstorming ways to eliminate any potential jinx for the Steelers, and it hit JR that our mayor’s name is ‘Raven-stahl’ — and that would not do. He was a great sport and gave us all the credit for the idea. TV stations from everywhere came down to cover it.” To keep the city’s mood cranked to “11” until Sunday, all three CBS stations (B94, Star 100.7 and Country Y108) will be hosting the “Balti-moron Bird Bash” all day Friday. “For a donation to charity, listeners can smash an old ‘Skylark’ painted like the hated Ravens,” says Clark. “We’ve always had so much fun with the Steelers fans here come playoff time ... but this year is weird. We’ve got two flocks of birds to get through to our sixth Super Bowl ring: first, the Ravens; then, the Eagles or Cardinals. The whole staff is wearing face masks to avoid the avian flu!”

(gosh, someday, I hope to grow up to write like that...)