NYC Radio: ESPN Returns To Eastern Long Island

ESPN’s Michael Kay afternoon radio host Michael Kaye and his colleagues are East End bound, effective next week in a deal the station plans to announce Wednesday for a noon-to-midnight simulcast on Hampton Bays-based WLIR 107.1 FM.

WLIR-FM 107.1 FM 60dBu Coverage Area

That is good news for a part of Long Island that always has had a complex relationship with radio signals, what with all those miles separating it from New York City and all that water separating it from everything else.

"This will ensure that we cover all of the Island, particularly Suffolk County," Dave Roberts, the station's vice president and general manager, told Newsday.

To further cover central Suffolk, WLIR also will be heard at 96.9 FM, a translator based in Selden that should fill in most gaps between the 107.1 signal and ESPN's primary outlet at 98.7 FM.

It's good news for fans of ESPN Radio talk shows and/or the Knicks, Rangers and Jets. It also is a return to an arrangement from 2008-11 during which ESPN used WLIR as a supplemental outlet for its notoriously finicky 1050 AM signal.

ESPN left in 2011 when WLIR turned to a Christian programming format, and moved to FM last year. Now it's back on 107.1 as part of a new-look WLIR, which is switching to an all-sports approach and will launch its own local morning drive-time talk show next Monday, the same day the ESPN simulcast begins.

Read More Now