Eight CBS-owned The CW affiliates to become independent stations in September 2023

[Justin Hill]

Eight CBS Stations To Ditch CW And Go Independent This Fall

UPDATED, 9:33 a.m.: The CW is about to lose eight important affiliates: the CBS owned and operated stations that are currently affiliated with the Nexstar-owned network will become independent in S…

deadline.com

According to the article, eight CBS-owned The CW affiliates will be converted to independent stations in September 2023, including:

• KBCW 44, San Francisco, California
• KMAX-TV 31, Sacramento, California
• KSTW 11, Seattle, Washington
• WKBD-TV 50, Detroit, Michigan
• WPCW 19, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
• WPSG 57, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
• WTOG 44, Tampa, Florida
• WUPA 69, Atlanta, Georgia

 

[Justin Hill]

Where will The CW go in each of those markets, you might ask?

• San Francisco, California: It has been confirmed that a TV "musical chairs" game involving KRON-TV 4 becoming The CW's new affiliate, KBCW 44 becoming independent (and possibly changing its call letters back to KBHK) and KICU-TV 36 (owned and operated by the Fox Corporation) becoming the new home for MyNetworkTV (a program service owned by the Fox Corporation) will happen.
• Sacramento, California: Nothing yet announced...
• Seattle, Washington: Don't expect KSTW-TV 11 to do another affiliate swap with Cox-owned CBS affiliate KIRO-TV 7, the new CW affiliate is yet to be announced...
• Detroit, Michigan: The CW is moving to WADL-TV 38, the future of MyNetworkTV's affiliation to be announced...
• Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania: To be announced...
• Philadelphia, Pennsylvania: The CW will move to WPHL-TV 17, bumping MyNetworkTV onto a digital subchannel.
• Tampa, Florida: The CW will move to WTTA-TV 38, the future of MyNetworkTV to be announced...
• Atlanta, Georgia: To be announced...

 

[KyL416]

Detroit, Michigan: To be announced...

Nexstar's shell company Mission is in the process of purchasing WADL

Tampa, Florida: To be announced...

They already announced Tampa, it's going to be Nexstar's WTTA

 

[DirecTVFanSince2016]

Nexstar's shell company Mission is in the process of purchasing WADL

Maybe that’ll finally get them to get their stations back on DirecTV! Unless we somehow end up in a scenario where as soon as the sales all set and done it’s automatically blacked out as part of the STILL ongoing Mission dispute.

 

[mwdxer1]

Where will The CW go in each of those markets, you might ask?

• San Francisco, California: It has been confirmed that a TV "musical chairs" game involving KRON-TV 4 becoming The CW's new affiliate, KBCW 44 becoming independent (and possibly changing its call letters back to KBHK) and KICU-TV 36 (owned and operated by the Fox Corporation) becoming the new home for MyNetworkTV (a program service owned by the Fox Corporation) will happen.
• Sacramento, California: Nothing yet announced...
• Seattle, Washington: Don't expect KSTW-TV 11 to do another affiliate swap with Cox-owned CBS affiliate KIRO-TV 7, the new CW affiliate is yet to be announced...
• Detroit, Michigan: The CW is moving to WADL-TV 38, the future of MyNetworkTV's affiliation to be announced...
• Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania: To be announced...
• Philadelphia, Pennsylvania: The CW will move to WPHL-TV 17, bumping MyNetworkTV onto a digital subchannel.
• Tampa, Florida: The CW will move to WTTA-TV 38, the future of MyNetworkTV to be announced...
• Atlanta, Georgia: To be announced...

I would think full powered KONG 16 in Seattle would be a good candidate for a new CW.

 

[Justin Hill]

I would think full powered KONG 16 in Seattle would be a good candidate for a new CW.

If Tegna declines that offer to affiliate with The CW, their only other option would to become a subchannel of Weigel Broadcasting's full-powered Seattle MeTV affiliate KFFV 44.

 

[Justin Hill]

Someday, Paramount might drop their remaining share of The CW...if so, I just hope it means a 50/50 venture between just Nexstar and Warner Bros. Discovery and a return to The WB network in the future, with The WB affiliates starting newscasts of their own (just like Fox did in the 1990s), thank to Nexstar's broadcast news expertise...I could picture "CW 7 News" in Evansville, Indiana becoming "WB 7 News" if it ever happened...something like this would only happen if Paramount completely parts ways with The CW, and if WBD agrees to partner with Nexstar afterwards...

 

[osu1991]

Someday, Paramount might drop their remaining share of The CW...if so, I just hope it means a 50/50 venture between just Nexstar and Warner Bros. Discovery and a return to The WB network in the future, with The WB affiliates starting newscasts of their own (just like Fox did in the 1990s), thank to Nexstar's broadcast news expertise...I could picture "CW 7 News" in Evansville, Indiana becoming "WB 7 News" if it ever happened...something like this would only happen if Paramount completely parts ways with The CW, and if WBD agrees to partner with Nexstar afterwards...

Why do they have to wait? Tulsa CW affiliate has had their own morning and evening newscasts for years going back to it being WB.

 

[KyL416]

CBS and WB sold 75% of CW to Nexstar, so even if Paramount divests their remaining 12.5% back to them, Nexstar will still be the majority owner. As we saw with the 2023 renewals where only 1 DC show was renewed, WBD no longer has any control of the programming decisions. Heck, I wouldn't be surprised if Zaslov eventually divests from the network too for the writeoff.


Nexstar is also trying to grow NewsNation's recognition, so even if CW rebranded back to The WB, I doubt their O&Os would brand their newscasts using a WBD owned trademark, as they have been de-emphasizing the network names in their newscasts so they can reuse the reports for NewsNation without using a name tied to one of their competitors. i.e. here in Northeast PA they end their reports with "WBRE 28/WYOU 22 Eyewitness News" instead of NBC 28/CBS 22, and in Charlotte they recently rebranded the newscasts to "Queen City News" instead of Fox 46 News.


Also, effective 9/1 KBCW is becoming KPYX and WPCW is becoming WPKD

 

[Justin Hill]

Maybe Nexstar should rename "The CW" to "TVNation" to complement "NewsNation"...

 

[TNGuy84]

Unfortunately that name is used for an OTT box overseas and a Michael Moore film. Surely the marketing geniuses at Nexstar can come up with something much better than "CW" to rebrand the channel.

 

[Justin Hill]

Unfortunately that name is used for an OTT box overseas and a Michael Moore film. Surely the marketing geniuses at Nexstar can come up with something much better than "CW" to rebrand the channel.

International trademark registration can be tricky, yes...

Just as Sega hit a snag with the "Mega Drive" trademark in 1989 (the trademark was used by a now-defunct American technology company Mega Drive Systems, Inc.) bringing the Japanese-made game console which would later be known as the "Genesis" to the U.S./Canada/Mexico (the system almost went by the name Sega "Tomahawk").

In that case, the OTT box you're talking isn't sold over here under "TVNation" (and nothing under that trademark exists national), just like how "Burger King" goes by the name "Hungry Jack's" in Australia, because they hit a trademark snag in 1971 when an unrelated drive-in restaurant in the city of Adelaide took the "Burger King" trademark in the 1960s...

Other than that, maybe they could call themselves "NXCW" or "NSCW" (short for "Nexstar-The CW") if those trademarks aren't yet taken in North America (we've seen channel names with four-letter acronyms before, like ESPN, PTEN, HGTV, CCTV, CBBC, CNBC and MeTV, for example)...

 

[KyL416]

Sacramento's new CW affiliate will be Hearst's KQCA.

 

[KyL416]

Sinclair's WPNT will become the new CW affiliate for Pittsburgh, MyNetworkTV is moving to overnights.

For Tampa, MyNetworkTV will air overnights on WTTA

Even though Nexstar's shell company Mission intends to purchase WADL, the purchase hasn't been approved yet and Detroit wasn't included as part of the announcement for the other Nexstar stations.

 

[Justin Hill]

I'm interested in seeing what new logos/branding they come up with for the affected stations.

I know KMAX 31 in Sacramento just rebranded to something more in line with sister station KCAL-TV 9 in Los Angeles, with the call letters or channel number being housed inside a square (like in KYW-TV 3's case), much like the other CBS O&O stations...

 

[KyL416]

KPYX (KBCW) will be using KPIX+, WPKD (WPCW) will be using KDKA+, WKBD will be using Detroit 50, WPSG will be using Philly 57.

They also registered domains for Seattle 11, Tampa 44 and Atlanta 69. No previews from them yet though because these are standalone markets so they will just be repurposing their existing city pages on the CBS News website.

 

[Justin Hill]

KPYX (KBCW) will be using KPIX+, WPKD (WPCW) will be using KDKA+, WKBD will be using Detroit 50, WPSG will be using Philly 57.

They also registered domains for Seattle 11, Tampa 44 and Atlanta 69. No previews from them yet though because these are standalone markets so they will just be repurposing their existing city pages on the CBS News website.

I guess "Boston 38" and "Miami 33" are going to be used for their independent stations in Massachusetts and Florida soon (those two CBS O&Os shed their MyNetworkTV affiliations only a year ago), just to unify all of their stations...

 

[KyL416]

WADL Detroit now has CW's programming on their schedule starting 9/1, MyNetworkTV is airing afterwards at 10pm-12am ET.

Seattle is rumored to be Tegna's KONG, but it's not a done deal yet. Atlanta is rumored to either be Tegna's WATL or Gray's WPCH. One article is claiming WPCH's Canadian distribution that they inherited from WTBS is a sticking point because CW's schedule now has a bunch of CBC and CTV imports, but that's clearly false as Canadian providers already carry CW's flagships WPIX and KTLA in the same Superstation package that has WPCH, and Canadian law only allows simsubbing if the American network is showing the same episode at the exact same time as a Canadian network is showing it locally, so it doesn't apply to these imports that are 1 or more seasons behind. And even if it was an issue, Canada's "Peachtree" is actually fed by WPCH-D4 which already carries alternate programming for Canadian viewers.

 

[mwdxer1]

Interesting. I still have the Super Station package with Dish, grandfathered in (KTLA, WSBK, KWGN, WPIX, and WWOR.)Most are CW right now.

 

[KyL416]

Canada's regulation of Superstations is slightly different. Like the feeds are required to be their OTA versions, so their Superstation packages still include WGN Chicago instead of NewsNation and WPCH Peachtree (via WPCH-D4) instead of TBS.

The syndex rules that resulted in WTBS, WGN, and for a while WWOR, launching seperate national feeds in the late 80s doesn't apply in Canada, instead they have a simsub rule that lets local Canadian broadcast stations replace the American stations on cable and satellite so viewers see their local ads and promos, but only if they are showing the exact same episode or telecast at the exact same time.