Christian Arcand is leaving the Sports Hub’s night program
Arcand has co-hosted "The Adam Jones Show" since 2018.
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Christian Arcand, who has co-hosted 98.5 The Sports Hub’s weekday evening program the past two years, will no longer be part of the show after Tuesday.
Arcand’s contract, which expires Tuesday, was not renewed, a decision that was budgetary rather than performance-based. He will continue at the station as a part-time fill-in and weekend host.
Arcand, who came to The Sports Hub from rival WEEI in June 2018, said during a phone conversation Tuesday that the decision did not come as a shock despite the show’s strong ratings.
“My contract was expiring and I hadn’t heard anything about my status,’’ said Arcand, who learned of the decision about 10 days ago. “And I just sort of felt like, things aren’t getting any better with the pandemic and with the effects on advertisers and local businesses and everything. I didn’t know what was going to happen, but I wasn’t completely blindsided.”
In case you didn’t hear just now – tomorrow will be my final night on the Adam Jones Show – starting Wednesday Jones will be solo at night – the Sunday Service will continue.
— Arcand (@ChristianArcand) June 23, 2020
The show, named after co-host Adam Jones, is successful, ranking second in its timeslot in its key demographic (men 25-54) in the most recent Nielsen Audio ratings period. And the Sports Hub was first overall in the Boston market.
But the station, owned by Beasley Media Group, has been affected by the financial fallout from the COVID-19 pandemic. Full-time employees at the Sports Hub were hit with a 10 percent pay cut in May. It was initially supposed to extend only through one quarter of the fiscal year, but staffers were informed recently that it will continue through the end of the calendar year.
“In this business, one thing that I’ve learned is that things can change really quickly, even in normal times,’’ said Arcand, whose rapport with Jones was immediate upon their pairing in 2018. “A lot of it just being in the right place at the right time. But sometimes it’s the right place but the wrong time, and that’s sort of what happened here with my contract expiring in the middle of this.”
Arcand said he will be taking some time off but will be filling in on shows across the schedule later in the summer.
“I know things aren’t great anywhere right now, but when things do get better, I want to be there for it,’’ he said. “I told them when they hired me that I wanted to work there for a long time. I still feel that way and hope that I can.”
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