10 Questions with ... Jason Hammer

BRIEF CAREER SYNOPSIS:

Started professional radio career at 19 and have done pretty much everything in the industry. I’m 43 now and love living on talk radio. I have worked in Christian, New Hit Country, Hot AC, Alt Rock and now news and sports. I took about 6 years off from radio to work in the casino industry in Indiana before returning to Emmis.

1. Okay, then, how and why did you get into radio in the first place?

I feel in love with the creative aspect. I originally wanted to be a TV weatherman: I am a weather nerd, I still have “covering a hurricane on location” on my bucket list. I still want to be the guy broadcasting LIVE while holding on to a palm tree in Kill Devil Hills with wind and sand smacking my face trying to talk about how there is wind and sand smacking my face, but radio allowed me to show more of my humor and personality on a day-to-day basis. In college, I shifted more toward the radio side of broadcasting than the TV side.

2. How did you get into a partnership with Nigel? How and why did you first pair up at 103.3?

I knew of Nigel from his radio work at X103 in Indy. All radio nerds know each other, especially ones that have the same sense of humor. He was there while I was at WZPL in the late '90s into the early 2000s. Social media (early days of Facebook) is how we stayed connected. When I was out of radio and working in the casino industry, he was also out of radio. We each still had the love to do radio, but we didn’t want to just “jock the hits” anymore. Music radio was going down a road of “less is more” from the hosts and we disagreed with that. We still felt there was room for entertaining hosts who make people laugh, good interviews with tough questions and more. Plus, things were really getting politically correct, so we went the opposite way.

We started a podcast together and did it at a bar each week. We called it a “Bar-Cast” and got local celebrities, athletes, politicians and national comedians to appear. The popularity of that podcast lead us to X103 for a brief stint. From there, we continued to grow the podcast and ultimately landed at Emmis doing sports and weekends. The radio show grew in popularity and we were given the night show at WIBC before moving to afternoons. Since that move, we’ve been #1 for most of 3 years in afternoon drive.

3. What makes "Hammer and Nigel" different from standard talk radio fare? How would you describe what the show's like?

Hammer and Nigel is like an FM morning show, but designed to handle the news of the day. We will make sure our audience is up to date on the top stories, and we will give those top stories and have amazing guests, but there is also room for a few juvenile jokes throughout the 4 hours! So many political talk shows sound the same, and all the hosts are trying to be like Rush Limabaugh. That’s not what we do. We use a lot of sound, imaging and fun writing/parodies to entertain our audience.

On the drive home, nobody wants to hear another lecture; they have heard it all day at work. We want to entertain as well as inform. We do a SHOW and not a lecture. We are entertaining hosts, not finger-wagging pundits. Our regular guests range from Jesse Watters of Fox News to Bret Michaels of Poison, and more. Lots of bits and creative writing, and we want it to sound like friends at a bar having a conversation. Too many talk hosts can’t make fun of themselves; that’s not us. Our occasional self-deprecating humor shows our listeners we are all the same. Good dudes but flawed at times, and that’s OK.

4. You've gotten into the sports betting show business, first at The Fan and now with a TV show coming this Fall. Every bettor has had (many) bad beats: What's the worst loss you've had?

Former Bears coach Lovie Smith is dead to me. DEAD! I had $500 on the Bears to cover against Minnesota on MNF a few years ago. $500 on a radio DJ’s salary is like $10,000 to most people. Keep in mind that Lovie told his defense, the mighty Bears defense led by Brian Urlacher, to just give up the Minnesota TD at the end of the game and cover the onside kick to win the game. By being a bum with no pride, that garbage TD with 20 seconds left cost me $500. However, I did WIN that much on the amazing comeback in the Colts/Buccaneers Monday Night Miracle in Tampa, so I guess it evens out. Water always finds its level in sports betting!

5. You and Nigel are native Hoosiers, so... what's something cool about Indianapolis that people outside the area don't know? (Because other than the Colts, the Pacers, the Speedway/500, and maybe St. Elmo's shrimp cocktail, most of us don't know much..., )

Indy takes pride in doing events and conventions better than anyone. As a city, we have a chip on our shoulder when it comes to that. We want to be the best. All of our downtown is connected. You can walk anywhere downtown (hotels to bars to sporting events) in just a few minutes. There are also connected tunnels and bridges if the weather is bad. Indy is an amazing place to have a large event. Lots of hotels, bars, clubs, sporting events and music, just in downtown alone.

6. Who have been your influences, inspirations, and/or mentors in the business?

When I was young, I wanted to be David Letterman, a fellow Hoosier who made it big and made people laugh. He showed people will still laugh at bits like “How many guys in a panda suit can fit into a Starbucks?" An Indy kid who went to Ball State and did all the things to get to a point to where he could bet on himself and have it pay off. As a broadcaster, you just need the opportunity to where you can take a chance and capitalize on yourself.

7. What's the most important lesson you've learned in your career?

Two things. Never give up, and it’s OK to hate people. Use it as motivation. In my career, I have worked for and with some real zeroes. Awful people who look to hold you down and belittle you. Use it as motivation. Michael Jordan, Tom Brady, Kobe Bryant -- all had that “chip” on their shoulder. They used it as motivation. It would have been easy for me to quit the industry, but that wasn’t what I wanted and I couldn’t let those awful people win. I’m super competitive that way. If that makes me a horrible person, say hello to the bad guy!

8. How has the change in administration affected the WIBC show? Is the slower pace of material coming out of the White House a problem, or do you have plenty of stuff to talk about with an ideological opposite (relatively speaking) as President? (Another way to look at it: Is it better for a talk host to be on the same side as the folks in power or to be the opposition?)

This has not really changed our show at all. We used to do fun bits like celebrities reading Trump Tweets, now we have “Words of Wisdom” from Joe Biden. The strength of our show is thinking outside the box. We want to do what no other talk radio show in America is doing. We haven’t lost our audience as a result of that thinking. Instead of focusing on a policy of Trump or how the media deals with Trump, the story shifts to Biden and his policies and how the media handles him. Same storyline, but vastly different in results and conversations. Plus, our show has a lot of fun and pop-culture sprinkled in. We have 4 hours each day and try to go back and forth between “newsy” things and fun original things. Expect the unexpected on our show.

9. Fill in the blank: I can't make it through the day without ___________.

... a 44 oz fountain Diet Mt. Dew from the gas station. I’m not really a coffee guy, so I need my caffeine hit. I choose Diet Mt. Dew because despite eating $25 worth of Taco Bell by myself at 11pm and binge drinking a “dirty 30” pack of Busch Light, I’m really into my health!

10. How do you want to be remembered when you're gone?

A man who took care of and loved his family and entertained people. That or the fat hillbilly from Beech Grove who died and people cheered when he did. Either way is fine.