ESPN 1000 to launch new morning show with David Kaplan and Jonathan Hood

Two longtime sports talk veterans get together for new 7-10 a.m. program

In a sweeping schedule realignment, ESPN 1000 (WMVP-AM) is adding a new local morning show. 

David Kaplan and Jonathan Hood will take over the 7-to-10 a.m. slot starting on Monday, giving ESPN 1000 its first morning drive-time show in recent memory as the station has mostly stuck with national programming from ESPN Radio.

“We are really excited to give our fans a chance to have a local interactive show starting at 7 a.m. every weekday,” Mike Thomas, ESPN Chicago market manager, told Robert Feder, who first broke the story Tuesday. “From a local standpoint, it’s going to put us in a strong competitive position.” The first two hours of the new Kap & J. Hood show will go head-to-head with the last two hours of The Score’s (WSCR-AM) Mulley and Haugh. (Mike Mulligan and David Haugh.)

Previously, Kaplan hosted Kap & Co. from 9 a.m.-noon, while Hood hosted a evening baseball show from 6 to 7 p.m., followed by his regular show.

The opportunity to launch a local show came after ESPN pulled the plug on nearly the three-year old morning chatfest hosted by Trey Wingo and Mike Golic, who departed the network at the end of July. ESPN launched a new national morning show with Keyshawn Johnson, Jay Williams and Zubin Mehenti on August 3.

In a bit of a compromise, the national ESPN morning show will now air only from 5 to 7 a.m., allowing ESPN 1000 to air their new morning show with Kaplan and Hood.

In addition, ESPN 1000 is airing two hours of Mike Greenberg’s nationally syndicated show from noon-to-2 p.m., on an one-hour delay. Greenberg was a former on-air personality at the Score and later teamed with Golic for ESPN’s longtime morning show Mike And Mike In The Morning. 

Here’s the revised schedule, effective Monday:

Make it appointment listening! Download the new ESPN Chicago app! It's the easiest way to listen on your phone from anywhere! @ESPN1000 pic.twitter.com/d1LnCh0XHj

— Mike Thomas (@mikethomasmt8) August 11, 2020

The move by ESPN 1000 is a smart one, given the station has long lacked a local morning show. Despite the 7 a.m. start, it also gives WSCR some strong local competition as sporting events have returned from the pandemic. The move is also wonderful for Chicago sports talk veteran Hood, who spent a decade at WSCR and hosted programs for Sirius/XM and weekend programming for ESPN Radio. Hood also had an earlier stint at ESPN 1000 in the mid-2000s.

Even though ESPN owns WMVP, it is managed and operated in a local marketing agreement by suburban Milwaukee-based GoodKarma Brands.