WANTS TO DO SHOW WITH BUDDY QUESTION FOR DAN O’DAY: I've been doing mornings at a small station for four years now. Before that I did mornings at a similar station for two years. I've got a hugely popular show and I enjoy doing it very much. I haven't had a full time sidekick for a couple of years now. They fired my old sidekick for a lot of reasons that had nothing to do with his air work and found that they liked not having to pay that salary so now I'm mostly solo, which is tough and not nearly as good or as much fun. I say "mostly" because we have a sports guy who comes in for a half hour a day and we do what amounts to a 20-25 minute talk show, of which only maybe 5-10 minutes is about sports. He's a former jock who works as sports information director for a nearby college and he's really good on the air (and, because he gets to plug the college, he hardly costs the station anything) and people love us together. I want to move on to another station (for many reasons) and would like a morning gig. I have a friend who is very funny, and the chemistry between us is amazing. He and I together put me and the sports guy or me and my old sidekick to shame. I have no doubt that we could do the job in a market larger than the one I'm in now. My question is, how do we get that chance? He has some radio experience, but it's been around five years since he was on the air and I don't think he has any old airchecks and we certainly don't have one together. There's no way we can work together at my present station. Should we make an aircheck together in the studio and use that? What should we do? DAN REPLIES: Your only two realistic approaches are these: 1. Wait until an opening somehow occurs on your own morning show, then bring your friend in to fill it. 2. Have your friend wrangle some kind of a job at your station. After he has become a valuable & trusted staff member - a part of the station team and not just your buddy - make your pitch to your GM. But no larger market station will hire for their morning show two guys who've never worked together (and one who's been out of radio for five years).