TV Q&A: Will someone let KDKA-TV’s Jon Delano out of his attic?

Trib Total Media TV writer Rob Owen answers reader questions every Wednesday at TribLive.com in a column that also appears in the Sunday Tribune-Review.

Q: Why do we keep seeing Jon Delano of KDKA-TV in his attic? Everyone else is at the studio.

– Ann, Cranberry

Rob: Not everyone. It’s two years into the pandemic and many white-collar workers are still working from home, including some TV reporters.

We’ve reported previously on CBS’s work-from-home policies, which are still largely in effect. While anchor/reporters will be seen in the studio on set, they are there because of their anchor duties. Reporters are not going into the building on a regular basis. When he retired last summer, Paul Martino said part of the impetus for his decision was having to work outside the station.

“Not working in the office, working in a car all day was becoming difficult for me,” Martino said, noting he’ll often have “a laptop on one knee, an iPad on the other knee and two phones going. It’s crazy.”

Anchors, meteorologists and sportscasters are allowed in the building; reporters are not. Of course, most reporters file stories from locations around town so viewers don’t see them with the same background day after day. Because Delano is the station’s political reporter, often conducting interviews over Zoom, his background is more often the attic – except when he goes out to interview local political leaders in person.

While exceptions have been made – Delano was in-studio on election night in 2020 – generally, KDKA-TV reporters are still not going into Gateway Center, filing their stories entirely from the field.

Q: Late to the party but I stumbled upon “Young Sheldon” and love it. I’ve been recording the nightly broadcasts on TBS and religiously going through the seasons one-by-one. My question is: They have every episode in order but skip two episodes in season three and two in season four. Why would they do that?

– C, Moon

Rob: This is the kind of question I’m fascinated by but often find hard to get an answer to because publicists are, understandably, generally more interested in spending time on new shows, not reruns.

God bless the friendly WarnerMedia publicist I’ve known to be extremely helpful for many years. She managed to track down an answer.

It turns out when a current show that’s still in production goes into syndication, there are some “holdback” episodes that are reserved for exclusive use on broadcast, hence those couple of missing “Young Sheldon” episodes that C. noticed.

The good news for C. is the missing, “holdback” episodes are now available to TBS. All season three “Young Sheldon” episodes began their run on TBS on Feb. 21 and the full run of season four will follow in March.

Q: When we subscribed to GSN many years ago, they used to air a lot of old black and white shows. I especially remember “The Price is Right” with Bill Cullen as host. Is there any reason why they don’t air those types of episodes, or even game shows from the ‘70s, ‘80s, etc.? You can only watch so much of “Family Feud” and “America Says!”

– Beverly, Irwin

Rob: Alas, not all questions – even seemingly easy ones! – are easily answered.

The response I got from GSN was that GSN only airs programs from its library, either originals or licensed shows. So then the question becomes, why doesn’t GSN air or license older game shows anymore? My assumption is it’s because newer shows get better ratings, but when I asked if that was a fair assessment, I was told it was not. So I tried again and the response was that GSN airs “Match Game” at 1 p.m.

Beverly might have better luck finding older game shows on Buzzr TV, available over-the-air on Channel 61.3, on DISH Network Channel 245 and streaming through Amazon Prime, Pluto TV and STIRR.