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They say loose lips sink ships, but they also spread some pretty good news sometimes.

NBC announced four years ago that in 2009, Jay Leno would leave The Tonight Show and Conan O’Brien would move up into a better time slot than the one he’s held on NBC for the past fourteen years. Supposedly this was done to keep him, as NBC feared he’d take off for another network while they waited around for Leno to tire of his hosting duties, similar to the way they lost David Letterman to CBS. The loose lips surrounding this rumor say that Leno isn’t too anxious to leave next year. After all, Johnny Carson held that position for thirty years, and Leno has only been there sixteen.

More rumors abounded last year after NBC signed Jimmy Fallon for apparently no reason at all. He’d been a Not Ready for Primetime Player on Saturday Night Live until 2004, then left for a solo career, but didn’t have as much success as others that have left. Amy Poehler hasn’t even left and is enjoying more film success. The greatest success Fallon has had in the past four years was as Drew Barrymore’s costar in Fever Pitch .

Loose lips are flying again as someone requesting anonymity was talking over the weekend to seemingly everybody that today NBC will announce that Fallen will take over O’Brien’s time slot once O’Brien takes over Leno’s. Perhaps they think that later time-slot is now branded for that same type of offbeat humor, as O’Brien was a writer for Saturday Night Live before coming to Late Night after David Letterman’s exit for CBS.

Don’t get me wrong; I like all these guys, Leno, O’Brien, and even Fallon, but I don’t see Leno as running in overtime just yet. I don’t think he’s stale and think he still has several good years ahead of him. The guy is a known workaholic, and if he’s willing to do all that despite rarely having a vacation, why not? I also think O’Brien’s humor is more suitable to a later time period. In fact, I prefer his offbeat humor to Leno’s run-of-the-mill stuff, but I just can’t see Triumph, the Insult Comic Dog appearing after the nightly news.

Photo courtesy of eonline.com

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