KARE 11 weekend mainstay Eric Perkins has been named the station's new sports director, the station announced Thursday. Perkins will join Julie Nelson, Randy Shaver and Belinda Jensen at the anchor desk weeknights at 5, 6 and 10 p.m. Perkins also does sports radio broadcasts for BringMeTheNews.

Twin Cities NBC affiliate KARE 11 has hired Blake McCoy to join Rena Sarigianopoulos as weekend news co-anchor beginning Sept. 17. McCoy has been the weekend anchor/reporter at KTNV-TV in Las Vegas. McCoy will also join meteorologist Jerrid Sebesta and Dave Schwartz, who was promoted to the weekend sports reporter/anchor position recently.

Rena Sargianopoulos will join KARE 11's Saturday morning show with Belinda Jensen. The reporter and weekend anchor is replacing Eric Perkins who was recently promoted to weeknight sports anchor and sports director.

Julie Nelson will be flying solo in the KARE-11 anchor chair for awhile. Randy Shaver suffered a broken arm and scraped-up face in a bicycle accident Tuesday that sent him flying over his handlebars. It was not immediately clear when he would return to the studio.

Mike Pomeranz is leaving KARE 11 News anchor desk. He says he's taking 'the opportunity of a lifetime' to work for the San Diego Padres. Pomeranz was a pitcher in the Minnesota Twins system before injuring his shoulder and he began his broadcast new career. He started with KARE in 2006.

The KEYC anchor hasn't been on the air since a bizarre news segment went viral on the Internet, sparking rumors that she was drunk on the air. Station officials said she was having a bad reaction to medication.

Former Mankato television news anchor Annie Stensrud is speaking publicly for the first time since she lost her job at KEYC after a newscast in which she appeared drunk, a video clip that quickly went viral. It was anti-anxiety medication that had affected her on-air performance, she tells KARE 11. She later turned to alcohol and hit bottom, she says, but is now sober with a positive new outlook. "It feels good to finally talk about it," she says.