The Sports (talk) Leader

I have been a huge WFAN fan for as long as I can remember. I grew up waking up to Imus in the morning, listening to Mike and the MadDog in the afternoons and fell asleep listening to Captain Midnight. I have met Russo, Fatso, Benigno and Sidney Arthur Rosenberg and have listened so long that I feel like I know some of these people intimately (although they don’t know me from a light-pole). What is sad though is that through the many stages of WFAN’s history, it has never been as bad as it is now. The demise is hard to trace but it started years ago when they started losing talented hosts to other mediums and filled the slots with the kind of on-air ‘talent’ which lacks it.


I was such a big WFAN fan for years and whenever I’d travel around the country, I’d find their local sports station (usually called “The Score”, “The Zone” or “The Fan”) and feel badly for their regular listeners as most of their hosts would blabber on about non-sports issues for hours on end. WFAN was great in its heyday because they talked sports intelligently. As WFAN’s popularity grew there were obvious attempts at their throne from new upstart radio stations with big money behind them (Sporting News Radio and ESPN Radio for example) and every-time I’d find myself surfing up or down the dial, I’d be disappointed in their lack of understanding. Their on-air personalities were often national guys who I generally don’t like as they lack a local flavor and I often find that the production values in syndication are poor.

Well as WFAN started showing cracks with the departure of people like Sid Rosenberg and Jody Mac but the spot where it really started to break was when Steve Somers was moved from his role of zoo-keeper in the overnights to the 10-1 slot alongside Russ Salzberg. The midday show has been kind of a grave-yard since the departure of The Coleman and the Soul-Man but this was the worst. Somers schtick didn’t work in the midday and Salzberg was a pompous prick.

Although I believe that this is the point where WFAN jumped the shark, it did give Joe Benigno his original role as the overnight-host which somehow worked even better for him than it did for Somers. Benigno was brilliant as the obsessed Jets fan and there hasn’t been better radio than the 1AM hour after a bad Jets loss. The rest of the story can be read fairly in a billion places but Benigno was the last great find WFAN has had but his day-time tenure has been pretty bad. Imus leaving was rough and Mike and the MadDog’s departure was a sad day for both the hardcore and the casual listeners…

The problem for WFAN was that throughout all of their internal family issues, ESPN Radio started to get better…

The lineups today are clearly in ESPN’s favor

Mike and Mike, Brandon Tierney, Collin Cowherd are an awesome 6AM till 2PM grouping. The obvious weak-link is Michael Kay who needs to be put out to pasture. But ESPN really works well in the other slots. The most underrated sports-host in NYC is Bill Daughtrey, the overnight show AllNight is fantastic and Jody Mac on Weekend mornings is a pleasure.

WFAN can’t compete in any slot expect the midday (Mike Francesa alone is still miles better than Michael Kay) but in every other slot WFAN now loses out. Evan Roberts is horrible, Richard Neer is horrific, those Sunday morning guys sound like they are hosting from a Russian Bath House and Marc Mallusis and Tony Paige have the combined sports IQ of a donkey