Pope Christopher?

[Edgy MD]

Mike Francesa's contract is up at the end of the year (point one in the the argument that universe is sometimes just). Mark Chernoff has declared that he will "be looking to do some stuff" (which is just the most reassuringly professional-sounding thing an executive has ever said). And by most accounts, New Jersey Governor Chris Christie is on the list of potential candidates.

It almost makes me want to stand up and applaud, in between hurls. Twelve geniuses locked in a room for a month could not have come up with a more insane choice.

I mean, yeah, there are far crazier crazies out there, but as for a sustainably crazy act, where a metropolis of angry will tune in every day just to make themselves angrier. A Sports Talk with the Guv show on drive time would be flaming comet of insanity.

I mean, it would be awful, for any number of reasons, for sports and culture at large. For pure spectacle, short of setting fire to the Empire State, it's hard to top. And it would give our awful president a cultural toehold in the metropolitan area five nights a week.

[Lefty Specialist]

Well, at least if he's on the FAN I can turn him off, which is more than I can do now.........

[nymr83]

this actually sounds like a great idea for entertainment, which the whole point of talk radio anyway

[Edgy MD]

Yeah, but there's entertainment and then there's entertainment.

Emporer Gallienus wrote: The Gladiatorial Games actually sound like a great idea for entertainment, which the whole point of the Colosseum anyway.

[HahnSolo]

Biggest news here is someone actually leaving FAN. Guys seem to stay there forever.

Somers, Francesa, Chernoff, Benigno, Coleman, Minko. Even that dope Evan Roberts has to be there a decade now.

They've cornered the NYC sports talk market for whatever that is worth, and seems like they see no need to adjust or adapt to a changing landscape of sports fandom. But I guess they "get the ratings" so they don't feel the need to change.

I'm interested to see what they do.

[Guest sharpie]

I haven't listened to the FAN since the Mets left. Huge improvement in my life.

[Benjamin Grimm]

sharpie wrote: I haven't listened to the FAN since the Mets left. Huge improvement in my life.

I stopped listening in 2005 and my IQ immediately increased by 40 per cent.

[Edgy MD]

You can actually feel it tick up, can't you? It's in the spring in your step. It's in the increasing clarity of the horizon.

Foreign newspapers suddenly make just a little more sense. You take historical tours and find yourself asking more acute and engaging questions of the docents.

[MFS62]

Speaking of blowhard sports talk radio hosts, its Black History Month. And not ONE of the hosts on the sports talk radio stations has even mentioned Art Rust Jr., one of the early pioneers of the genre. The current hosts should all listen to his tapes and learn how to conduct themselves on a show of that type.
He was knowledgeable about all sports and never insulted his callers, their opinions nor the teams for which they rooted.
He was a true gentleman.

Later

[Guest John Cougar Lunchbucket]

I only listen to FAN during baseball season because I hate hearing people talk about football. I just listened yesterday for the fist time since October.

I hate-listen to Francessa and enjoy some of the Twitter accounts devoted to making fun of him.

Joe & Evan are dopes and despite Francessa sucking, his show is a better listen than when they do the slot (like this week)

[tweet:wlas7ywd]

[/tweet:wlas7ywd]

[Ceetar]

when I was still listening occasionally the best parts were always the first twenty minutes or so. You get a quick take and recap of what's going on. After that it's just callers arguing that point or the host reiterating it, for hours.

There are others, but I've been listening to the Effectively Wild podcast for a while. It's dropped from 5 to 3 times a week but it's generally just broad baseball talk which is what I always wanted from the radio. "Hey, Trout did this cool thing last night, let's talk about it." "Hey, this guy did this other thing, let's chat about that now."

And it gets appropriately silly too, if you like. They did a good 20 minutes on trying to figure out if Adam Lind farted during an AB last year.

[Frayed Knot]

I suspect WFAN's desire for swapping Christie for Francesa is that they already have the proper sized chair.

[Lefty Specialist]

Frayed Knot wrote: I suspect WFAN's desire for swapping Christie for Francesa is that they already have the proper sized chair.

And those heavy-duty freight elevators.