Earlier in the week, Adam Schein appeared on a Marchand Sports Media podcast where he recalled a meeting with Mike Francesa about a potential succession plan at the station. While meeting at a restaurant, Francesa hosted Schein at a restaurant to go over his thinking, although nothing ever came to fruition. When morning show co-host Craig Carton was arrested and subsequently resigned from the show, it created an opening in morning drive along with availability in the afternoons. According to Schein, morning show co-host Boomer Esiason was thinking about a move to the daypart and, if that were the case, he would have tried to host with him.
Chris McMonigle, who was filling in as the anchor of Boomer & Gio on Friday, talked about how Schein cited former WFAN program director Mark Chernoff as flexible and willing to work with him to figure everything out. Schein was hosting on SiriusXM Mad Dog Sports Radio at the time while also starring on his Time to Schein television show with CBS Sports Network. Esiason confirmed what Schein said after Gregg Giannotti and Al Dukes weighed in with their opinions and further elaborated on the situation.
“What you don’t understand and you don’t see behind the scenes is when I floated this idea to Eddie, Al and Jerry, [it] looked like three guys that looked like they were going to have a stroke at that moment,” Esiason said. “Like, ‘We’re going to the afternoon? We’re going to the afternoon? What about traffic? What about this, what about that, what about my life?’”
“Shame on them caring about their own lives,” Giannotti replied. “How dare you.”
Esiason ended up staying in morning drive on WFAN and signed a multiyear contract extension with Audacy last April that will have him eclipse 20 years in this timeslot. With the new deal, Esiason will pass Don Imus to become the longest-tenured morning show host in the history of WFAN. In addition to his role in morning drive, Esiason also anchors the Audacy Sports Minute and co-hosts Kick-Off with Boomer and Valenti, the nationally-syndicated NFL preview show. Esiason also appeared on CBS Sports as an analyst on The NFL Today for 26 years before stepping away from the show after Super Bowl LVIII.
Within the podcast, Schein indicated that he and Esiason would have been phenomenal working together in afternoon drive. Later in the segment, Giannotti offered an impression of Schein trying to discuss several non-sports related topics that could be mentioned on editions of Boomer & Gio.
“On the other side of that, I don’t think I would have enjoyed it as much,” Esiason said. “That’s true – I like this format a hell of a lot better.”
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