ESPN's 'Michael Kay Show' leads WFAN's 'Carton and Roberts' in first month of fall ratings book

ESPN New York’s "The Michael Kay Show" out-rated WFAN’s Craig Carton and Evan Roberts for the first month of the autumn ratings book among men ages 25-54, according to data released Monday by Nielsen Audio and obtained by Newsday from an industry source.

While the Sept. 16-Oct. 13 period represents only the first of three months for the ratings period, it was a good early sign for Kay, who had lost the previous two full quarterly periods to Carton and Roberts.

From 3 to 6:30 p.m., Kay finished fourth overall in the New York market in the key advertising demographic, averaging 5.8% of the radio audience, compared to WFAN’s 3.7, which ranked 10th overall.

It was a significant change from the spring book, in which Carton and Roberts finished fourth at 5.7% and Kay was seventh at 4.1%.

In the spring, the shows overlapped from 2 to 6:30 p.m. In September, Kay returned to a 3 p.m. start time.

Both stations traditionally have judged themselves by the men 25-54 metric, but among all people age 12 and over, the WFAN afternoon show has a larger audience. By that measure, Carton and Roberts were 12th at 3.1% and Kay 19th at 2.3%.

The data includes both over-the-air and streaming audiences, but not the shows’ TV simulcast audiences.

From 6 to 10 a.m., WFAN’s Boomer Esiason and Gregg Giannotti ranked third in the market at 6.1% for the month and ESPN was 13th at 3.4%.

From 10 a.m. to 2 p.m., WFAN’s Marc Malusis and Maggie Gray were eighth at 3.8% and ESPN was 15th at 2.6%.

WFAN’s Steve Somers, who recently announced he will leave his regular show on the channel, is expected to host his final show sometime this month.

By Neil Best

Special to Newsday@sportswatch

Neil Best first worked at Newsday in 1982, returned in 1985 after a detour to Alaska and has been here since, specializing in high schools, college basketball, the NFL and most recently sports media and business.