WFAN's simulcast on SNY will continue with Tiki Barber and Evan Roberts
Evan Roberts sits in WFAN's redesigned studio for the "Carton and Roberts' simulcast on SNY on its debut on Monday, May 24, 2021. Credit: Corey Sipkin
The show will go on for WFAN on SNY, even with Craig Carton no longer working afternoon drive time.
SNY announced on Thursday that it will continue to simulcast SNY from 4 to 6 p.m. weekdays as Tiki Barber joins Evan Roberts starting on Monday.
"The decision wasn’t Carton-centric in the beginning two years ago, and it wasn't Carton-centric in deciding to stay with the partnership,” SNY president Steve Raab told Newsday.
“It checks a lot of boxes for us, and Tiki is a knowledgeable, recognizable, polished personality. And Evan we're certainly familiar with and we’ve been working with him.”
SNY began simulcasting “Carton & Roberts” in May 2021, after having shown little previous in that sort of programming.
Raab said the show proved to be a good fit and WFAN a good partner.
“This wasn't the beginning of embracing simulcasting in general,” he said. “It was just the right fit. For us, it was the right station in the right time slot, with a show that we thought was great. And I think that has been the case.
“It extends our live window by two important hours and gives us a better lead-in to the rest of the day than some of our library programming was doing. It's a relevant, topical show every day. It has entertainment value.”
Raab expects that entertainment value to remain, even in a post-Carton world.
He credited Chris Oliviero, market president for Audacy New York, WFAN’s parent company, for his track record of pairing radio personalities who produce valuable content.
“Craig was terrific for those two years with us,” Raab said, “but there's no reason for us to believe that Tiki and Evan is going to be something less than Carton and Roberts was.”
Carton periodically complained publicly about SNY not carrying the show in its entirety starting at 2 p.m. Raab said there was no discussion this time around of extending the two-hour window.
“We feel like these two hours is the right block for us,” he said.
Carton and Roberts had been together for only 6 ½ months when their simulcast began, and Carton was less than a year removed from a yearlong stay in prison.
Both hosts told Newsday at the time that radio always must be the priority, but that being on television is a valuable milestone. Two years later, Carton left WFAN to focus solely on his morning television show on FS1.
“The debut of ‘Evan & Tiki’ is the next chapter in our tremendous partnership with SNY," Oliviero said in a news release. "Together we will bring the very best in sports audio and video to New York fans daily, which is exactly what they have come to expect from WFAN on SNY.”
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.
