Before Boomer and Carton, long before Carton and Roberts, the sports radio shock jock had an opportunity presented to him that likely would have negated his WFAN tenure. During last Friday’s celebratory show for morning producer Al Dukes, Craig Carton said he was offered the job to replace Howard Stern when the King of all Media moved to satellite.
Stern’s affiliates were split between a few hosts nationwide, but the most infamous one was Van Halen singer David Lee Roth, whose show filled stations in New York, Boston, Cleveland, Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, Dallas and South Florida. Popular radio disc jockey Rover replaced Stern in the Midwest and comedian Adam Carolla took over a few West Coast markets.
A lot of names were discussed to replace Stern at the time, including Jon Stewart and Whoopi Goldberg, but Carton said the opportunity was his and he wanted it. Carton, who was hosting at NJ 101.5, would have been given Roth’s East Coast affiliates.
NJ 101.5 was owned by Millennium Radio Group at the time and Carton remembered discussing the Stern deal with them saying, “if there’s anything you’re going to do to stop this, you gotta tell me now because I represented that you’re letting me go.” Carton said the company gave him the go ahead.
He described it as a done deal, Craig Carton was going to replace Howard Stern. But on his way home from receiving the offer, Carton got an angry phone call. CBS Radio CEO Joel Hollander just received a fax saying, ‘if you want to hire Craig Carton, you have to give us [‘X’ amount of dollars].” Just like that, Carton was out, and Roth was soon to be in.
Roth’s show was an epic failure, barely lasting three months. But taking over for Stern was a seemingly impossible task with unrealistic expectations, defining the sentiment that it’s always better to be the individual replacing the person who replaced the legend.
When Carton told his now WFAN co-host Evan Roberts and update anchor Chris Lopresti the story, he spoke as if it was an obvious decision to want the opportunity to replace Stern, “why wouldn’t I?” he asked. Lopresti pushed back a bit, noting it probably would have ended poorly, but Carton said, “you didn’t see the check.”
Less than two years later, Carton was back in discussions with CBS Radio about replacing a morning legend. This time, it was Stern’s rival Don Imus. Carton’s contract with NJ 101.5 was now closer to expiring and he made it clear he would never sign with them again, making him available to join CBS and WFAN to replace Imus.
