WFAN host Craig Carton did an interview with New York Knicks and New York Rangers owner James Dolan last Friday, and New York Post sports media columnist Andrew Marchand took issue with the seriousness of the conversation that transpired on Carton & Roberts.
Marchand followed the interview live and tweeted his reaction to his 86,000 followers.
It didn’t take long for Carton to catch wind of Marchand’s reactions. Carton called Marchand a clown and that his claims that they didn’t ask about banning fans from Madison Square Garden using facial recognition technology was “a bold-faced lie.”
“You are a clown! How bout you go listen to the interview before you make a suggestion or an accusation that we didn’t do something that we did,” Carton said.
Within minutes Marchand was on the phone with the show.
“My biggest issue with what you wrote, and I only bring it up because I recognize that you have a big reach as well on social media – is to say that we did not confront James Dolan about the notion that people have been dismissed from the building for being critical of his ownership,” Carton said. “Or that ultimately that this facial recognition technology could one day be weaponized by The Garden to banish people that are critical of him. How could you write that when we spent 15-20 minutes talking about that specific topic?”
“If we asked the question and the guy answers it, and we ask the question four more times and he answers it four more times, we’ve asked and we’ve confronted, quizzed, we’ve demanded answers,” Carton later added. “You’re suggesting that we didn’t even ask the damn question. You know what you did.”
Marchand pushed back, saying Dolan’s appearance was “a giggling interview.”
“You didn’t confront him on these things,” Marchand said. “How about a question such as why did these fans have the impression that they’re banned because they just said something on social media? That they’re being harassed.”
“How would he know why the fans think something?” Carton responded. “I’d have to ask the fan that, right? Right.”
Carton added he’s always felt like Marchand had something against him and the success of his show.
“Just acknowledge you have an agenda against me. Acknowledge that,” Carton said.
Marchand disagreed with that notion.
“There’s no agenda. I mean it’s ridiculous to say, and sometimes articles are good, sometimes they’re not good,” Marchand said. “I try to be fair and reflect the people that I’m covering.”
Carton later circled back to his original point about the fact that he did ask Dolan pressing questions.
“You can ask someone a question four, five, six times you don’t have to be a jackass in the manner in which you ask the question,” Carton said. “And that doesn’t mean that you’re not pressing him on it. I thought we pressed him on it, he has an answer. We asked him again, he has an answer.”
“I’m not gonna make everybody happy all the time anyway,” he added. “We’re not gonna try to either. But I just don’t think it’s right when you mischaracterize what was asked and what wasn’t asked.”
