The Jets signed an exclusive rights deal because they didn't want to deal with him bashing the team all week and then suck up to them when they call in. The Jets appear to be prideful in that regard. It wasn't just a business decision, it was personal and the Jets didn't start it. Mike has no problem bashing the Jets, if something happened he would have said it.
Pretty much echoing Neil Best's report in Newsday. Says confronted Mr. T about it in November, "Dat didn' go well."
Last year, Mike Francesa asked for Rex Ryan but he wouldn't be available because they wanted to keep him on 1050 (the station that carries the Jets games). They tried again after the middle finger incident and the Jets said they shouldn't have bothered. HBO wanted Mike to come onto training camp and do a Hard Knocks segment with Mike doing a show on training camp. Mike declined. Acknowledges players are not embargoed from the station.
He keeps acting as if it's just a random business decision by the Jets but Mike has been unfairly critical of the Jets since Rex was hired.
The logical question here is, did Francesa ask for Ryan AFTER he ripped the Jets and Ryan (calling him a clown) after the Colts game. If it was, and I suspect it was, then can the Jets be blamed for keeping Ryan off Francesa's show? And by the time the MMA/Finger incident happened, Francesa had been ripping the Jets regularly for a month after the playoffs. Again... why wouldn't they keep Ryan on 1050, and try to make Francesa's show suffer, when they felt (rightly so) he was not being fair to them?
his excuses are ridiculously lame. he simply refuses to resolve the situation w/the Jets and refuses to admit that he bears at the very least partial responsibility for his lousy coverage of the Jets for his listeners. He should be rocking w/Jets and pats guests pumping up and analyzing the game - instead his show just kind of sucks w/him floating excuses for why it sucks.
Good point, he started this by not giving credit to the Jets, infact calling them lucky after beating the Chargers, and then he expects the team to be friendly towards him. I find that laughable... :rofl:
He needs to cut his losses, get Tannenbaum on the phone, apologize for any misunderstandings and get some Jets guests on his show. Big Wood was great on Rome Yesterday - he's a great RT who is clearly a difference maker and who is very articulate, he is playing the Pats on Sunday, he lives in Freaking Jersey and Mike won't even ask to have him on his show. I mean thats really freaking absurd. Mike needs to get a frikken clue.
Well I guess Mike got what he wanted, I'm willing to bet somebody will attempt to contact Tannenbaum and get him to comment about this whole thing
The problem is his ratings are ridiculous. You hear the callers that call up. 85% of them agree with him about EVERYTHING! I made this comment on that blog I linked to a couple pages back