“Dollars and sense” is a weekly column about sports business and media in Chicago.
If you’re angry at Jimmy deCastro about his latest managerial encroachment at The Score, just remember, he doesn’t hate the players, he just loves The Game.
Early Tuesday morning, July 3, 2018, media blogger Robert Feder, the town crier of media hirings and firings in Chicago, tweeted his story that Brian Hanley was out as the longtime co-host of The Score’s unchallenged, dominant morning show “Mully & Hanley.”
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Feder reported Chicago Tribune columnist David Haugh, the regular fill-in host for the show, would replace him to pair with Mike Mulligan, who writes Bears columns for the newspaper.
This move was surprising — Who breaks up a No. 1 show? — but not out of the blue if you understand the context of it.
DeCastro shocked the station 3 1/2 months ago by taking out Jason Goff and Matt Spiegel from their respective shows and inserting Connor McKnight and Dan McNeil, while demoting Dan Bernstein to the mid-day show. During that time, reporters and media rooms were buzzing about moves that weren’t made, namely replacing Hanley with Haugh and possibly adding Northwestern guard-turned-broadcaster Tim Doyle on one of the shows.
McKnight, Haugh and Doyle (who did weekend Score shifts with McNeil before the latter moved into the afternoon spot) all hosted at The Game, the short-lived WGN-affiliated FM sports talk station deCastro created back in 2014.
It’s become a bit of a joke at the station and around town that deCastro is recreating The Game at WSCR 670 AM, which deCastro took over when Entercom hired him as the senior vice president and market manager for its new stations for its merger with CBS Radio in November.
The Game only lasted 10 months before WGN pulled the plug on the experiment, with Feder breaking the news of the station’s demise while a show was on the air. (Our contributor Ben Finfer went viral for his perfectly legitimate on-air reaction, and because of that is probably the only ex-Game host who doesn’t have a shot at a job on The Score.)
Hanley, a former Sun-Times reporter, was a Score original who has been full-time with the station since 2005 and had hosted the 5-9 a.m. morning show with Mike Mulligan for the last 10 years. The two quickly managed to upend ESPN 1000’s “Mike & Mike” ratings dominance and had been the most consistent, ratings-dominant sports talk show in the post-Afternoon Saloon era. Both Mulligan and Hanley left the Sun-Times for the radio show just as the industry was going down the tubes, making them look prescient in the process.
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While ESPN’s “Waddle & Silvy” show has been, arguably, the best one in town over the last 10 years, “Mully & Hanley” often set the tone for the day, breaking news with solid interviews from their station’s partnerships with the White Sox and Cubs. Mostly they were familiar to the regular listeners who counted on them to ease their early morning commutes.
And that’s the key with sports radio shows. The good ones and the mediocre ones succeed by building bonds with their listeners. Mulligan and Hanley did that.
Needless to say, from what I heard, Hanley had no idea the axe was falling when he met with deCastro and operations director Mitch Rosen on Monday.
Well, that’s not quite true. Everyone at the station who wasn’t handpicked by deCastro in the last few months feels uneasy about their staying power at the station. Given that Hanley’s contract was up for renewal, he likely wasn’t expecting a five-year extension. But when the spring ratings book comes out Tuesday, his show will be atop its 25-to-54-year-old male demographic. No one can spin this move as being about ratings and that’s what makes it so disheartening for Score employees. It’s all about one man’s opinion, not performance.
While I discount the real importance of radio ratings, “Mully & Hanley’s” numbers are so strong, the show pops up every month in the overall Nielsen top 10 charts. But sports talk shows are sold using the adult male demo, and often times, stations sell ads on the anecdotal popularity of the overall package.
While the Haugh for Hanley switch didn’t happen in March, it was only a matter of time. (Haugh has been the regular fill-in for the show well before deCastro came aboard.) While Hanley was aware of the change before it was announced during his show, few other people in the station had any idea it was coming. No one knew it would break during the show, except the person who told Feder, I suppose. (DeCastro didn’t return a late morning phone call Friday, but we’ll update this story with any comments.)
People often say, “Don’t meet your heroes.” I’ve known Brian for 18 years now and can’t think of a remotely negative thing to say about him. He’s a wonderful guy. One of the best I know. The Score is, and always will be, better with him than without.
— Jay Zawaski (@JayZawaski670) July 3, 2018
On Tuesday, no one mentioned it on air. That didn’t happen until Thursday because Bulls contributor and Sun-Times writer Joe Cowley brought it up at the end of an interview with Hanley and Mulligan, who was working from London where he was on “holiday.”
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At the end of the show, Cowley said, “Hey fellas, Brian, I just want to say, to both of you, I just wanted to thank you for everything through the years and Brian, I was always glad to call you a teammate, I felt like at the Sun-Times, you were a teammate, on The Score you were a teammate and I wish you nothing but the best of luck, dude. You’re first class.”
Hanley responded, “Appreciate it, Joe. Thanks so much. We’ll talk soon.”
After Cowley hung up, Hanley said, “We might as well address that, since Joe did and I appreciate his remarks. Uh, look, the one thing that’s been constant here since we’ve had a change of ownership is change. And this show is not immune to it apparently, and change is coming. We’re not sure exactly…well, there are reports out there that are pretty accurate. Not sure exactly the details or the timeline. You’re stuck with me for a few more weeks anyway. So hopefully you tolerate that and we’ll do what we’ve been doing for a number of years here. And as we move forward, when we get more information, we’ll share that with you.”
Mulligan responded, “That sounds great, Brian. You know a lot of love from this end, and obviously I wish I was not in London right now. I wish that this wasn’t a pre-arranged holiday from months ago, but I’m thinking of you and…”
Hanley interrupted with, “Also, I have to say, thank you for your support. The support over the last couple days, it’s absolutely been overwhelming. It’s like I was at my own wake. Thankfully, people are saying nice things so I didn’t have to get out of my casket and walk out. It’s floored me, it really has.”
Mulligan, sounding a little emotional, said, “Well that’s good to hear because you deserve all of it. I’m sure we’re going to take care of all of this before all is said and done. I think it’s genuine, Brian. You’re world class and everybody that’s ever worked with you knows it.”
“I’ll try to change that in the next few weeks,” Hanley said.
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“Good man,” Mulligan said.
“I’m going to be on that balcony in Las Vegas that Boogie Cousins vacated. I’m going to Golden State too.”
Mulligan then ended the segment.
I wouldn’t be shocked if Hanley sticks around as a weekend or fill-in host, but nothing is finalized yet, including, from what I’ve heard during the week, Haugh’s contract.
Will the show change without the easygoing, wisecracking Hanley? Sure. He and Haugh have different comportments, angles, opinions and interest. Mulligan will continue to drive, crack his own jokes, talk soccer and White Sox, give well-sourced Bears nuggets, and ask questions that can be timed with an hourglass. Haugh, who isn’t shy with his opinions, will provide his own insight. I’m guessing the ratings will stay high, just as I assume the other mixed-up shows are still competitive with ESPN 1000.
(Selfishly, I hope “Mully & Haugh” will continue to bring on guests from The Athletic, which I thank the current show tremendously for doing.)
Twitter reaction to the move, like most moves of this kind, wasn’t positive and while Haugh, a longtime radio host at The Score, The Game and ESPN 1000, is well-liked among many media members, Hanley is particularly popular at the station, just as he was when he covered sports for the Sun-Times. I rarely see him anymore, but I always looked up to him during my early days as a freelance reporter in town.
While Hanley can roll eyes with corny jokes, he’s the counterpoint to Mulligan’s garrulousness. (Behind the scenes, Hanley is known as the host who is easy to work with, while Mulligan, the show’s driver, is a little more prickly.)
If the radio folks in Bristol, Conn. were smart, they’d attack The Score while it’s potentially vulnerable in the mornings and move up David Kaplan’s 9 a.m. morning show by two hours in place of (lol) “Golic & Wingo.” Then again, Kaplan, who co-hosted The Game’s anchor show with Haugh, could be the next Score addition when his ESPN contract runs out in September 2019.
We’re a week removed from talking about Sammy Sosa, so I apologize in advance for bringing him up, but the last flap happened when I was out of town for a week, and I was curious about some stuff.
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The Sports Illustrated “Where Are They Now?” story was fine but unremarkable, particularly since Kaplan had recently done a fine but unremarkable interview with Sosa in Florida. (I still haven’t watched Jeremy Schaap’s recent ESPN interview with Sosa.) But it was interesting to read references about a botched 2014 peace summit between Sosa and the Cubs.
Haugh expanded on SI’s anecdote in a very interesting column on his previously little-known involvement with that 2014 meet-up. What Haugh wrote was that Sosa balked at the last second, literally while Haugh, Kaplan and their multimedia crew for print, radio and TV were in the air, because Sosa decided (or was advised) he didn’t want to do the required interviews. I briefly commiserated with Sosa, wondering if the Chicago side of the media push, who were identified as being led by Ricketts’ PR team, i.e. Dennis Culloton and his eponymous firm, over-reached and blew the deal.

The Cubs might not want Sammy Sosa at Wrigley Field, but a lot of their fans do, if only for a day. (Stephen J. Carrera/AP Photo)
What I learned in digging around was that Sosa was definitely aware of the outline of the arrangement. In fact, the landing was going to be so soft for Sosa that he even had a set-up for a practice interview with a Florida-based producer and camera crew to prepare for the real one. While no one told Haugh and Kaplan what they could or couldn’t ask Sosa, it wasn’t set up to be a Frost/Nixon interview either, just a chance for Sosa to publicly face the obvious questions as the rapprochement took hold.
But, according to what I heard, Sosa balked before the practice interview as he started to complain any negative press could ruin his new business ventures. He ended the talks, which also involved the Dominican Republic government for some reason.
Aside from our annual questions about the Sosa-Cubs relationship, all was mostly quiet until Sosa’s latest media tour, which achieved the opposite of the 2014 goal to get him back in the organization’s good graces. Now he’s more radioactive than ever.
My opinion remains the same: Welcoming Sosa back for a day at Wrigley Field and regular invites to the Cubs Convention isn’t about him paying homage to Tom Ricketts. It’s about Sosa’s connection to Cubs fans, many of whom would welcome the chance to cheer him again and remember what it was like 20 years ago when Sosa could do no wrong. Would some fans boo him? Yes, but many would love to see this reunion happen.
Is Sosa an oddball egotist and a chronic pain in the ass? Yes. He was 14 years ago when he left, so why would you expect him to change now that he fancies himself some kind of international man of intrigue? Why would anyone think he’s going to find humility in Abu Dhabi or wherever?
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The Cubs should just hold their nose and get this over with so we can all stop talking and writing about it.
(Top photo of Mulligan and Hanley, left to right: courtesy of The Score’s website)
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