NYC Radio: Carton & Roberts WFAN-SNY Simulcast Starts May 24

CableTV's SNY will carry two hours of WFAN’s afternoon program starring Evan Roberts and Craig Carton beginning on May 24.

The simulcast was announced in March, but not the start date, which awaited details such as a new studio design, according to Neil Best at Newsday.

"For Evan and I, it’s a validation that the show works, that the show’s good," Carton said on the air after making the announcement, confirming an earlier Newsday report. "We already know that, because ratings are good, but to have another media outlet want the content of the show is very satisfying and validating to the work we’ve put into it and what we put into the show . . . We’re pumped."

Steve Raab, SNY’s longtime president, in the past has not been a fan of televising radio shows. But he said in a phone interview last week that this opportunity fit so well he warmed up to the idea.

Among those boxes was the show’s ratings popularity, its time slot leading into Mets programming — SNY will televise only a 4-to-6 p.m. slice of the five-hour program — and the improved technology for such endeavors.

"And I like the idea we’re truly selling the program together in an integrated fashion," he said. "We’ve already sold a presenting sponsorship together for both mediums." (It will be Grubhub.)

Why only two hours instead of starting at 2 p.m., when the radio show begins? YES carries the entirety of ESPN New York radio’s "The Michael Kay Show" when it does not conflict with Yankees and Nets programming.

Raab said two hours felt right, at least initially, "But two hours felt like a pretty big commitment. It also just seemed to make sense for us, no great magic to it."

Raab said when SNY first began talking to WFAN, Carton and Roberts were early in their ratings rise. The show debuted in November, and for the quarterly winter ratings book it surpassed Kay’s show among men ages 25-54.

"We probably started the conversation as you could see the upward trajectory, and by the time we finished the deal, they were already in my view entrenched in that spot," he said.

Raab believes that will have a minimal effect on Carton’s and Roberts’ radio audience.