New Lineup For The Score In Chicago

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With the retirement of longtime host Terry Boers, CBS Radio Chicago’s 670-AM The Score is launching a new lineup Tuesday, January 17. Midday host Jason Goff (right) will move to afternoons, joining Dan Bernstein, and teaming up with midday host Matt Spiegel will be Danny Parkins.

WSCR PD Mitch Rosen said, “The retirement of beloved ‘Score original’ Terry Boers after 25 years, coupled with the exciting achievements of the station over the last year, led us straight to Jason as the perfect match with Dan in afternoons. As a hometown native, Danny brings passion to middays, and I couldn’t be more thrilled to hear what he and Matt create together for our loyal listeners.”

Goff originally joined 670 The Score in 2000 as a producer on The Boers and Bernstein Show in 2007. Goff was previously the evening host of CBS Radio Atlanta’s 92.9 The Game, and hosted SiriusXM NBA Radio’s midday Off the Dribble show.

Parkins joins 670 The Score from 610 Sports Radio in Kansas City where his afternoon show The Drive has been the highest-rated sports show in Kansas City for the last two years. Prior to his time in Kansas City, Parkins hosted sports radio programs in Syracuse, NY. He is a graduate of the prestigious S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications at Syracuse University, and graduated locally from New Trier High School.

Senior Vice President and Market Manager, CBS RADIO Chicago, Tim Pohlman, added, “Following the success The Score has seen in the past year sharing the historic Cubs Championship with all of Chicago, and celebrating 25 years of delivering the city’s best sports coverage, I’m thrilled to see the pairing of Jason Goff and Dan Bernstein and to welcome the talented Danny Parkins to our already stellar lineup of Score hosts.”

10 COMMENTS

  1. Gofful is brutal! Gofful thinks he’s gonna make such a difference in the world. What a fool, I wonder if he talks to himself a lot too?!

  2. About Danny Parkins (to reply to comments from Dave and Greasetrap) —

    While Parkins isn’t quite as overbearing as Jason Goff, that’s like saying that DDT isn’t quite as poisonous as cyanide; both Parkins and Goff ultimately run the gamut (in a 5-minute listen) from cloying to annoying to (click – station changed).

    As Greasetrap so aptly pointed out, it’s as if Parkins thinks if he “acts” like he’s an established Chicago radio personality who has paid his dues in this market (and in his career, for that matter), we’ll buy it, no questions asked. Sorry… again, this is the No. 3 media market in the country. It’s not that easy.

    Greater talents than Parkins have tried and failed to hold an audience in this town. Hell, even Howard Stern’s syndicated show on terrestrial radio didn’t do that well here years ago, and there aren’t many radio personalities more capable of commanding an audience than Howard.

    And that actually leads me to this point: Stern’s syndicated show didn’t blow away the competition here… because he wasn’t talking from the perspective of a dyed-in-the-wool Chicagoan. When it comes to radio, at least, Chicago embraces its own, and disdains anything from the coasts, particularly the Big Apple.

    While Parkins is originally from Chicago, he just doesn’t seem that familiar with the city or its sports history; and rather than sounding like a down-to-earth Chicagoan, like, say, Mulley or Hanley, he comes across as a smarmy, entitled rich brat, not far removed from the kid who once lived in both Glencoe and a snooty Lake Shore Drive high-rise. And no, slumming with some college buddies in a Wrigleyville apartment is not exactly “roughing it.”

    And then there is also the peculiar generation gap between Parkins and Matt Spiegel. Instead of “owning” the fact that he is a relative youngster at age 30, admitting he doesn’t get 99% of Spiegel’s (Gen X) cultural references, and being OK with not even being alive the last time the Bears won a Super Bowl, Parkins often seems like he thinks he’s supposed to be a combination of Jack Brickhouse, Pat Hughes, Mark Giangreco, Mike North and Terry Boers — but he comes across like a kid playing make-believe sports announcer with a flashlight for a microphone when he was 8 years old. (The Parkins-Spiegel “chemistry” isn’t quite as bad as the Bernstein-Goff train wreck, but it isn’t far behind, either.)

    To me, there is nothing worse than a young guy who is trying too hard to sound old… or an old guy who is trying too hard to sound young. I don’t really care for Hawk Harrelson, but I doubt he goes home and plays Resident Evil 7: Biohazard on Xbox or listens to “Views” by Drake on his Beats by Dr. Dre headphones.

    Like I said: Another poor ratings book for the midday and afternoon shows, and it will be “Danny, we hardly knew ye” and “Goff as in off … the air.”

  3. I agree with John. The Score has become unlistenable to me. I am a 55 year old who has listened for many years and I would always get mad and Boers & Bernstein when they would gang up and start hammering callers. However, they were funny enough in the “good hours” that I would always turn them back on. Nobody hit the button more than me as they would always say… “if you don’t like us then you don’t have to listen”. Goff just gets on his uncomfortable rants where he is describing how things and life work and it is hard to listen to. Mulley & Hanley have a way of conversing with us… I feel with B&G and Parkins & Speigel they are talking at us and telling us how much they know… I can honestly say I have turned them off and it is no surprise that ratings are going down. All of my sports buddies have the same opinion….. sad to see as I have enjoyed the Score over the years.. MacNeil & North both had personalities and were entertaining even though frustrating at times…

  4. To (belatedly) respond to the 1/26/17 comment from MS:

    Sorry, but I stand by my original post (1/13/17). And I HAVE listened to B&G, and I find myself cringing within five minutes. The pair has zero chemistry; worse still, it’s clear that they both know that, and so every laugh is hollow, and every segment and “debate” is forced and awkward.

    (And occasionally, Jason Goff will let his thinly veiled contempt for Dan Bernstein poke through to the surface, and it’s not funny, it’s just cringeworthy.) And clearly I’m not the only person who feels this way; after being #1 in its time slot when Bernstein was still paired with the now-retired Terry Boers, the show has nosedived to 7th in the ratings (6 spots behind ESPN) in the latest ratings book.

    And as has been pointed out numerous times in other online forums, Goff drops the race card so often, I’m amazed he is still on the air. Worse still, Goff is so clearly uncomfortable with SOMETHING — being paired with Bernstein? something related to race, sexuality, personal insecurity, ??? — that listening to him attempt to overcompensate for (whatever it is) for more than a few minutes is almost intolerable. He comes across as so painfully self-conscious that it consistently overpowers any salient points he might be attempting to make about sports. And again, pairing him with Bernstein is like concocting a cocktail consisting of gin and Merlot wine. They just don’t mesh well together.

    And while Goff is intelligent, and he does seem to know sports, that is not nearly enough to justify holding down half of the afternoon drive slot of what until recently was the #1 sports radio station in the #3 media market in the U.S. To be blunt, Goff simply does not have the personality and polish for it; there is a reason why he didn’t last long in Atlanta.

    Say what you want about Bernstein (and I happen to think that he gets a bad rap), but there is no denying that Bernstein understands what being a radio personality is all about. You may hate him or love him, or despise or embrace his politics, but he is hardly unlistenable, and is a legitimate A-level talent. Goff, on the other hand, is in way over his head.

    To those who are suggesting relegating Bernstein to overnights and pairing him with Les Grobstein: Get serious.

    Grobstein probably makes about $15-$16 an hour. Bernstein’s contract probably pays him at least $250k a year, and probably closer to a half million. He is being paid to do afternoon drive (again, in the #3 media market in the country), and earns a salary that correlates with the ad revenues applicable for that lucrative time slot. Put another way, there are probably 1,000 times as many people listening to the radio at 2 p.m. as there are at 2 a.m. … Bernstein isn’t going anywhere until his contract is up; he signed a multiyear extension in 2014, but for how many years, I’m not sure. But the Score isn’t going to pay him big bucks to work overnights, or even the early evening shift.

    And with Mulley and Hanley pulling in good ratings in morning drive, Bernstein’s not going to mornings. Maybe Mitch Rosen gets cute and flip-flops the midday and afternoon shows, or puts Goff on solo in the early evening and pairs Laurence Holmes with Bernstein, but if I was going to bet, I’d say that if B&G tanks in the next (summer) quarterly ratings book, Goff will be let go, and they’ll bring in someone with a more compatible personality to bounce off of Bernstein, e.g., Barry Rozner.

    I’d love to know why Matt Abbatacola left the Score, but if anyone deserved the chance to fill Boers’ very large shoes, it was Matt. If he left because he was bitter about the train wreck that is B&G, and the fact he wasn’t offered the show, it would be understandable. Maybe his brand of acerbic humor, sarcasm and clear dislike of Bernstein wouldn’t have worked on-air with Bernstein either, but I think Abbatacola — like Boers before him — was a lot more clever and witty about how he “revealed” that card, in contrast to the “hit you over the head” style of Goff.

    In any case, ratings talk, and b.s. walks. Drastic changes to the Score lineup are inevitable within a year if the station’s ratings slide continues. Bank on it. Advertisers only pay for shows that have audiences.

    • Really spot on stuff here. Curious what your thoughts are on Parkins? I haven’t talked to one person that actually likes his act. I find him very annoying and feel he spends most of the show trying to convince everyone how funny, witty, of how great he was in KC. We get it, you gamble, you smoke weed, you drink, again I feel like he is trying to build this prosona that nobody is buying. It makes for very unlistenable radio.

  5. the score has become un-listenable between the loopy liberalism of the middle aged morning show and the new midday lineup arg, afternoons are even worse bernstein is still a tool and larry holmes is a minor market talent bye score after 25 yrs

  6. You obviously didn’t listen when Matt had his chance 5-7 Years ago. He was more argumentative than Dan (i like Dan by the way), and they pulled him back in. He blew it (Or at least that what i got from it). Jason is doing a great job

  7. I do believe Jason has proven you to be wrong. He can hold more than his own against Bernstein and actually fires back quite a few intelligent volleys. Your comment regarding “Bernstein’s much higher intelligence” is a crock of s**t (sorry) and Jason is in no way a B or C level personality. I think you should take time to listen a little more. They appear to be having a great time together as well. Jason actually makes Dan more palatable. (palatable is the best I could do. I’m sure Dan can whip out some obscure synonym for it)

  8. Jason Goff works hard, shows up well-prepared, and has paid his dues. But the thing is, what made Boers and Bernstein a unique show was the pair’s chemistry, quirky personalities and high degree of intelligence. With all due respect to Goff, he is a B- or C-level personality, and in a major market like Chicago, that just won’t cut it. Dan Bernstein will overpower him with his much higher intelligence, sharper wit and even his greater depth of sports knowledge; and the strain of Bernstein having to accommodate a lesser talent will soon become obvious. Boers could hold his own against Bernstein; Goff simply can’t. Yes, I realize Goff used to produce the B & B show, but unlike Matt Abbatacola, Goff just can’t bounce off of Bernstein in a way that engages listeners. Abbatacola, Barry Rozner, Laurence Holmes or Chris Rongey would have been much better matches for Bernstein; better yet, I wish Program Director Mitch Rosen would have brought in a young, fresh talent that Chicago was not familiar with; it might have been fun to listen to the chemistry develop (or not) between that person and Bernstein. The new midday guy from KC, Danny Parkins, would have been a better fit with Bernstein in my opinion. Nothing personal against the competent but oh-so-bland Goff, but this just isn’t going to work.

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