The lady with the Golden voice is getting a new gig and a new station. Former 790 The Zone personality Sandra Golden will be joining 680 The Fan’s morning show The Rude Awakening after a few years off since a long run at 790 The Zone. Golden, who up until recently was still heard on 790 The Zone promotions, commercials and some fill-in work, had a brief run at a daily sports show called The Sports Gig, which she co-hosted on CSS with 790’s Mike Bell. Golden was also featured frequently on CSS’s SportsNite as a reporter and co-anchor.
Honestly it will be nice to listen not just to a female voice in the Rude Awakening, but to a fresh voice on that show which had been getting stale with the addition of Leo Mazzone. Golden has experience with “the boys” as she was the only female in the boys club that used to be Mayhem in the AM on The Zone. Her laugh was distinctive but she also knows her sports. If Mazzone tries to run her over by dismissing her as just the female sideline reporter-type, he will be mistaken. Actually, I kind of hope they challenge her so she CAN flex her sports intellect.
Golden also continues a recent trend of 680 The Fan grabbing former 790 The Zone talent. Matt Chernoff “started” the recent ship-jumping to 680, followed by The King Chuck Oliver, Brandon “Hometeam” Leak, update man/producer Chadd Scott, fill-in host Brandon Adams and 3D Dennis Scott, who helps with the Hawks coverage.
National Signing Day 2011 was finally put to rest last Monday on Score Atlanta’s The Official Visit. Co-hosts Scott Janovitz and Fletcher Proctor broke down Georgia’s class and Georgia Tech’s class and fielded calls on both programs. The Official Visit is constantly changing and evolving as now listeners are calling in to seek information, something that had not been occurring in the past. The Official Visit is also expanding to the Twitter World with a brand new handle @OfficialVisit. The Twitter feed will provide updates on who will be appearing on the show, various recruiting updates and recaps of interviews.
Speaking of National Signing Day 2011, Brian Jones of Score Atlanta fame wrote up a tremendous recap which can be found on www.scoreatl.com, detailing the day/week that was in Georgia high school recruiting. A little less than one week after National Signing Day, nearly 750 football players had signed on to play at the next level. Score Atlanta, Georgia Public Broadcasting, which hosted two webcasts breaking down the recruiting season that was, and 790 The Zone all provided instant updates and analysis and should be lauded for their efforts.
The Super Bowl was played recently and the coverage was wall-to-wall as would be expected. A few interesting nuggets from the coverage, on a local level, involved the coverage of Aaron Rodgers. With his win in the game, some local personalities were ready to anoint him as one of the best ever. As much as one Super Bowl victory can improve a resume, I cannot say that this one title promotes him into the discussion for inclusion on the Quarterback Mount Rushmore. Sorry. While I personally believe that this title elevates him into the discussion for inclusion into the CURRENT quarterback Rushmore, his lone title hasn’t helped him surpass Elway or Brady or Manning or Marino or Favre. He hasn’t passed Montana, or Young, or Kelly or Bradshaw or Aikman yet. This isn’t to say that he won’t, but he hasn’t yet.
The win does though punch Rodgers’ ticket as the best young QB in the game, bar none. Atlanta fans sadly must agree with this statement as Rodgers actually went up against Falcons signal-caller Matt Ryan and outplayed him in the Georgia Dome. Ryan is a fine young quarterback, but he can only look at his 0-2 postseason record and then peek at Rodgers’ resume which now includes a ring and see that the bar has been raised. Don’t fret though Falcons fans, I’d still rank Matt Ryan in the top five quarterbacks under 30 years old. Philip Rivers has to be in the discussion as does Rodgers, but you must like Ryan ahead of Jets quarterback Mark Sanchez, St. Louis’ Sam Bradford and Baltimore’s Joe Flacco. While Sanchez and Flacco both have tasted some success in the postseason, I believe if given a choice, both of those franchises would gladly switch quarterbacks with Atlanta while I cannot see the Falcons willing to go through with a switch in a hypothetical swap. Rodgers lost a tough playoff game in the 2009-10 playoffs then went on to win the 2010-11 season’s Super Bowl. Perhaps Ryan will follow in Rodgers’ footsteps in 2011-12.
Other notes from the Super Bowl: Mayhem in the AM talking about how a handful of fans got jobbed (paraphrasing since I don’t want to write the word they used) out of the Super Bowl due to an overselling of seats. It was announced that these fans would be given deluxe tickets to next year’s Super Bowl and be allowed on the field and likely put up by the NFL in a hotel and allowed into parties. In my opinion, this was the best thing that could have ever happened to these people. Oh, you missed the Super Bowl. Big deal. You will be treated like a king/queen next season. It reminds me of when an airline oversells seats and the folks at the counter beg for a volunteer to take a later flight with a voucher for a free flight and a seat in first class. HECK YES you take that deal if your plans allow it. Oh, you have to sit in the airport for four more hours. Usually they let you go to the first class lounge and then you get to sit in first class on the next flight AND you get a free flight? No brainer. Same with these folks: they were going to sit in the nosebleed seats, but now they will be ON THE FIELD in 2012 with primo seats. The Mayhem crew relented a bit once it was announced what the “unlucky” fans would receive. I think they cleaned up.
ESPN.com ran a story on its front page recently declaring that Chipper Jones would be back for 2011. Thanks? I’ll take “things that were obvious six months ago” for $600 please Alex.
Can You Believe He Said That
Just a month ago things were looking pretty bleak, as the Dogs had turned in an excruciatingly bad bowl performance, whiffed on a couple of all star recruits and been dumped on verbally by a big-name football alum.
That was the AJC’s Georgia fan blogger Bill King. His statement brings up an interesting thought: I wonder how Frankly Fran Tarkenton is taking this recruiting class? The recruits and players don’t seem to agree with Tarkenton and his latest rant against Richt. I wonder if Frankly Fran will weigh in on Richt now. Ah, that’s right; he only surfaces to heap negativity. I would imagine we won’t hear from him until Georgia loses.
No comments:
Post a Comment