Greenberg: Danny Parkins leaving Chicago sports radio for FS1. Who will replace him? (2024)

Well, you know what this means.

The Bears are headed to the Super Bowl. Caleb Williams is going to be a superstar. Craig Counsell will rediscover his managerial genius and the Cubs will make a playoff run. The White Sox might not lose 120 games. The Bulls are going to win the next draft lottery.

Good tidings are coming our way because Chicago is now free of the “Danny Parkins Curse.”

On Tuesday, Parkins, the host of the “Parkins and Spiegel Show” on 670 The Score affirmed the worst-kept secret in town: that he was leaving his afternoon drive radio show. The move had been reported by the Sun-Times earlier in the week and was rumored for more than a month.

Parkins couldn’t officially say where he was heading, but we all know he’s moving on to a TV show at FS1 and leaving Chicago for New York City. The intro to Tuesday’s “Parkins and Spiegel” show was set to “New York, New York” with plenty of gratuitous Dak Prescott mentions to highlight how often Parkins will be talking about the Dallas Cowboys QB for his new national TV gig.

FS1 is announcing its new weekday sports-talk schedule on Wednesday. The 37-year-old Parkins will co-host a three-man show five mornings a week.

“This is, incredibly emotional for me and has happened very, very fast,” he said during the transition with the Score’s midday show. “I wish I could have given a little bit more public notice. But trust me, it’s happened incredibly fast in my personal life also. I’m grateful that we get a goodbye show because I truly love what Spiegs, Tanney, Shane and myself have created in the afternoons. This is a life-changing opportunity for me and my family and so I don’t leave here lightly.”

His pockets won’t be light, that’s for sure. National TV money always beats local radio money.

.@DannyParkins' final @ParkinsSpiegel Show will be tomorrow. They'll have a goodbye show.

Parkins will conclude his time at 670 The Score with the 24-hour radiothon, which begins Thursday.

"This is incredibly emotional for me and has happened very, very fast," Parkins says. pic.twitter.com/lwYi46EqnD

— 670 The Score (@670TheScore) August 13, 2024

Nationally, Parkins is an unknown, but the Syracuse and New Trier grad made a name for himself in his hometown over the past seven-plus years since leaving Kansas City for The Score. First, he hosted with Matt Spiegel on middays, and then, in 2018, he was put in afternoons with the prodigal son Dan McNeil.

When McNeil got fired for an off-color tweet in 2020, Score boss Mitch Rosen reunited Parkins and Spiegel in the afternoons in February 2021.

Parkins’ aggressiveness and love of wacky radio bits helped the show find its footing. In recent years, it’s basically been a four-person show with producers Shane Riordan and Chris Tannehill. The formula has worked. It’s a fun show, with a dedicated audience, that breaks news, books topical guests and stirs it up.

While Parkins said Tuesday that hosting afternoon drive in Chicago was his career goal, he developed other ambitions.

He had a podcast deal with Colin Cowherd’s Volume network, but the suits at Audacy squashed it. (He wound up hosting an Audacy NFL podcast with his longtime friend Andrew Fillipponi, who does a sports radio show in Pittsburgh.) Parkins has also served as a host for the Cubs’ TV station, Marquee Sports Network, and he recently co-authored a book about Division-III influence on the NBA.

In July, Parkins guest-hosted Cowherd’s “The Herd” on FS1, and when it was announced that Skip Bayless was leaving FS1, Parkins was mentioned as a potential new host. Now, it’s happening. It certainly helps that Parkins’ best friend in the industry is FS1 star Nick Wright. Cowherd has referred to Parkins as “the most talented sports talk radio host I think out there right now at his age,” which sounds like an old Hawk Harrelson compliment.

But Parkins has worked hard to get this opportunity. Unlike a lot of national voices, he is self-aware and while he certainly has a healthy belief in himself, he’s not an egomaniac. Well, not yet at least.

“I thought I was going to be here for 25 years,” he said on the radio Tuesday. “I can pass a lie detector test on that. Maybe it was from insecurity or self-deprecation — it wasn’t for lack of ambition or belief in my talent — but I didn’t really think this was going to be possible for me.”

Parkins’ last show will be Wednesday and then he’ll host a 24-hour “Cubs for a Cure” radiothon Thursday for cancer research. His older brother Brad passed away from glioblastoma in 2023. Parkins also hosted a radiothon in 2021 to raise money for a Chicago charity. He said he will continue to pop in on the station and will come back to host a radiothon next summer.

So what about this “Parkins Curse?” Well, he’s not only gotten the reputation for being a mush — who can forget his QB1 party for Justin Fields — but since he arrived in January 2017, right after the Cubs’ World Series win, no Chicago team has won much of anything, unless you count the Blackhawks and Bears getting No. 1 picks.The 2017 Cubs are the only team to win a real playoff series (not counting the 2020 Blackhawks’ qualifying-round win in the bubble playoffs). It’s been a dreadful period for Chicago sports, even by our low standards of success. So maybe Parkins’ departure will change our mojo. Hey, we rid ourselves of the “Billy Goat Curse” before he arrived.

That time @DannyParkins and @MattSpiegel670 threw a QB1 party in studio.

Watch on @YouTube: https://t.co/98lChwIUvx pic.twitter.com/sQVwgj0SQ8

— 670 The Score (@670TheScore) November 7, 2022

It’s ironic that Parkins, a lunatic Bears fan, is leaving now that the Bears have hope and a legitimate, possible franchise QB in Caleb Williams. Maybe for the Bears, it’s a good thing he won’t be talking about it locally and mushing their chances. Parkins admitted as much on the air Tuesday, noting that he left Kansas City just before Patrick Mahomes was drafted.

While Parkins will be obliged to chatter endlessly about Prescott and Aaron Rodgers on FS1, you know he’ll be shoehorning in Williams and the Bears every chance he gets.

Unlike some of his more self-serious peers, Parkins has a sense of humor about himself, but he deserves his flowers, as they say. He was a breath of fresh air in Chicago, a youngish (for sports radio anyway) voice and an energetic presence in town. His passion for Chicago sports, and Chicago in general, will be missed.

Now, who will replace him here? Rosen isn’t saying. But there are plenty of possibilities.

I like this one:

Keep Mike Mulligan and David Haugh in the mornings. Move Spiegel back to middays with Dan Bernstein and then finally try the pairing of Laurence Holmes and Jason Goff in the afternoons. Holmes and Bernstein are doing good work together, but they can both drive shows, which makes them valuable in different lineups.

Goff, of course, was famously jettisoned from the Score by Jimmy deCastro in 2018 — was it really that long ago? — but he’s made regular guest appearances on the station in recent years. Goff bounced back nicely, serving as the host of the Bulls’ pre- and postgame show on NBC Sports Chicago, and he has a Chicago-centric podcast, “The Full Go,” on The Ringer Network.

NBC Sports Chicago will cease to exist after the baseball season and all programming will be transferred to the new Chicago Sports Network (CHSN) this fall. Turnover could be coming to The Ringer as well. The New York Post reported that Bill Simmons, the Ringer founder, could be leaving when his contract with Spotify expires. He sold the company to the streamer in 2020.

CHSN would be wise to sign Goff to a new deal — he’s an honest broker and has real chemistry with Kendall Gill and Will Perdue — and if that happens, it would be tough for him to go from an afternoon show straight to Bulls pregame (the show’s studios are moving to the United Center). But if both sides were amenable to a reunion, they could work something out.

One thing is for sure: Goff is a radio natural and his hosting with his good friend Holmes, to use a comparison that the latter would enjoy, would be akin to Deadpool & Wolverine — an enjoyable fan-service team-up.

Of course, there’s also the matter of Audacy, which isn’t exactly in great financial shape, being able to pay Goff (or any new host) what they want.

Rosen has a number of options, including pairing Bernstein and Spiegel and creating a show called “Laurence Holmes & Friends” where he has a rotation of guest hosts, led by Goff and NBC 5 anchor/reporter Leila Rahimi, the former full-time host who now sits in with Holmes and Bernstein at least once a week.

I wouldn’t be surprised if Rosen makes a run at WGN anchor Jarrett Payton, who has the name and the Bears connection to bring in listeners. His only problem? He’s probably too nice for the job (especially if things sour for the Bears). Former NFL player Anthony Herron is a regular host on the station, and The Score’s Bears reporter Mark Grote is one of my favorites and could drive a full-time show.

If Rosen wants tension in the studio, he could pair Spiegel, Tannehill and Riordan with embattled Sox TV voice John Schriffen. They could call it “The Radio Losers.”

Lmao 🤣 pic.twitter.com/rOvlwxAgkM

— Danny Parkins (@DannyParkins) May 18, 2024

How about my friend Nick Friedell, who is still traveling the world on ESPN’s dime? The Score is the Cubs’ flagship and Friedell, a lifelong Cubs fan, is an unapologetic critic of the team. The Score also has the Bulls’ rights and Friedell, a former Bulls beat writer, savages them too. So the teams wouldn’t love it, which, to me, is even more reason to hire him. Plus, I want him back in Chicago.

And maybe there won’t be as much to be negative about. Because with “Parkins The Mush” gone, the Bulls will be raising banners, the Cubs will be going back to the World Series and the Bears, my friends, are Super Bowl bound.

(Photo of Danny Parkins and Craig Counsell: Jon Greenberg / The Athletic)

Jon Greenberg is a columnist for The Athletic based in Chicago. He was also the founding editor of The Athletic. Before that, he was a columnist for ESPN and the executive editor of Team Marketing Report. Follow Jon on Twitter @jon_greenberg