Mike Babchik received an all-access pass when he was invited to attend the championship game of the Arena Football League earlier in the summer. As a longtime listener, the league’s chief operating officer extended the opportunity to Babchik to watch the ArenaBowl between the Billings Outlaws and Albany Firebirds live in a first-of-its-kind endeavor at American Dream Meadowlands, a retail and entertainment complex just outside of New York City.
Throughout the day, Babchik had a chance to meet several consumers of The D.A. Show with Babchik, the new morning radio program nearing its first year on SiriusXM Mad Dog Sports Radio. When the game concluded, he was on the field for the championship celebration and touched the trophy before the winning team, something that, in retrospect, he should not have done. Nonetheless, he relished the day and attended the afterparty to conclude the league’s season while interacting with listeners along the way, an actualization of the tangible impact he has had with the station over the last 15 years.
“Everything about it was so cool,” Babchik said. “It’s so much fun to be out with people that listen to the show that know it so well that are so connected that, yes, they are friends as well as fans and listeners. It’s so amazing to go out and actually perform in front of people because that’s why we all are in the radio business – we’re performers, first and foremost.”
Ahead of a typical episode of the show, Babchik is focusing on sports taking place around the country and other news, analysis and storylines surrounding the leagues. Although he has knowledge about what is taking place in the landscape, he engages in minimal preparation for editions of the program. Rather than scripting what he is going to say, Babchik finds that he comes across in a more genuine manner by reacting to developments or assertions in real time.
“I just think from working in radio for so long and seeing it from all sides, you realize that the success is about being real, and so you don’t want to force anything,” Babchik said. “You just want to truly be who you are – know who you are, know your strengths, know your flaws, and let’s just have some fun along the way.”
Taking an approach of relatability and humility has helped keep Babchik grounded, maintaining an understanding of the mercurial nature of the media business. Working on a new program while continuing to elevate his own profile has afforded him chances to collaborate, experience trial and error and innovate within the dynamic marketplace.
“This business, you could be in it one minute and you could be out of it the next, so I would never think I’m better than anybody else,” Babchik said. “In fact, I’d prefer to think that I’m the king of the unknowns, but now I’m known, which is nice.”
At the behest of his high school English teacher, Babchik began working at a local radio station in an internship that counted towards his grade. A guidance counselor at the school knew personnel at the University at Albany, SUNY, and Babchik was later accepted to the school. Towards the end of his undergraduate studies, he began to struggle and figured that getting another internship in radio would help solve his problems.
“I got an internship at 660 WFAN in New York, and I realized too, early on, especially in high school at this local station, that, ‘What a cool job,’” Babchik said. “You could sit and not stand, and I was very into that, and I could use my mouth and some voice for maybe some good, and I felt like I was pretty good at it.”
Matt Deutsch, a producer at WFAN, took Babchik under his wing during the time he interned at the station. After six years behind the glass, Deutsch joined SiriusXM as an executive producer of its sports content and was part of the launch of SiriusXM Mad Dog Sports Radio in the fall of 2008. Babchik later became a game operator at SiriusXM and had responsibilities of ensuring that local commercials aired during national game broadcasts. Exhibiting his skills and passion for the medium, he earned more opportunities at the outlet, including serving as a producer for the first show on SiriusXM Mad Dog Sports Radio hosted by Christopher “Mad Dog” Russo.
“There’s so much freedom and creativity here that I thought, ‘This is the perfect place for me,’ and obviously I was right because I’m still here today,” Babchik said. “I just think it’s such a great way to connect with people and connect with the audience [and] connect with the fans, and I think SiriusXM does that better than anybody else and they give you the rope to do it; they allow you to be yourself.”
Several years into the job, Babchik began to perceive that he could be at the company for a long time, and he ended up flourishing with the sports talk radio channel. When he was producing Evan and Phillips, a program co-hosted by Evan Cohen and Steve Phillips, he began to find his voice on the air.
Babchik and Cohen later began hosting Morning Men on SiriusXM Mad Dog Sports Radio and established themselves as a dynamic duo on the airwaves. Former NFL guard Willie Colon joined the show in 2021, enhancing the on-air product and sustaining the momentum that had been previously established. Through its various iterations, the show continued to thrive because of the relationship with its fans, and Babchik sought to showcase his strengths by abstaining from pretentious, grandiose avowals of intellect.
“I always thought, ‘Let me tell people how wrong I am,’” Babchik said. “I think that just relates more to everybody who’s listening. The common fan doesn’t get these things right mostly, and the fact that you can watch a game and you can wager a little cash on it and you, most of the time, lose, I think that actually is quite relatable.”
Cohen left SiriusXM to join ESPN Radio last year and be a host of its new morning show, Unsportsmanlike. The Morning Men program continued with Babchik and Colon over the next month before SiriusXM Mad Dog Sports Radio announced lineup changes.
Damon Amendolara, a longtime host at CBS Sports Radio, departed the national outlet after 11 years to join SiriusXM and launch The D.A. Show with Babchik on weekday mornings. Babchik helped Amendolara in acclimating to the new station by fulfilling his role while remaining confident that realizing synergy would be facile. Amendolara utilized elements from the previous iteration of his show on SiriusXM while also being receptive to new ideas and innovations.
“It’s about finding balance and not, ‘Hey, we’re doing this, hard line in the sand,’” Babchik emphasized. “I think D.A.’s been so great to incorporate not only myself into the program today, but also with everybody that’s a part of our show, and it’s been great. I mean, the growth is – you can feel it; you can hear it every single day, week, month – we just get better and better. It’s all about just trusting each other, and I trust him, he trusts me, and we really do – we have the stuff.”
Babchik senses that the culture of the radio station emanates from Russo, who openly excoriates the lineup in a humorous manner. There is synergy between the programs, including repartee with midday host Cody Decker that Babchik posits has transformed into “a beautiful rivalry.”
Eric Spitz took over as vice president of sports programming at SiriusXM last year following the departure of Steve Cohen from the position. Babchik feels that Spitz has made great moves since taking over, and he listens to him when receiving feedback.
In addition to Spitz, Steve Torre oversees SiriusXM Mad Dog Sports Radio as its program director, someone with whom Babchik has a strong relationship. When Torre was on site in Las Vegas for March Madness, Babchik decided to call him live on the air at around 8 a.m. EST. Because of the three-hour time difference between New York City and Las Vegas, Torre’s phone rang at 5 a.m. in the morning, waking him up in his hotel room. Once Babchik asked him how he was doing, he started to scream and yell before hanging up.
“That’s the type of boss that I want,” Babchik said. “Just like the Howard Stern ‘pig vomit’ – I’m not going to call Steve Torre that because he’s got his radio chops about him and he’s a great man – but it’s so much fun to know your program director in such an intimate way that you can have so much fun with them.”
Going forward, Babchik hopes to sustain the growth trajectory of The D.A. Show with Babchik as it approaches its first year on the air. At the same time, he will aim to continue leveraging the SiriusXM brand and platforms to try and aim for other on-location programs. Babchik postulates that the show has demonstrated range beyond the sports genre and aims to continue imbuing other genres within the overall talk format.
“Let’s do man-on-your-street stuff, not just on a media night for sports or in general after a big-time game,” Babchik suggested. “Let’s bring [it] mainstream – how about the Oscars [with] Mike Babchik sitting outside with a SiriusXM mic? I promise you the questions I ask are going to be different than they’ve ever heard before.”
Derek Futterman is a contributing editor and sports media reporter for Barrett Media. Additionally, he has worked in a broad array of roles in multimedia production – including on live game broadcasts and audiovisual platforms – and in digital content development and management. He previously interned for Paramount within Showtime Networks, wrote for the Long Island Herald and served as lead sports producer at NY2C. To get in touch, find him on X @derekfutterman.
