Chris Russo

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Chris "Mad Dog" Russo
Chris "Mad Dog" Russo hosting Mike and the Mad Dog in 2007
Born	October 18, 1959 (1959-10-18) (age 48) Syosset, New York, U.S.
Show	Mike and the Mad Dog
Station(s)	WFAN, New York City
Time slot	1 - 6:30 p.m., Monday-Friday
Style	Sports radio
Country	United States

Christopher Michael Russo (born October 18, 1959), known as the "Mad Dog," is an American sports radio personality. He is best known as the co-host of the widely popular Mike and the Mad Dog sports radio show with Mike Francesa, which is broadcast on WFAN (AM) in New York City and simulcast on the YES Network.

Contents 1 Background 2 Rise to Prominence 3 Tirades 4 Trivia 5 Personal 6 Books 7 References and notes 8 External links

[edit] Background

Russo was born in Syosset, New York.^[1] He went to Darrow School in New Lebanon, New York, and Rollins College near Orlando, Florida with a degree in history. ^[2] He also spent one spring at the Cranleigh School south of London, England (Russo's mother is English) and one semester at Sydney University in Australia studying Australian history and literature.

Russo has wanted to be a broadcaster since he was a child. Prior to joining WFAN, Russo worked for WKIS in Orlando, Florida between 1984 and 1987 and WMCA in New York City between 1987 and 1988. During his career at WKIS, when it became clear that the people of Central Florida were having trouble understanding his accent, the station sent him to see a speech therapist twice a week. He got the "Mad Dog" nickname from New York Daily News Sports TV and Radio critic Bob Raissman.^[3]

Russo is known for his quick manner of speaking, the expressiveness of his voice, and his trademark greeting of "AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAnnnnnnnddddd good afternoon everybody! How are you todaaaay?"^[4] at the start of the Mike and the Mad Dog show. George Vecsey of The New York Times described his voice as "a bizarre mixture of Jerry Lewis, Archie Bunker and Daffy Duck."^[5] Russo's voice is also described as "Donald Duck on steroids."^[6]

Russo has done his shows from the US Open and the Jersey Shore on many occasions. However, he has made no secret of his dislike for NASCAR, despite his previous on-air work in Orlando.

Russo also develops into his alter-ego, "The Marquis", during the two week period between the NFL Conference Championship games and the Super Bowl. As "the Marquis", he takes pride and joy in shooting down the hopes of callers who look to answer 4 Super Bowl trivia questions in exchange for a trip and tickets to the Super Bowl. The Dog likes to bait listeners with easy questions at first, and then destroy them with question # 4. The # 4 questions tend to be extremely obscure, such as, "Who was the color commentator for the television broadcast of Super Bowl II?"

[edit] Rise to Prominence

Main article: Mike and the Mad Dog

Russo's rise in popularity happened rapidly. Russo joined WFAN in December 1988 as an overnight, weekend and fill-in host.^[7] He caught the attention of former WFAN Morning Show Host, Don Imus. Imus brought Russo on-board the Imus in the Morning show as the Sports Reporter. The attention Russo received on Imus was enormous. Imus also later helped promote Russo's nickname. By early 1989, his work on Imus led to Russo getting his own regular weekend show on Saturday Mornings. When Pete Franklin's drive time Show from 3 p.m. to 7 p.m. was not renewed by WFAN station management, WFAN paired up Russo with Mike Francesa, who at the time was a co-host on the mid-morning show. The show was dubbed the Mike and the Mad Dog show and was launched on September 5, 1989 at 3 p.m.

The combination paired up Francesa's hard-hitting style with Russo's unorthodox and humorous style and proved to be a huge success. Francesa and Russo's show quickly became the signature show for WFAN, as well as among the most influential sports talk shows in the country.

[edit] Tirades

Chris Russo's rants often involve New York sports teams, most frequently the Yankees. The San Francisco Giants are the only team in which he has a rooting interest. Russo's pairing with Mike Francesa, a lifelong Yankee fan, adds enough friction to make their unexpected evenhandedness the template for success.

In 1989, when Sports Illustrated named Greg LeMond the Sportsman of the Year, Russo ripped the selection angering many Cycling fans in the New York area.

In 1989, he angered Yankee fans by saying Will Clark of the SF Giants was a better ballplayer than NY Yankee Don Mattingly claiming Clark was more feared by pitchers.

In 1992, he flew into a tirade about New York Rangers head coach Roger Neilson's laid-back coaching style. He shouted that Neilson should "kick over a garbage can."

In 2003, after his beloved San Francisco Giants lost to the eventual-World Series champion Florida Marlins in the NLDS 3 games to 1, Russo went on perhaps his most famous tirade where, among other things, he states that he would give up his 3 (at the time) children to see the Giants win a World Series[1].

In June 2004, he called in to Imus in the Morning to respond to Sid Rosenberg, who felt he crossed the line in suggesting Marv Albert had no business positioning himself as a play by play man for the Nets. The two traded barbs for several minutes but Sid ultimately got the last laugh when Russo tried to portray himself as a good samaritan for giving Subway tokens to a less fortunate sportscaster.

In 2006, he flew into a tirade about Bryant Gumbel's Winter Olympic remarks.

On March 4, 2006, Russo criticized his parent company for hiring David Lee Roth. He ripped Roth for not being able to do a talk show. He was also critical of his parent company suing Howard Stern because it was keeping Stern's name in the newspapers.

In June 2006, Russo ranted about media coverage of 16-year-old Michelle Wie as she attempted to qualify for the US Open, which he felt was overblown since she had never won anything and was on the cover of the New York Times.

On July 31, 2006, Russo got into a heated argument with Yankees General Manager Brian Cashman on the respective merits of the players Cashman had recently acquired from the Phillies. Russo claimed that SP Cory Lidle was simply not a good pitcher and OF Bobby Abreu lacked the intangibles to lead a winning team. Cashman responded by saying that he was firmly behind his players and believed their individual performances would complement that of the entire 25-man roster.

Russo openly dislikes the Yankees' financial dominance and resulting success. However, his beloved Giants' high-priced acquisition of Pitcher, Barry Zito, in the 2006-07 off-season, exposed some admitted hypocrisy in his statements. Maddog had decried Zito's market value, until the Giants unexpectedly signed him to a contract. He defended the signing, when it was announced. Russo was later forced to admit his own irrational fandom.

On December 4, 2006, Russo blasted Sports Illustrated for naming Dwyane Wade their Sportsman of the Year. He claimed that Wade was given the award based solely on game performance and that there were better candidates such as Roger Federer, who won 12 tournaments in 2006, including 3 grand slams. Russo then continued his rant and said that the Heat wouldn't have even won the championship had referee Bennett Salvatore not made a very questionable call to put Wade on the free-throw line at the end of game 5. Russo continued the tirade the next day, explaining that they gave the "stupid" award to Wade rather than Federer because Federer couldn't care less and was vacationing in Dubai, where he trains. Francesa and Russo spent a segment of their show on December 5, 2006 making sarcastic comments towards SI and criticizing some of their previous award decisions.

On December 22, 2006, Russo, hosting the show by himself on a football Friday, spent nearly the entire 5 1/2 hour show slamming numerous movie critics for their unflattering reviews of the movie, We Are Marshall, the film about the Marshall University football team's tragic plane crash in 1970. Russo called the movie one of the better sports movies he's ever seen and was shocked to see that the movie was killed in the papers. Among the critics he said deserved to be "smacked around" were Stephen Holden of the New York Times, Jack Matthews (New York Daily News), Claudia Puig (USA Today), Jan Stuart (Newsday), and Kyle Smith (New York Post), who incorrectly described the plot of the story in his review. He continued to say that "half of these critics don't know their fannies from their elbows" and that "when they come knocking, (these critics) should hand in their playbooks."

On February 22, 2007, Russo, again hosting by himself, opened the show by blasting society in general for the crime activity in Las Vegas for the 2007 NBA All-Star Game, as well as the attention that the Anna Nicole Smith investigation and the Britney Spears saga are receiving. During his diatribe, Russo yelled, "I wouldn’t watch that if I was on a desert island, death upon me." He continued his rant the next day by saying, "If it was in my backyard, I’d draw the curtains," while discussing the media's fascination with Smith and Spears. “There must be enough dopey housewives out there who have some interest," Russo admitted.

The next day, Russo received a call from a relative of a victim of the Pacman Jones-related shooting in Las Vegas during the NBA’s All-Star Weekend. The victim was paralyzed from the waist down after being shot in the spinal chord. During the next segment of the show, at 6:00, Russo blew a fuse, leading to perhaps his greatest tirade of all-time. He ripped Roger Goodell and the National Football League for not taking any action when their players are involved in off the field incidents. “Does the NFL care at all about its image?” Russo asked. He then started screaming, “ENOUGH’S ENOUGH! THIS IS A DISGRACE...THROW HIM OUT OF THE LEAGUE! THROW HIM THE HELL OUT! IT’S A DISGRACE! WHAT’S THE NFL DOING? THROW HIM OUT!!!”^[8]

On April 12, 2007, at the start of their show, Russo and Francesa destroyed MSNBC for firing Don Imus less than 12 hours before WFAN was set to begin their 18th Annual Radiothon to benefit the Tomorrows Children's Fund, the CJ Foundation for SIDS and the Imus Ranch. Russo ripped the network for "washing their hands" of the matter and pointing the blame at WFAN. Francesa called the decision, "one of the least gracious acts he has ever seen", as well as a "cowardly act." He also said that they now have "no loyalty and no guts" to suit their "no ratings." This was followed up the next day, when Russo and Francesca continued their criticism of the Imus firing by criticizing Imus' "friends" (such as Tim Russert) for not standing by him during this difficult period.

On April 19, 2007, Russo went ballistic over Alex Rodriguez hitting a game-winning walk-off come-from-behind home run off the Indians, screaming at Bob Heussler, "You're a phony! You're a phony! You're a phony! You're not a part of the Crack Committee! You're not even a Met fan!"^[9]

On August 8, 2007, after Barry Bonds broke Hank Aaron's home run record Russo went after Aaron for congratulating Bonds on a pre recorded messages after saying all year that he would not attend the game and wanted nothing to do with him.

[edit] Trivia

Trivia sections are discouraged under Wikipedia guidelines. The article could be improved by integrating relevant items and removing inappropriate ones.

• Russo is a big fan of Bruce Springsteen & the E Street Band (persistently raving over their 2007 single "Radio Nowhere") and Southside Johnny.

• Russo was a big fan of the TV show LA Law and would often dedicate a few minutes every Friday recaping the episode shown the night before.

• His voice/radio persona was used in the movie, Bad Lieutenant, starring Harvey Keitel.^{[citation needed]}

• Russo has a irrational fear of snakes and clowns, causing him at one point to exclaim "Take all the snakes and clowns in this world, tie 'em to a rocket and send them to Pluto".

[edit] Personal

Russo is the only child of Tony and Vera Russo, from Flushing, Queens and England, respectively. Russo married Jeanne Lavelle on May 6, 1995^[10] and they have four children. He resides in New Canaan, Connecticut.

[edit] Books

• Russo, Christopher; Allen St. John (2003). The Mad Dog 100 : The Greatest Sports Arguments of All Time. Doubleday. ISBN 0-385-50898-0. 
• Russo, Christopher; Allen St. John (2006). The Mad Dog Hall of Fame: The Ultimate Top-Ten Rankings of the Best in Sports. Doubleday. ISBN 0-385-51746-7. 

[edit] References and notes

[edit] External links

• Chris Russo bio on WFAN

Persondata
NAME	Russo, Christopher Michael
ALTERNATIVE NAMES	Mad Dog
SHORT DESCRIPTION	Radio host
DATE OF BIRTH	October 18, 1959
PLACE OF BIRTH	Syosset, New York, United States
DATE OF DEATH
PLACE OF DEATH