By Rodney Ho/rho@ajc.com, filed originally on May 18, 2014
More than 11 months after Nick Cellini was fired by 790/The Zone for that ill-fated Steve Gleason bit that went national courtesy of social media, he returned to the AM/FM radio dial on 680/The Fan this morning.
Cellini joined "Home Team" Brandon Leak at 10 a.m. with no reference to the past, no promotion and no fan fare. Their show ran from 10 to 1 p.m.
David Dickey, who runs the Fan, wrote in a text this morning that the Fan's local ad inventory was sold out and he needed more local programming to accommodate advertisers. In other words, this sounds like a one-time deal but could potentially lead to more work for Cellini.
Now all three former Mayhem in the AM from 790/the Zone have landed on rival 680/The Fan, though Cellini has not been hired full time. His former colleague Chris Dimino was picked up by the Fan last fall but wasn't able to get back on air due to a non-compete until March. In January, Steve "Steak" Shapiro joined the mid-morning show with Sandra Golden and Brian Finneran.
If you're reading this, you are probably familiar with what happened last June. (Details here.) Cellini decided to do a bit about Steve Gleason, a former NFL player with ALS, that many thought was tasteless. The other two agreed to participate. In most cases, it probably would have been quickly forgotten but someone wrote about it on a New Orleans football website. Soon, the audio got out and the outrage was instantaneous. They were quickly suspended, then fired by the end of the day.
Shapiro, who is also judging a Food Network show and building his "Atlanta Eats' franchise, is now doing just fine. Dimino was quite down over the summer but landed on his feet thanks to the Fan. Cellini has had the toughest time in terms of finding employment but went through a major change, sincerely helping the Gleason Foundation for ALS research.
Coincidentally, Eric Von Haessler showed up on AM/FM for the first time in eight months on Saturday subbing in for Monica Perez on News 95.5 and AM 750 WSB. He was let go from the Regular Guys last September.
With higher ratings and revenues, the Fan has fended off 92.9/The Game despite its much stronger signal. 790/The Zone, trapped with just a weak AM signal, is now a distant also ran.
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