WHERE TO HEAR GOLDEN
“The Front Row” with Steak Shapiro, Sandra Golden and Brian Finneran, 9 a.m.-noon weekdays, AM 680 the Fan (and simulcast on 93.7 FM)
During the baseball playoffs in October, 92.9 the Game host Mike Bell tweeted his displeasure seeing a softball player doing baseball analysis on ESPN, going after her with a sexist insult made famous by the film “Anchorman.”
After hurling potshots and defending his position with foes for hours, Bell made an on-air apology the next day and was suspended for three days.
Though his insult was aimed at Jessica Mendoza, the ridiculous nature of his comment wasn’t lost on Sandra Golden.
Golden — Atlanta’s only female sports talk radio host, heard daily on the Fan (680 on the AM, 93.7 on the FM) from 9 a.m. to noon — has survived in a male-dominated business by successfully battling this prevalent attitude about women in sports media.
“His argument makes about as much sense as saying men can’t be gynecologists,” Golden said. “Most of the men in TV and radio have never been professional athletes themselves.”
At the same time, she is actually friends with Bell and called him soon after the kerfuffle happened. “I said, ‘Hang in there. That “Anchorman” line is funny. People are too serious.’ I’ve called him a meathead myself, but he really has a big heart.”
Bell, in return, calls Golden “a great loyal friend. I always loved hearing her laugh at my corny jokes back in the day when we were on mornings together. She’s the best.”
Golden has been in sports media for more than two decades, coming to Atlanta in 1997 after multiple broadcasting stints in Florida. She has built a reputation for her preparation, her sports knowledge and ability to wrestle with the big boys in their playpen. Before joining radio in 2004, she spent seven years at Fox Sports South covering the Atlanta Braves and ACC sports.
“She’s a sweetheart,” said Chipper Jones, the legendary starting Braves third basemen from 1995 to 2012. “It’s not easy to be a female in a professional locker room. She carried herself with the utmost professionalism. She always had a huge smile on her face.” (Golden said she was “kind of tough on him, but he was always respectful.”)
Golden is part of “The Front Row,” a show that features bombastic veteran host Stephen “Steak” Shapiro and soft-spoken former Atlanta Falcon Brian Finneran. On the morning earlier this month when longtime University of Georgia football coach Mark Richt had signed with the University of Miami, she bemoaned his departure but felt jazzed by the spate of college football news that week.
On the show, the 50-year-old Buckhead resident plays like the sassy older sister to the two younger men. “It’s almost annoying how happy she is in the morning,” Finneran said.
She also possesses what she calls a “loud cackle,” which she tried to suppress when she first started on sports talk radio station 790 the Zone as the news update person for the morning show. But Shapiro told her that this was part of who she was, so let it rip!
David Dickey, who runs the Fan and hired Golden in 2010, said he loves the trio’s chemistry. “They can poke fun at each other, but it’s not mean-spirited. They can laugh at each other and themselves. Sandra is very comfortable in her own skin.”
Occasionally, she’ll get hot on a subject such as athletes committing domestic violence. When the video of Baltimore Ravens player Ray Rice punching his fiance in an elevator leaked last year, she couldn’t believe Rice had defenders. “I didn’t hold back calling it reprehensible behavior,” she said. “Nancy Grace was calling me about it. It definitely bothered me more than most men.”
To a younger generation of female sportscasters, “she’s like the godfather,” said Rachel Baribeau, a college football host and analyst for SiriusXM and a sideline reporter for the ACC Network. She spent 10 months in 2012 and 2013 as a co-host on 92.9 the Game.
Baribeau, who now lives in Nashville, Tenn., said Golden “placed a wing over me” and inspired her to do the same with young women entering sports media. “What happens more often than not, women in this business become catty and mean and terrified you’ll take their jobs,” she said. “Sandra came along and was nothing like that. She was cool and kind and killing it. She’s fierce.”
Golden, who grew up in Florida and credits her father, Stan, for instilling in her a deep love of sports, said veteran Fox Sports NFL sideline reporter Pam Oliver mentored her when she was coming up the ranks. Oliver admires Golden for excelling in sports talk, where she has to be on air for 15 hours a week spouting her opinions on a vast array of subjects.
“That takes stamina and range,” said Oliver, who meets with Golden regularly to vent and share experiences. “I’m a one-trick pony in comparison. I know she spends hours preparing each day, watching games, constantly researching players. She has definitely persevered.”
Golden is rarely the focal point of controversy on “The Front Row.” That would be Shapiro. But even then, she has to regularly block nasty, often sexist harassers from her social media and email. “When I had to put my cat down, people would write, ‘Go (bleep) yourself. I’m glad your cat died!’ People are crazy nuts about sports. The name calling? I’m used to it.”
She feels deeply grateful she gets to talk about sports all day for a living.
“I just interviewed Will Smith,” said Golden, talking about Smith’s upcoming film about the NFL, “Concussion.” “I do wish sometimes my brain was full of more important things in life, but I love my job and the people I work with. If the hardest thing I have to do is talk about domestic violence in the NFL, that’s pretty cool.”
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