Expect more WFAN watch party livestreams in the future

“Welcome to the first ever WFAN draft party. The Knicks, the Yankees, the Mets, the NFL Draft. For the first time ever, all the WFAN daytime personalities in one room – except for that slob Boomer.”

With that, Shaun Morash introduced WFAN’s first livestreamed-only NFL draft party on Thursday night and took the first of many digs of the two-hour event, this one directed at Boomer Esiason.

“Why is he speaking for us?” Esiason said as he entered the room holding a pizza box.

The draft party also featured Tiki Barber, Craig Carton, Gregg Giannotti, Chris McMonigle, Jerry Recco and Evan Roberts, plus Yankees radio announcers and WFAN hosts Rickie Ricardo and Emmanuel Berbari, who popped in after their game was over. It was streamed on YouTube and Facebook and X and on every other social media platform you could think of.

With the backdrop of the Jets and Giants each having two picks in the first round of the draft, plus a Knicks playoff game, plus the Yankees playing the Red Sox in Boston and the Mets’ continuing their march to oblivion, it was “a perfect storm,” said WFAN brand manager Ryan Hurley, who said the NFL draft livestream would have happened even if the other events weren’t going on at the same time.

But they were. And the event was an unmitigated success.

One clip that lasted 1:10 from the two-hour livestream went viral and had 800,000 views on YouTube as of Friday. It showed the hosts reacting in real time to the Knicks blowing a late lead in Atlanta in a game they eventually lost, the Jets picking tight end Kenyon Sadiq and the Mets giving up a game-tying grand slam in a game they eventually won.

Overall, WFAN said the livestream drew 301,000 views and 1.1 million impressions on X, nearly 80,000 views on YouTube and more than 36,000 views on Facebook.

The livestream shows the WFAN hosts watching sports on TV and commenting on them and ripping on each other while eating in the penthouse of the Hudson Square building that houses their studios.

“Happy to be in their beautiful penthouse,” Morash said. “Who wouldn’t want to have a party here?”

There was even some cursing, which is not allowed on the radio.

If watching a group of guys have a party while they watch sports attracts you, know that it will happen again in the future.

“We'd love to find the right opportunity, and we'll continue to discuss what those could be, for sure,” Hurley told Newsday. “It's about finding the right opportunity, the right timing. This was something that has been discussed for a while. It's just finding that right time to do it, and listen, it's a lot, obviously, to get our main talent from 6 [a.m.] to 7 [p.m.] to be able to commit with their schedules. But it was awesome. The guys did a great job with it and we’re really, really proud of everyone's effort.”

Oh, yeah. Getting all the talent (and their egos) to assemble at the same time in the same room and share the same livestream for two hours . . . that couldn’t have been easy, could it?

“It is unprecedented,” Hurley said, “and that goes to show you these guys, each one of them that I went to talk about it, all loved the idea and bought in. Obviously, it's schedule-wise, it's different for everyone. Obviously, Boomer, Gio, Jerry, they're on so early in here, [arriving] earlier than the [morning] show to start getting ready for it. But these guys were all excellent about it when I went and had individual conversations about the idea.

“People may think, ‘Oh, it was very difficult.’ These guys all bought in from the start and then the whole lead up, talking about it and getting ready and promo-ing it and creating interest around the night itself, they all did an excellent job as well.”

By Anthony Rieber

anthony.rieber@newsday.comAnthonyRieber

Anthony Rieber covers sports media and business and professional sports (you know, games and trades and things). He has worked at Newsday since Aug. 31, 1998, and has been in his current position since Jan. 1, 2026.