In the land of New York sports talk radio wars, Michael Kay and Gregg Giannotti take their turns at the plate

The war of words between ESPN New York Radio’s Michael Kay and WFAN’s Gregg Giannotti has hit a new level.

Hours after Giannotti slammed Kay on WFAN’s "Boomer and Gio" morning show about an apparent threat Kay made toward an ESPN morning show producer, Kay fired back Thursday by saying Giannotti “moved into a ready-made, furnished penthouse” when he took over for Craig Carton and that “he had nothing to do with the penthouse.”

The back-and-forth stems from another feud in the sports radio landscape, between Kay’s afternoon show and ESPN’s morning show with Rick DiPietro and Dave Rothenberg. Ray Santiago, a producer on "DiPietro and Rothenberg," made a quip last Friday about the fact that Kay’s show kept talking about the morning show and asked, “Is it the fear that this show is now on the rise, and that show’s kind of gone in the other direction lately?”

Santiago’s comment was in reference to Kay’s sliding ratings. "The Michael Kay Show" finished 15th overall in Nielsen’s autumn ratings book with an average of 2.5% of men ages 25-54 tuning in. That was down from 3.3% in Nielsen’s spring book and far behind WFAN’s afternoon show with Carton and Evan Roberts (second overall with 7.5%).

Santiago’s ratings jab irked Kay, who later that day on his show appeared to threaten Santiago’s job.

“Do you realize, Ray, that all I’d have to do is make one phone call, and you would be on the unemployment line?” Kay said. “You have the nerve to say something like that about this show? One phone call, which I’m considering making and you will be fired! Remember Ray, I am really, really sitting on the fence right now about getting you canned, opening your mouth when you shouldn’t have.”

Kay on Tuesday said he was upset about Santiago’s comment but that his threatening rant was “performative” and that people believed it was real because “I’m such a good performer on the air.” Co-hosts Peter Rosenberg and Don La Greca likened the situation to professional wrestling and soap operas.

Enter Giannotti, who on Thursday’s WFAN morning show called Kay’s explanation “embarrassing” and that Rosenberg and La Greca were “bootlicking” by not calling out Kay, who reportedly is considering retirement from his radio show once his contract is up.

“By the way, if it is performance art, why are you pulling back the curtain?” Giannotti said. “Does the magician show you where he keeps the rabbit before he pulls it out of the hat? If you’re such a great performer, then continue your bit. But then you pulled back the curtain to tell everybody about it because you weren’t man enough to step up and say that you were wrong. And for someone to be in the business as long as he has . . . to pull that kind of lie and [expletive], to me, was embarrassing.”

Kay responded hours later on his show, and although he never actually mentioned Giannotti by name, it was pretty clear he was referring to his comments.

It started when Rosenberg took a shot at Giannotti by sarcastically saying La Greca was “living up to our reputations as the hack yo-yo sidekicks who just approve everything Michael does.” La Greca said he was going to let the comment off the hook out of respect for Giannotti (who, again, was not directly named) and because “it was a jab and a byproduct in the name of the show.”

Kay jumped in and said, “So you have respect for said person who actually moved into a ready-made, furnished penthouse that was made by somebody else and now is taking credit and preening as if he created that penthouse? He had nothing to do with that penthouse. He just moved in because the other guy [Carton] got thrown out. The other guy built it.”