Donna Brothers covered her final Kentucky Derby on Saturday, and before she rides off into retirement after the Preakness Stakes on May 16, she’s made sure NBC knows exactly who should replace her.
Brothers appeared on the Sports Media with Richard Deitsch this week and named her likely replacement — FanDuel TV reporter and analyst Andie Biancone — and revealed that Biancone has been shadowing her at major races over the past year.
“I know that NBC has somebody in mind because she has shadowed me for the last couple of races, and that would be Andie Biancone,” Brothers said. “She’s covered horse racing for FanDuel TV for the last couple of years. She’s young. She’s enthusiastic. She’s engaged to Keith Asmussen, a jockey and trainer. I think she does a fantastic job on FanDuel TV. One thing that I’ve said to NBC is that she knows more about the stories of the people on the backside than I’ve ever known, and I hope they do lean into that a little bit more because there’s a lot of great stories back there that we haven’t even touched on.”
Brothers said Biancone shadowed her at last year’s Breeders’ Cup at Del Mar and was back with her this past week for both Kentucky Oaks Day and Kentucky Derby Day, spending time on the track for four races leading up to the Derby itself. By the time the horses hit the gate on Saturday, Biancone had seen firsthand exactly how Brothers positions herself before a race and how she gets into place to make that post-race interview happen.
“I think she’ll do great,” Brothers added. “She loves the sport and people in the sport love her.”
In her conversation with Deistch, Brothers also spelled out what she considers the two requirements for the job: you have to be able to ride a horse and understand racetrack traffic, and you have to know the jockeys personally. Biancone checks both boxes. She grew up on the backside as the daughter of accomplished trainer Patrick Biancone, still exercises horses for his barn, is engaged to jockey and trainer Keith Asmussen, and has spent five years at FanDuel TV building relationships with riders and backside personnel that Brothers is describing.
As for Brothers, she got about as good a send-off as anyone could ask for. Her final Derby walkover came alongside trainer Cherie DeVaux, who went on to become the first female trainer to win the race in its 152-year history. Brothers had told DeVaux before the race that she hoped she’d make history. She did.
NBC holds Kentucky Derby rights through 2032, and it already sounds like they know who will be on horseback for the next one.
About Sam Neumann
Since the beginning of 2023, Sam has been a staff writer for Awful Announcing and The Comeback. A 2021 graduate of Temple University, Sam is a Charlotte native, who currently calls Greenville, South Carolina his home. He also has a love/hate relationship with the New York Mets and Jets.