It was always obvious to me that Opie sucked, but you actually had to pay attention to that to notice back in the day. It really is amazing how good Jim and Ant were in their prime at turning any shit that Opie threw at them into something funny. Opie could do a 180 on an absolutely hilarious conversation and start talking about something completely dull, and Jim and Ant would find a way to turn even that into something funny. Those 2 are fantastic together.

Regarding #2, they were becoming millionaires together. If management at the companies they worked at paid attention, they would've realized that Jim and Ant were the talent and been happy to pay them to work without Opie, but all signs point to them having no clue, so it would be too huge of a risk to try to break up the show. Honestly, if I was making that kind of money to talk on the radio for 20 hours a week in what's probably a pretty fun environment, I wouldn't even think about trying to make a move, no matter how much I hated Opie.

Ill add to this that even ant has said on the show that management viewed opie as "the radio" guy and ant as the funny side kick. Their opinion of jimmy was even less im sure. Why management couldnt see that ant was the real talent, who the fuck knows.

1. Two possibilities:(a) Sometimes the best place to hide a leaf is in a forest. We all enjoyed Jim and Ant's humor so much that we did not notice Opie's poor humor. (b) He wasn't that bad before Ant got fired, but now that everyone is annoyed by him, the lens in which we view the show is different.

2. Maybe they did notice his douchiness, but what are they going to do. They probably like him as a person so they don't want to fuck him over by leaving. They probably (either individually or together) figured that they would just work around him. They had to figure that they would be responsible for the humor while Opie kept the show moving and occasionally did some evil shit that was funny.

Well, look at Anthony. Why did Ant stay in his marriage? He's said time and time and time again, he doesn't like to rock the boat. They had a brand name and he didn't hate the guy. Opie is a douche but he was tolerable for a long time. I think getting married ruined and social media ruined him, because he either thinks he has something the world wants, or he realizes he completely lacks it. Trying so hard to show he's an easy going guy. "Anthony" had a good life from being "One half of Opie and Anthony". So did Jim. They were both loyal guys and just wanted to ride it. I get the feeling though, and this is speaking out of turn probably, that if Opie had ANY chance to do ANYTHING else with a better paycheck, he would have left a cartoonish hole in the wall of the studio.

Because he started a shitty incarnation of the show in 1994. He was Ant and Jimmys cross to bear. A real burden that they were stuck with...

They were getting paid handsomely to not rock the boat. At one time, Norton was making hundreds of thousands presumably and Opie and Ant were getting paid a rumored 3 million a year. If you had a guaranteed 3 million, would you jettison a third of the broadcast team to possibly make 4 million? Maybe you would, but I wouldn't. It would be far more likely to make zero dollars than 4 million in such a scenario.

Opie was the Golden Goose. He wasn't shitting out good content but he was part of their fine paychecks.

He's the bridge to the douchey world of corporate $$$

Lots of good points. A few others.

The older you get, the more cynical and critical you become. Shit you used to just get confused about, it was easier to shrug it off than to look close and figure out what was really going on in someone's head. And the more familiar with a show you become, the more these things start to nag at you and demand the answer.

As a younger, energetic and naive (read: douchey) fan you were more likely to fall into that shock radio loving, O&A "army" demo they used to go for. It's no surprise that they started playing down the shock angle, but Opie and his approach always fit better with that mentality. Now, there's really nothing positive he can add. It's all either neutral or negative. When the show was still in its stage where it had fans who wanted the shock jockery, and even encouraged his brand of dick-headedness, his few and far between "big moments" went a long way towards distracting you from all the negatives. There haven't been any of those in years, but at least we still had the funny of A+J as a distraction.

Two high school dropouts, lacking in motivation. Yeah, that'd work. He show ended at the right time. They were old, lazy and complacent. Now just old and complacent.

Looking at Ron and fez, it must be really hard to split up a show

They need to bring Danny back and double his Rockstar salary

That's never gonna happen Danny,you know that.

1. Because you don't actually know the difference and are just parroting what you read here (as many posters do).

2. Because neither believe your premise and understood better than anyone here what Opie's function on the show actually was.