And, to cap it off, you're fired

The broadcast media in Arkansas is something else. Even the Little Rock TV stations are trying to out-Razorback each other, calling their sports casts the "Hog Zone" and such and wearing red polos on set ... in mid-July.

 

Like I said, in the SEC radio and TV guys are required to be homers and wear the home team's logo. Any wavering of that homerism and fans change the channel.

 

The local spin on this is pretty humorous. A lot of the local guys are attacking Petrino and the fans. A co-worker of the lady, who has his own radio show, is publicly stating that he told her the hat was a bad idea and offered to find her another one. Fans are making a big deal out of Facebook status updates where the lady said she wished she didn't have to go to work and cover the Razorbacks, but would feel differently if she were getting to cover the Gators.

 

That radio station GM on Dan Patrick's show was the stereotype of the slippery radio manager.

Spent the first two minutes saying he couldn't comment on why she was fired... but then essentially said it was for tweeting during practice.

Weasel.

 

I used to wear a New Mexico Lobos hat when I had to wear a baseball cap to an event. I work in the Southeast, so it never seemed to be an issue. But I recently found an Under Armor hat that's light, comfortable and fits my big head. I hate the Under Armor logo and kind of feel like a tool sporting it, but I feel better not wearing a team's gear, even if nobody within 1,200 miles of the two or three high school events I've covered with it on recognizes the Lobos logo or cares.

I'm also a Florida grad (without a single Tebow autograph, alas), and I'm kind of impressed someone got through that J-school without at least four professors telling her horror stories about similar incidents. I even remember two profs in particular there who were hell bent on convincing every one of the student-run paper's sports writers it was 100 percent wrong to eat the food in the press box.

I used to on occasion cover FSU football when UF was on the road or had the week off, and I remember always being surprised to find at least one or two reporters totally decked out in Seminoles gear in the press box. I know there are some good reporters covering that beat, but it was my impression Bobby Bowden fostered this kind of camaraderie among many of those guys that made them feel OK about doing that after being on the beat for years.

 

There's no argument from here that the state's media are homers, especially the talk show hosts and TV guys. One statewide TV station has even had news anchors wearing Hog hats in station commercials. It can get very irritating and cause a desire for honest, unbiased reporting among those who want truth, not hype.

I don't think that's different than many, many other places either, but yes it's what is expected by Razorback fans (and the school administration) or they'll tune in another that tells them what they want to hear.

Still, she was stupid to wear a rival's cap at a team presser.

 

It was pretty obvious he'd fed info off-air to Patrick or his producers.

BTW, does that station carry Patrick's radio show? I'm guessing so, since they had the GM on the show. If so, shouldn't they have mentioned it? Kind of a "full disclosure" type thing?

 

It does carry Patrick's show.

 

Having worked in print, radio and TV for a long time, I've worked for a ton of shady characters. That being said, I would put "station manager" of a radio station as the most likely to pimp out his own mother to be #1 in a key demographic in the Arbitron book.

"Smarmy" is how I felt listening to this guy talk to Dan Patrick.

So this reporter worked for a month at this station? That's it? Either she was super disruptive (a possibility) or she shouldn't have been hired in the first place because of lack of skill or, more likely, a lack of honest background checks.

I can understand what that station is in as well. I've spent plenty of time in Arkansas and find their fans among the most thin-skinned in the SEC, maybe in the nation. Oddly enough, I didn't get that vibe when they were in the old SWC but with the move to the SEC in 1992, they sure have picked up on the insecurity and homerism that plagues the Old South.

Ugh.

 

If you wear a cap, just don't wear it backwards all the time.

 

As I said before, weaering any team gear to any assignment is unprofessional.

But really all this proves is that everyone connected in anyway with SEC football is a complete jackass.

 

I think we've established that the woman was unprofessional but shouldn't have been fired.

The worst part of all this, though, is that the message board cretins are claiming victory.