So as many of you probably now know, Greggo is back – in a way. Greggo’s Gigantic Blog and Cafe is up and running, and full disclosure: I am helping him edit it, proof reading the entries he publishes for midday. That means I helped him on the three biggest articles that people are talking about.
So Greggo was pretty brutal in exposing the details of him and Richie getting the boot from 105.3 The Fan. Basically, his beef with Spittle, Gavin, as he likes to call him, has three parts: He knew he was getting fired for weeks but Spittle kept lying to him about it, Spittle refused to give him a straight reason to his face, and he didn’t get the chance to say goodbye to anyone. With these reasons, I can fully understand why he’d be upset, and I can’t say I’m surprised by all that happened.
Let me say this: I still bear no ill will to those that were and still on the air there. But Richie and Greggo were my guys. I was reading Richie Whitt’s work in the Star Telegram when I was 15. And even though I’ve had problems with 1310 The Ticket, Greggo never held it against me (or maybe he didn’t know). But they’ve been supportive of me for years. I know their ratings weren’t good; guess what, if I only watched what was popular, I wouldn’t be a die-hard Rangers fan. And it’s not just that they were fired. Every Fan fan with a working brain cell knew Ben and Skin were coming back for weeks. And Spittle lied to Richie and Greggo to their faces about it. Then they treated them like criminals when they abruptly cut them, unlike previous PMs that gave Jagger and Hensen the chance to say goodbye. Then they strung us along with Kevin and Cory
for weeks when we all knew they weren’t keeping that time slot. 1053’s management insulted the intelligence of its talent AND its listeners, and now it expects us to follow like sheep and tune into the guys who spent much of their first go-round on The Fan saying “The Rangers will never win, they should just quit playing once Cowboys training camp starts.” And The Fan will be definitely anti-Rangers, all-Cowboys. Orders from Spittle to put the Cows in a positive light. When they haven’t done a damn thing in more than 15 years to warrant that. Looks like Dale Hanson was right about The Fan being about shilling for Jerry; he was just a bit premature in the accusation.
So that sums up my beef now with 105.3 The Fan. They cast out my friends like rotten fruit, their PR department is doing everything they can to destroy the reputations of those friends (the whole “you will never work in this town again” mentality) while praising their new yes men that will take to the airwaves and follow corporate orders of saying “The Cowboys are the bestest team in the whole wide world and everything else here can suck it!” If that’s their game, I ain’t playing.
I still hope to get Richie’s side to this, but for now, Stay Rowdy, My Friends.
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ROWDY TIME SPORTS 
Please. RAGE was always anti rangers with Richie leading the charge. He would play snoring sounds anytime someone tried to talk about them and was always shilling for Jerry. They deserved to be fired and it should have happened much sooner.
Are you suggesting that The Fan should have stuck with them even though there ratings were abysmal? At least Ben and Skin talk about something besides football. Its baseball season and RAGE didn’t even talk about the Rangers.
I don’t feel sorry for those two bigots richie and greggo. I can’t believe those two fools had a weekly segment solely to highlight something bad a Muslim did. Wow! This followed by them saying “guilty” anytime a foreign sounding name is mentioned. Good riddance!
That was Greggo’s segment, and you’re definitely entitled to not liking it. But I wouldn’t put Richie in that same boat. He got called out by several people for being too much of a liberal.
Greggo’s blog is an interesting read regarding his and Whitt’s firing. Obviously, Greggo is not concerned about working in this market anymore.
Although no one will hear any corporate response to this, the one thing the suits at CBS can point to is the poor ratings. This is the only reason that CBS has to give regarding their termination-the ratings numbers don’t lie.
The ratings were so poor that even the great Bruce Gilbert could not fix them. Whereas Spittle was the PD of record when they were terminated, he was not responsible for their poor ratings since the inception of the show. Now, if B & S cannot beat Grandpa Urine consistently in the monthly ratings, they and Spittle will get their heads lopped off as well.
Is it possible that Spittle is acting on orders from the home office at CBS Radio? It seems no one has mentioned this possibility. He may well have made promises and then lied to them. However, after 35 plus years in the corporate world, if it’s not in writing, it didn’t happen.
It is also odd that Whitt has basically sat back and let Greggo go and not one word said. With this in mind, I am getting a vibe that if and when Whitt speaks, it will include throwing Greggo under the bus along with not burning any media bridges. Whitt still wants to work in this market so I doubt there will be any scorched earth on his part or writing anything that has one hint of potential libel and slander in it.
I’m definitely waiting for Richie’s response as much as anyone. I’ve continued to talk to people, and I admit Greggo did things to justify getting the axe at that point, and that ratings would justify canceling RAGE anyway. Above all else, I still just don’t like the way The Fan handled the firings of two people in particular: Richie and Jasmine. They were both among the hardest workers at that station, and I will forever say Jas is one of the most wonderful people in the world. They both deserved more dignity in the way they were handled, and I can’t forgive Spittle for that.
From what I read, Jasmine’s contract was not renewed. If she knew her contract was coming up for renewal, were there any discussions prior to the contract expiring? If so, then perhaps she was wronged. If there were no discussions whatsoever about a new contract or an extension some 30-60 days before expiration, she should not have been surprised.
I believe she was there when Spittle was there before the flip to all sports so she should have known who she was dealing with. A contract expiration made it easier for CBS and the suits to just let her go. Sometimes, whether in radio or the corporate world, hard work does not always relate to keeping a job if the hard work does not produce results.
Whitt is another story. I heard Whitt when he tried out for a role on the Hardline after Greggo was fired. He was absolutely unlistenable. He tried to be “cool” and acted like radio was no big deal and was easy. He thought he would get the gig because he was a friend of the show He was much like his blog at the Observer-smarmy and snarky.
He routinely took a nut kicking in the comments section weekly after some of his douche bag comments. He would continually brag about radio ratings in the Observer even though whatever show he was a part of finished dead last in its time slot. His infamous prediction of the Ticket’s demise (“The Last Supper”) after Greggo was fired blew right up in his face. In fact, The Hardline experienced higher ratings than ever before after Greggo was fired. Again, mark my words-Whitt will kick Greggo to the curb like a sack of garbage.
There is no easy way to fire someone. Ask Jim Nill, the new Stars GM. Gully & Nieuwy are great guys with good hockey minds but sometimes, change has to be made-especially in results oriented businesses.
I am so glad that those two clowns are off the air. What goes around comes around and they finally got theirs. They would celebrate others unfortunate situations and Richie would even try to take credit for people suffering (Failure Jesus). Well “Failure Jesus” finally bit them in the butt!! These two insulted their listeners and deamed anyone who disagreed with them ‘idiots”. They spoke down to the listeners and constantly degraded the fan texters.
Their attempts at shocking the listeners grew old very quickly. These two were so infectious that even Sybil started to talk bad about listeners and fan texters. I completely understand why the station would want them out. They had to be horrible for morale. Greggo was such a wierdo and his actions were becoming more and more unpredictable. It was time to cut and run from his crazy ass.
Sorry Richie, as hard as you tried you just couldn’t carry a show by yourself. Nobody wants to listen to a self righteous prick that for some reason thinks he is better than the people he depends on for his success. Wrong move you Pug looking fool.
It remains to be seen how long this sawed off loser will ride his 15 minutes but if his personality determines his future success he’s in trouble. One thing I do agree with Richie Shit about is if a athlete starts to suck cut’em and move on, which is exactly what the Fan did with these two losers. It’s business and they are taking it personal.
That’s definitely your opinion that you’re entitled to, but when you talk about how they apparently celebrated the failures of others and talked down to listeners, I can’t help but think you just described almost every talk radio host in the market, maybe in the country. That’s one thing that irked me, how so many would complain about the way Richie is on the air, but whenever I said the same thing about the Hardline or Bob and Dan, I’d get called out by their loyal fan bases with “That’s not how they are in real life! You don’t know them!” Well, if that’s true, ever think it might be the same for Richie?
All I have to say is “Dead and Gone”….that was their bit right? and in the intro they said they would snicker at someones demise….Richie used to run his mouth and celebrate the pain and suffering of others. Hopefully he never gets back on in the DFW market. Also his whole attitude towards religion was very offensive. I don’t care how he is in “real life” as far as I’m conserned you reap what you sow. You spew enough hatred and it’s going to come back on you eventually. He didn’t accidentally act like a jerk while he insulted listeners and kicked others while they were down. His actions were habitual and intentional because he thought it would bring him attention and ratings but too bad so sad it didn’t. He is in the same class of people as another former host on the Fan Sean Salisbury. What a couple of losers. Perception is reality so then in reality Richie is a big ass jerk that really outlasted his 15 minutes and it’s better that he is gone. So like this little blog I’m done with anymore thoughts on the fool because just like his column, his radio show and him in general he’s non-existent.