LITTLE ROCK — It was like an Arizona brush fire in a windstorm.
The news of the firing of a Fayetteville radio talk show co-host spread across the nation at an almost alarming pace.
It was, and is, a story that took on a life of its own with national radio talk show hosts such as Dan Patrick getting involved.
What happened was Renee Gork was fired from The Hog Sports Radio, KAKS-FM, 99.5. It just happened to be after she wore a Florida Gators cap to Arkansas Coach Bobby Petrino’s news conference after Saturday’s scrimmage.
Stop the presses, said Jeff Long, Arkansas’ athletic director, who was in Little Rock on Tuesday. Petrino, nor anyone at the University of Arkansas, had anything to do with Gork’s dismissal.
It seems that, among other things, Gork tweeted herself into being Gators bait.
The hat trick was probably just the final straw for the radio station’s general manager, Dan Storrs.
Saturday, Gork - standing to the side of the media seating area with another young lady who apparently wasn’t in the media - asked a question and Petrino answered it.
He concluded his statement by saying he wouldn’t answer any more questions from anyone wearing “that” hat. News conferences are for the media, not fans.
Even though the episode was personally witnessed, the entire interview was watched on wholehogsports.com several times Monday and Tuesday to make sure. Petrino didn’t get angry or rebuff her in any form or fashion. It was very matter-of-fact, and if you want to see for yourself, the news conference and hat reference are free to watch at that website.
Later that morning, quarterback Ryan Mallett expressed a similar feeling to Gork about the hat.
Again, the hat was not the main reason she was fired. However, most journalists consider it unethical to wear sports gear of the team they cover, especially on the job, and at the very least consider it in bad taste to wear the gear of a team that competes with the team they cover.
Gork said it was raining when she left home Saturday and that she grabbed the hat without realizing it was a Florida cap. She is a Florida graduate.
Once again, according to Storrs, her former boss, that was only a small part of his decision to fire her.
Apparently some of the rub, but not all of it, came while she was watching the scrimmage in her Gators hat and tweeted that she would rather be covering Florida. Later, she said it was because she has family in Florida and misses them.
The University of Arkansas’ rules for covering practice prohibit cell phone use during practices. Yet, the UA did not ban her from future practices.
Here is another part of the problem: Her tweet was a regular theme on her Facebook account, which was set to private after she was terminated by the radio station.
It seems a number of Razorbacks fans were upset with her tweet and they found the Facebook reports and posted them on hogville.net, a message board for Razorbacks fans.
This is similar to what happened recently at a Little Rock television station when some folks did a video about hating their job - for the record, I love my job - and then posted it on YouTube. Those people were fired, too.
Because of privacy laws, Storrs has wisely refused to go public with all the reasons why he fired Gork.
Storrs, though, did wish her well and said she is very talented.
Maybe Gork really didn’t realize she had on a Gators cap, but when you work for a company named The HogSports Radio, it would seem you would be careful about publicly showing your support for Florida, where the Razorbacks were hosed last season by the officials.
She has gotten some local media support, partly because she is reported to be a nice person and partly because her husband, Mike Capshaw, is a former sportswriter and is well-liked and respected.
The bottom line is her firing is between her and her boss, and the hat was not the reason she was terminated.
And that Bobby Petrino, who has more to worry about with another season pending, and the UA had nothing to do with it.
Sports, Pages 19 on 08/18/2010