RIP Ron Franklin

#4
#4
I always loved their broadcasts. Hard to believe only one of them is left now, and I had thought Gottfried had already passed way because I had read he was in declining health even back when he was doing games.
 
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#10
#10
Tennessee football was legit good when he called most of our games. I grew up as a kid watching him and Mike Gotfried call the Saturday night prime time games. Good memories of the 1990 Florida win game he called and the 1991 Auburn win him counting off the yards as James little man Stewart rumbled downfield 5,10, count them off as 15 yards in that Auburn game. He was a great sports broadcaster not only in football but basketball to. RIP Mr. Franklin.
 
#14
#14
Among other missteps…

He was an Hall of Fame announcer who disrespected and spoke down to his female colleagues.

Both things can be true.
Yep. There was an incident with Holly Rowe as well. It's like he kind of went off the rails at the end, or perhaps he did stuff like that his whole career and it started to come out towards the end.

I always wondered why he was moved off the main game after the 2005 season. He was the face of ESPN's college football coverage as far as play-by-play, but got demoted to ESPN2 and wasn't given all that many big games.
 
#15
#15
Among other missteps…

He was an Hall of Fame announcer who disrespected and spoke down to his female colleagues.

Both things can be true.
Yea but in his defense they said some dumb things. All the female sideline reporters have ever been for the most part have been eye candy. Most of the time they offer little to zero informative news of substance and the coaches usually hate being interviewed by them at halftime.
 
#16
#16
Yea but in his defense they said some incredibly stupid things. All the female sideline reporters have ever been for the most part have been eye candy. Most of the time they offer little to zero informative news of substance and the coaches usually hate being interviewed by them at halftime.

So given your premise, are you suggesting it’s perfectly acceptable to be overtly misogynistic to a female colleague during a national TV broadcast, or respond to a female co-worker’s request not to be called “sweet baby” in the workplace with profanity?
 
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#17
#17
They could do without the Holly Rowes and the other sideline reporters female or male and be just fine during a broadcast of a game but they can’t make it without the broadcasters such as Franklin and Gus Johnson and others.
 
#18
#18
They could do without the Holly Rowes and the other sideline reporters and be just fine during a broadcast of a game but they can’t make it without the broadcasters such as Franklin and Gus Johnson and others.

So since you don’t see the value of sideline reporters, it’s okay for others to disrespect them during a broadcast.

Got it. 👍🏾

Granted, Franklin did apologize to Rowe, and oftentimes sideline reporters don’t add much value to the broadcast. It doesn’t give the play by play guy a free pass to disrespect them.
 
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#19
#19
Yep. There was an incident with Holly Rowe as well. It's like he kind of went off the rails at the end, or perhaps he did stuff like that his whole career and it started to come out towards the end.

I always wondered why he was moved off the main game after the 2005 season. He was the face of ESPN's college football coverage as far as play-by-play, but got demoted to ESPN2 and wasn't given all that many big games.

I’m guessing he operated in Ron Burgundy mode for a long time, before there were real consequences for doing so.

When those times changed, he couldn’t reprogram his muscle memory.
 
#20
#20
They could do without the Holly Rowes and the other sideline reporters female or male and be just fine during a broadcast of a game but they can’t make it without the broadcasters such as Franklin and Gus Johnson and others.
I don’t want anyone that treats females that way regardless if sideline reporters exist or not. Just because you’re good at your job doesn’t mean you get to be a mysogynist. Especially on live television.
 
#21
#21
Just a great voice, with the cadence of a professional narrator that few have had. Like Robert Stack, William Conrad, Morgan Freeman and Keith Morrison (the Dateline guy). He could read the phone book and it would sound interesting. RIP.
 
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#22
#22
Remember him for the 95 bama game. Great announcer. Hope his family finds peace.
 
#23
#23
Yea but in his defense they said some dumb things. All the female sideline reporters have ever been for the most part have been eye candy. Most of the time they offer little to zero informative news of substance and the coaches usually hate being interviewed by them at halftime.

Cool, you're one of those "tell it like it is" guys, huh? Always need to hear from the lower end of the gene pool.
 
#24
#24
I’m guessing he operated in Ron Burgundy mode for a long time, before there were real consequences for doing so.

When those times changed, he couldn’t reprogram his muscle memory.

My guess is he was probably like most of these cases; these are the 2 we heard about and probably got away with the same type crap for years. I missed him calling games but if he was a jackass like that then I have no sympathy for him getting canned. Plus the firing came 5 years after the Holly Rowe incident so it's not like they didn't give him a long rope to hang himself.
 
#25
#25
Fun fact: Shortly after Peyton Manning's career ended at Tennessee, the athletic department produced a documentary of his college career, beginning with his recruitment. They asked Ron Franklin to narrate the video and he agreed to do it.

Florida had asked him to narrate a similar video tribute to Danny Wuerffel a year earlier... and he declined.
 

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