Regular reader, but not a poster to the forum. It’s not Tony’s responsibility for anything in this situation. This is a classic example of shooting the messenger. First, the criticism started out about the story being false. Now that we know there’s validity to the story you’re blaming the reporting on what’s out there. As Tony would say, “he didn’t do it.”
The criticisms of Tony on this form are tiresome, unmerited, and quite frankly sophomoric. Tony has one of the most content rich shows in the nation, when it comes to coverage of a single, specific college sports team. Do you know who loves Tony Basillio and gives him more time than any other radio show? Coach Tony Vitello. Vol baseball legend Chris Burke, is a regular on the program. He has quality guest such as Watson Brown every week, as well as numerous other national media representatives who bring great info. He allows callers some leeway that other shows dont.
Having listened to Tony for 30 years, this is a guy that built a show completely, 100%, from nothing, and developed a grassroots following that has grown into tens of thousands. He’s provided unmatched coverage with post game shows that have run until 5:30 in the morning. He’s recruited VFL Will Heflin to run a post game baseball show.
He relies on ZERO corporate funding to support the show. He’s active in great causes for our community and provides a voice for the common fan.
Whether you like it or not, he absolutely, 100% has sources inside the program, and he comes up with great information time after time. These degrading comments about him say more about the people posting than it does anything about Tony Basillio.
Dont like it? Dont listen, but keep your unfounded criticisms and lies to yourself.
Standing Tony's corner this strongly, and going out of your way to say his name seven times (all advertising is good advertising, eh?), I'm going to take a guess that you are one of the following (in order of decreasing probability):
1 - Tony himself, though portraying yourself as a third party ("having listened to Tony...")
2 - Tony's dad, mom, wife, sister, brother, cousin, aunt or uncle
3 - Tony's producer, associate producer, assistant producer, production manager, or studio technician
4 - Tony's preacher, lawyer, high school teacher, dental hygienist, or neighbor
5 - just a really big fan, who maybe would like to get a job with Tony's team
Heh, just messing with you. I'm all for you defending the man, you're absolutely right he did nothing to deserve the intensity of criticism seen in this thread.
On the other hand, you (and Tony) have to realize that people shoot the messenger mostly out of frustration with the message. It comes with the job. Can't complain about it, if you are (or he is) the one who chose to be a messenger.
Go Vols!