Nashville Sports Reporter Allegedly Fired for Prince-Themed Broadcast

In the aftermath of Prince's death, many in the sports world paid tribute.

Included in that group was Dan Phillips of Fox 17 in Nashville, Tennessee. Phillips, who had reportedly been with the station for more than 10 years, delivered a sportscast that appeared to be a sincere attempt to honor the late music icon.

On Friday, Phillips posted a statement to his Facebook page indicating he had been fired for the broadcast. Per Phillips:

"

First of all, I want to thank everyone for the kind words, comments and positive feedback on this tribute I did to Prince last week. It really means a lot.

Unfortunately, there were apparently some viewers, as well as management at the station, who did not feel the same way. They felt I was insensitive. And as a result, I was terminated today.

"

Matt Yoder of Awful Announcing reported Phillips' Twitter account was deleted—as was his bio from the Fox 17 website.

Update from Wednesday, May 4

As it turns, it was not the Prince tribute that got Phillips fired. Rather, it was reportedly a profane Facebook rant that cost the sportscaster his job.

According to Deadspin's Timothy Burke, a source revealed that Phillips was terminated after dropping multiple F-bombs during a Facebook Live video run by Fox 17 reporter Meagan O’Halloran. The concept of the video was to draw questions out of a fishbowl and answer them for the viewing audience.

That's apparently something the sportscaster had no interest in doing, per Deadspin:

"

Phillips reportedly told O’Halloran 'you better not f--king come in my office with that,' and proceeded to repeatedly yell 'F--k you! F--k you!' on the Facebook Live broadcast after she entered his office. We’re told Phillips then told the rest of the staff 'I f--king told her that would happen if she came into my office.'

"

The video was taken down as a result of the NSFW language.

--End of Update--

[h/t Deadspin]