Ron Diaz - The Ron & Ron Show

The Ron & Ron Show

Beginning in the mid-1980s, Ron Diaz partnered with stand-up comedian Ron Bennington to create the wildly successful raucous morning radio program, The Ron and Ron Show on Tampa Bay, Florida radio station WYNF-FM (95YNF). The show also featured regulars Fez Whatley, Fast Eddie, Billy the Phone Freak and Flipper. The show's audience quickly grew and was a huge ratings success and ripe for syndication. Known as "Radio's Bad Boy's" Diaz and Bennington teamed with their agent Ross Reback to found The Ron & Ron Radio Network to syndicate their show nationally. The Ron & Ron Show's final broadcast for WYNF-FM was on March 12, 1993, as Reback quickly negotiated a deal for the newly formed network to broadcast the show in Miami, FL, Orlando, FL, and Jacksonville, FL with another dozen markets soon following (including a new more lucrative deal in Tampa, FL).

The Ron & Ron Show regularly featured celebrity guests and Ron & Ron made national headlines after engaging in a screaming match with apparently inebriated actor Don Johnson (Miami Vice, Nash Bridges) which was highly chronicled in the press, on many TV entertainment news shows and was featured in People Magazine and on Inside Edition. The show made international headlines once again when show regular Flipper formed a rock band to play at the upcoming Ron & Ron Live Gig in Miami, FL and named his band The Dead German Tourists after two German tourists who had recently been murdered upon leaving the Miami International Airport in a rental car. The band's name caused an uproar and Miami city officials held an emergency meeting and voted to prohibit The Ron & Ron Show from holding their Live Gig within Miami city limits. The show considered the city council's vote a form of censorship, and undeterred, moved the Live Gig to neighboring Hallandale, FL at the last minute. An estimated crowd of approximately 10,000 fans attended the show.

In May 1993, Diaz's wife Debbie was diagnosed with AIDS, leading him to periodically take time off from the show. On December 20, 1994, Ron Bennington publicly broke the news of Debbie's diagnosis and devoted their entire show that day to the topic of AIDS. On November 13, 1995, Debbie Diaz died.

Ross Reback negotiated a divestiture of The Ron & Ron Radio Network through a sale to Paxson Communications Corp., a publicly traded company headed by Lowell W. Bud Paxson, the co-founder and former president of Home Shopping Network (HSN). At the time, Paxson Communications owned a large number of radio properties. Ron Diaz announced his departure on-air from The Ron & Ron Show in early 1997 as Paxson prepared to relocate it from the network's studios in St. Petersburg, FL to one in Hollywood, FL. Under Paxson and without Diaz the show quickly floundered. On September 29, 1997 after a successful 11 year run (the last few months of which featured several replacement hosts, all of whom took the name "Ron" in an attempted replacement of Diaz) The Ron & Ron Show was promptly canceled when Paxson's radio division was acquired by Clear Channel Radio.