DMN Bill Mercer: Three Most Impressive Students At NT

[FirefightnRick]

http://sportsday.dallasnews.com/other-sports/moresports/2016/04/01/hot-air-bill-mercer-recalls-great-opening-statement-rangers-inaugural-opening-day-chats-wrestling-roots

 

Quote

 

You started teaching at North Texas in 1965 and retired for good in 2009. Who was the student who off the bat wowed you with his broadcast skills?

Mercer: Dave Barnett (the former Mavericks and Rangers play-by-play broadcaster). I could tell from his first tape that he would be a star. It was hard for me to find a critique. He had the voice, the pace and the knowledge. It was amazing how good the young man was. Craig Way (voice of the Texas Longhorns) was great, too. I once gave him a two-page critique of a tape. He read it, looked at the grade and asked me how he earned an “A” if he did so much wrong. And Mark Followill (TV voice of the Mavericks) was a heck of a broadcaster. We used to argue all the time because he wanted to jump on the officials. I told him to wait until he got a job. He’s done pretty well for himself.

 

Rick

Edited April 6, 2016 by FirefightnRick

[VideoEagle]

I had multiple classes with Dave and worked at KNTU while he was there. His voice was as clear and clean back then as it is now. He was always very good, that is calm, clean and accurate. We are lucky someone with experience with multiple NBA, MBL and national broadcast networks has landed in our booth. 

[All About UNT]

And of course he mentioned all of these names tonight in the booth at the Rangers game

[GrandGreen]

Kind of weird but true to form, that they listed about 10 of Mercer's broadcasting jobs and left NT were he had to broadcast longer than anywhere.  Also obvious that he continues to omit Dunham as a student when he lists them.  

Mercer was a treasure that NT should have found a much better way to replace than they did.  

[VideoEagle]

37 minutes ago, GrandGreen said:

Mercer was a treasure that NT should have found a much better way to replace than they did.  

The  way Mercer was treated was terrible and it didn't need to be done that way at all. 

Edited April 17, 2016 by VideoEagle

[UNT90]

2 hours ago, VideoEagle said:

The  way Mercer was treated was terrible and it didn't need to be done that way at all. 

Why should this surprise anyone?

But being not real familiar with the situation, remind me again who was the department head responsible when this treatment occurred?

Edited April 17, 2016 by UNT90

[RushnStudies]

I didn't know he'd left UNT under negative circumstances. That's a shame.

[EagleD]

Mercer was in the broadcast booth for Rangers game in the third inning last night. I didn't get to catch it but was told at age 90 he still has it. 

 

Great great man. 

[FirefightnRick]

10 minutes ago, EagleD said:

Mercer was in the broadcast booth for Rangers game in the third inning last night. I didn't get to catch it but was told at age 90 he still has it. 

 

Great great man. 

He does still have it..  It was great to hear him and the guys talking old times.  

I believe it was Sloan who was the AD.(might have been Helwig though by then?)...when he was jubbed in the back.

 

Rick

[VideoEagle]

3 hours ago, FirefightnRick said:

I believe it was Sloan who was the AD.(might have been Helwig though by then?)...when he was jubbed in the back.

 

Rick

If the question is who was the AD at the time, I think it was Helwig. I base that on remembering the decision was made by a new AD just coming in. Part of the justification to the administration was a new AD should be able to name his own people, and thus "this is the time to make a move." 

As I understand it, there had been a whisper campaign that Bill had lost it and was making too many error on calling games. The whisper campaign was made to the AD and convinced the AD a change needed to be made. No one talked to Bill, asked him about the mistakes, compared the number of "missed calls" by Bill to any other announcers, none of that. Mercer explains much of what happened in his book which I suggest everyone read. 

If you are a new leader coming in and want to replace a long time person in your department, you should talk directly to that person, thank them for their years of service, have a party and call them a hero very publicly and announce their retirement. The person being replace might not like it, but when you are being publicly praised and even have some kind of celebration in your honor it's hard to say you were mistreated. 

[untjim1995]

It was Helwig. He was brand new, had just fired Dennis Parker, as well as several other guys in the AD who got run off. That, in and of itself, isn't really all that bad, but the problem was that he hired poorly, too, and was allowed to stick around too long, which hamstrung us with incredibly poor OOC schedules for the two main revenue sports.

I never had any problems at all with George Dunham getting the gig, as he loves the university tremendously and was a part of the local sports station that was quickly climbing the ratings, allowing us to still get mentions in DFW sports media, when usually we just go ignored (some thing really never change...) Bill Mercer is legendary in these parts and I think his legacy of tremendous students becoming great voices in sports speaks for itself. And I'm glad to know that George and Bill finally got reconciled to the point where hard feelings are no longer at play.

[RushnStudies]

3 hours ago, untjim1995 said:

Bill Mercer is legendary in these parts

Not just these parts. A bunch of us girls growing up in the Houston area used to watch World Class Championship Wrestling on Saturday mornings. Or perhaps I should spell the word as Bill used to say it... "Rassling."

[drex]

It definitely Craig Helwig...enough said.

[EagleD]

I read Mercers book. He got screwed, especially since he gave his heart and soul to NT. I'm glad he made nice with Dunham.  Craig Way had to play peacemaker. I am fortunate enough to have the occasional conversation with Craig. Mercer is his dear friend as is Dunham. If the University hadn't done something to bring him back into the fold it would have been a slap in the face. 

 

[VideoEagle]

11 hours ago, RushnStudies said:

Not just these parts. A bunch of us girls growing up in the Houston area used to watch World Class Championship Wrestling on Saturday mornings. Or perhaps I should spell the word as Bill used to say it... "Rassling."

A decade or so ago there was a roast of Mercer. Verne Lunquest said he appreciated Bill doing wrestling as it made Verne's "Bowling for Dollars" look better. 

[UNTLifer]

Dave Barnett and Hank should invite Mr. Mercer back in the booth to call one more game.

[FirefightnRick]

11 hours ago, drex said:

It definitely Craig Helwig...enough said.

Thanks drex. I fault Helwig for the move since it was his call to make.  But he had some real POS pushing the buttons to make it happen, so they're just as much at fault.

 

Rick

[michelle]

I worked in the athletic department in the late 1980's through early 1990's.  Mercer was a true professional calling all the games.  He had several students that went on to be great broadcasters.  I travelled with all of them to off site games and it was really fun.