Wednesday, July 3, 1996

Bill Mercer and Texas sports go hand in hand

By LANCE FLEMING
Sports Writer

Bill Mercer has been a part of many great moments in Texas sports history.

For instance, he broadcast the very first Texas Rangers game with Don Drysdale in 1972. He did the Dallas Texans of the old American Football League, and he was the voice of the Dallas Cowboys as they grew from expansion franchise to NFL powerhouse from 1966-72.

But ask anyone between the ages of 25 and 35 where they know the name Bill Mercer from and they'll likely tell you, "Saturday night wrestling."

From 1976-87, Mercer was the man who captured the rivalries between the Von Erichs and the Freebirds and introduced us all to the likes of "Gentleman" Chris Adams, "Iceman" King Parsons and Khimala the Ugandan Giant. (The Giant, by the way, didn't make his way to Dallas via Uganda, but rather Birmingham, Ala.).

"I always thought of doing wrestling as a hobby," said Mercer, who is in Abilene to broadcast the tree-game series between Abilene and Tyler with longtime friend Mike Capps, who is the Wildcatters' play-by-play voice.

Mercer, who looks much younger than his 70 years, did some wrestling on the radio before moving to TV work in the late 1950s. The wrestling work was just a hobby while Mercer made his mark as a baseball and football man.

For years he was the voice of North Texas Eagle football, and he began doing the old Dallas/Fort Worth Rangers of the AAA International League. Then when the Washington Senators became the Texas Rangers in 1972, Mercer and Drysdale did the games for the first two seasons.

After that Mercer moved to Chicago where he did White Sox games with Harry Carey for two
seasons. But then the White Sox changed ownership and Mercer was left without a job.

"I had a chance to go to Oakland," Mercer said. "But I knew how (Oakland owner) Charlie Finley was. I had just finished two years with Harry Carey, so why would I want to put myself through that again."

Mercer then returned to Texas full-time where he resumed calling North Texas football games and teaching broadcasting at North Texas.

Then in 1976 famed wrestling patriarch Fritz Von Erich called Mercer and asked him to do a wrestling show from Dallas.

In 1980 that small wrestling show exploded into the National Wrestling Alliance (NWA) with the Von Erichs (David, Kevin and Kerry) as its main draw.

"In 1980, Channel 39 in Dallas came up with the idea of doing wrestling really well with hand-held cameras on the ring and four or five microphones," Mercer said. "With the Von Erichs as big as they were it hit and just took off.

"We had the Sportatorium filled every Saturday night, and we filled up Reunion Arena for special events," he said. "We had 40,000 at Texas Stadium (when Kerry Von Erich beat 'Nature Boy' Ric Flair for the NWA World Heavyweight championship in 1985)."

The NWA and Mercer were so big that he couldn't even walk across campus without being noticed for his work.

"I was teaching at North Texas at the time, and I would walk across campus and see kids from the Middle East and they would stop and point at me and talk to me," Mercer said. "And these were kids from Lebanon or Saudi Arabia; that's how big that thing was."

But it eventually began dying out in the late '80s when the Von Erichs - first David, then Mike, Chris and Kerry - died. The last three were suicides.

Mercer, though, enjoyed his time in the world of professional wrestling - real or not.

"I really like the old wrestlers, and still have great relationships with some of them," he said. "They got out and worked to make it a success. The outcomes are fake; they've been determined for promotion, and I'm not telling anything that anybody doesn't know. "But I always respected wrestlers, because if they got hurt they had to keep going," Mercer said. "I saw Chris Adams hit Kevin Von Erich with a chair one night and it split his head open and blood went everywhere. They had to be tough."

Mercer hasn't called wrestling since, concentrating mainly on his teaching and calling UNT games. But he quit doing that a few years ago, and now he's aching to get back into minor league baseball.

"I've retired, but I thought I could still do baseball because it's the most fun to do," he said. "Every fall I've contacted some minor league teams, and I just missed a couple last year. But I've known Mike (Capps) since he was eight, and we had talked about me doing some games with him. I did some with him last week, and I decided to come out to Abilene to do these three games. I told him I'd drive to El Paso to do baseball.

"I still feel like I'm 45," Mercer said. "I'd love to do a season of minor league baseball. I don't want to do major league baseball again; it's too strenuous."

But no matter what he does, Mercer will always be beloved because of the life and color he brought the men in the "squared circle."

"I never planned to be THE wrestling announcer, and now it's one of my legacies," Mercer said. "I did baseball and other things so early in my career that people have forgotten some of that. It makes me feel really good when people come up to me and say they used to listen to me do the old D/FW Rangers or the Texans.

"I'm not really working right now," he said, "but if somebody wants to hire a former major league announcer to broadcast minor league games, just call me." Tonight's game

Kerry Knox (4-2, 4.30 ERA) will get the start on the mound tonight for the Prairie Dogs. Tyler's starter is undetermined.

Tonight's promotion if Dr Pepper/Pepsi Can Night at Scott Field. Fans can get $1 off any ticket if they bring a Dr Pepper or Pepsi product can with them to the park. Dyess Air Force Base will also provide a B-1 flyover before the game.