Hero Worship

Jon Teicher has broadcast UTEP football and men's basketball for 37 years, or since I was nine, taking the reins from Gary Gallup. As a UCLA graduate he called around in the early 1980s looking for a broadcasting gig and learned the El Paso Diablos minor league baseball team didn't even air their games. That's how he landed in town. He also called games for New Mexico State, and in Portland, Oregon, and in Wichita, Kansas. But he made it back to the border and stayed.

On Tuesday, December 5th the National Football Foundation awarded him the Chris Schenkel award, given to a sports broadcaster who has had a long and distinguished career broadcasting college football. The award seeks to recognize broadcasters with direct ties to colleges and universities rather than strictly national types. Past winners include Larry Munson at Georgia, Max Falkenstein at Kansas, and Ray Christensen at Minnesota.

Working radio in Athens, Georgia, I can tell you what the locals feel about the late Larry Munson is very similar to what we El Pasoans/Miner fans feel about Jon Teicher. I don't know Miner athletics without him. One of the things I like most is that he an El Pasoan, that he is our guy, and that he is one of us. We don't have to share him with anyone. He is our connection to great years, great teams, and great games. He's a beacon at a time when we could use some positive news from out athletic department.

Jon is the reason I started out in broadcasting. I would listen to the Diablo games in my living room with my engineer's graphing notebook (the straight lines were already drawn) and keep score of the game while listening. When I worked in radio he would air check my Levelland High School broadcasts when I breezed through town. I don't know what possessed me to reach out to him, but he made time for a guy calling class 4A games on a 6,000 watt FM station near Lubbock. Surely I was a little awestruck, but he was as down to earth as could be. I've also stopped in just to say hello in subsequent years. When we lived in Alabama a few years ago I'd stop to say hello after the UAB games. He recognized me and we'd chat for a moment or two.

He's the radio voice in UTEP's win over Kansas in the 1992 NCAA basketball tournament when Johnny Melvin stepped to the line and swished two free throws, and he was as ecstatic as everyone else when time ran out on the win. I've read the accounts on how the MinerTalk post-game call in show ran seven hours until they got kicked out of the arena. He was there in Tucson in the '88 tournament when we had to overcome a ton of adversity to win what amounted to a road game vs. Arizona. There are YouTube clips of those games with his audio that serve as comfort food when I need some.

An old friend took me to the 1988 Air Force football game at the Sun Bowl on a sunny and cool November afternoon. It was one of the first times the good guys wore orange tops and orange britches. I brought my radio and listened and it's how I learned Wake Forest tied their game, opening the door for us to go to the Independence Bowl. Tony Tolbert made a big stop on fourth down late to preserve a 31-24 win. Jon was there for that one too.

He cites the Great Man Don Haskins as one of his mentors. I heard in an interview that Jon lost his father early in life and that Coach became one of his role models in the 18 years they worked together. It's a little wild that Jon has been Voice of the Miners for 37 years and that Haskins was our coach for 39. They both found El Paso and loved it so much they stayed.

Dad and I went to a Diablo game in, I don't know, '84 or '85. We sat in the third-base grandstand and Jon came up to us and asked Dad a few questions as part of a survey. My eyes about popped out of their sockets because I knew exactly who he was since I'd already been listening to him for a while.

Jon also bitched me out once when I was about eight. We'd won a lucky number drawing and scored something like a free car wash or whatever. To claim your prize you had to go up to the press box since there was no guest services booth back then. There was no raised press box, it was more like a high school stadium where the top row of seats is directly in front of the press box. So when Dad went to claim our prize I stopped right in Teicher's sight line as he called the game. He barked at me and said I had to move. I don't blame him-- I'd have gotten in my grill too.

He's the soundtrack of my time as a Miner fan. I don't know him well, but I do know him and he seems like a very nice man. The Chris Schenkel award is a great honor and it is well deserved.

Congratulations Jon. And thank you.