High
school English teacher loses job as school’s P.A. announcer for plugging novel
during football game
By Jake
Bumeier, THG Sports
August 22, 2004
When legendary announcer
Tim Baize decided to hang up his microphone to pursue other interests, officials
at F. J. Reitz High School didn’t have to go far to find a replacement. English
teacher and novelist Mike Whicker volunteered to fill the post.
A respected member of the
Evansville community, Whicker has an extensive public speaking background,
regularly giving talks to book clubs and civic groups about his novel
Invitation to Valhalla, a World War II spy novel that has been as high as
#19 on Daltonbooks.com’s fiction bestseller list. Whicker has also played or
coached a variety of sports for over thirty years.
He seemed like the perfect
person to fill’s Baize’s shoes.
That is until Friday
night, when athletic director Richard Nau fired Whicker immediately after the
Panthers routed Jeffersonville 39-18 for shamelessly plugging his novel dozens
of times during the game.
Every time Reitz ran for a
first down, Whicker would announce, “Another big Reitz first down brought to you
by Invitation to Valhalla, a novel by Mike Whicker available at local
fine books stores or at Amazon.com!”
Whicker
also encouraged fans to visit the concession stand for “Valhalla Dogs” and to
stick around for the Invitation to Valhalla halftime show.
Many fans were so
disgusted with Whicker’s announcing that they left the game early. When the
fourth quarter ended, only about 500 fans remained, despite Reitz handily
defeating the outmatched Jeffersonville squad.
When asked why he kept
mentioning his novel over and over, Whicker said, “I volunteered to do this
job—I am not getting paid. The least I can get is a little advertising out of
it. I don’t see what the big deal is.”
Nau said that Whicker will
retain his teaching position at Reitz, but a letter of discipline will be put in
his personnel file. Reitz will begin looking for a new football announcer on
Monday.
