As a journalism major at Temple back in the late 1970s, they made us take a course on public relations even knowing many of us would be in the traditional media.

The thought process behind that was we needed to know how the other side wrote.

Really, the whole process of PR a lot of times is polishing a turd and that’s exactly what the Temple PR team did on Thursday.

Can’t take credit for that description but saw it on the Temple basketball facebook site and almost spit out my coffee laughing.

“That release was like polishing a turd,” one of the guys said.

No shit.

The PR release in question was that Temple was announcing an “exciting” new format for broadcasting its major sports games and nowhere in that release did the university include terrestrial radio in its plan.

What does that mean?

A tradition that goes back to at least 1937–and probably even further back–comes to an end with the Aug. 30th opener at Oklahoma.

You will be able to hear Temple radio on a streaming basis but for the first time in history you won’t be able to get in your car and turn the dial to a Temple football game. You won’t be able to carry a transistor radio to hear a Temple football game.

Don’t know if Temple is the only school that doesn’t broadcast its games on a regular radio station, but pretty sure it is probably one of the very few.

And that’s pretty sad because my first job in journalism after Temple was being the sports editor of an afternoon daily in Norwich, N.Y. and the Temple football radio network back then included 10 stations, the farthest north of which was in Binghamton. I could even hear Temple football on the radio in the Southern Tier of New York state.

The “Temple football radio network” went from double-digit number of stations in the 1970s to one in the 1990s and after.

That’s sad because many of my great Temple football moments are radio-related.

When I was an underclassman at Temple, the games were broadcast both on WRTI-FM and WCAU (1210 AM).

Students like Howie Herman did the play-by-play and Jim Kelsh did the color on WRTI. On the AM dial that reached 40 of the 48 states on a cloudless night, the great Ron Menchine did the play-by-play and Heisman Trophy winner Joe Belino did the color.

While the two students who were my friends at Temple did a great job, Menchine and Belino brought a big-time aspect to the Temple broadcasts.

Former Navy coach Wayne Hardin brought both announcers over from Navy radio.

For many of the road games, I doubled as both the Temple News correspondent and the statistician and spotter for Ron and Joe. The two could not have been nicer to a 17-year-old kid and Belino probably was the humblest Heisman Trophy winner I ever met.

Menchine had a big-time voice and tabbed former Owl fullback Henry Hynoski, a 1,000-yard rusher, as “Dynamo Hyno.”

Hynoski had the kind of running style where he would burst through the line, knock over a linebacker, break a tackle of a safety before he was caught from behind by a corner.

Menchine: “Dynamo Hyno looks like Bronco Nagurski out there.”

As a 17-year-old kid, I had no idea who Bronco Nagurski was but since Google didn’t exist back then, I went into the Paley Library the next Monday and looked him up.

Pretty high praise by Ron.

Temple had a few radio announcers after that who didn’t quite measure up.

Steve Fredericks was one.

He was arrested for doing drugs at Kensington and Allegheny and lost his career not only as a play-by-play guy but as a sports talk show host.

Before Menchine and Fredericks, Pro Football Hall of Famer Merrill Reese did the Temple football games of head coach George Makris. I assume he called at least one touchdown by a fullback who wasn’t as good as “Dynamo Hyno” but became more famous.

A guy named Bill Cosby.

Dave Sims was the play-by-play guy for the 7-4 1990 season and his call of the 23-18 win at Wisconsin that year was a masterpiece. Now Dave calls the NFL on Westwood One and is the Seattle Mariners’ baseball play-by-play guy.

For most of the years after Menchine, the play-by-play guy was Harry Donahue. He became famous for his call of the final play in Temple’s 28-24 upset win at No. 10 Virginia Tech.

Since my headphones weren’t working that day, I carried the radio on my jog up East River Drive (now Kelly Drive) listening to the Temple game and wearing my Temple game jersey. When they won, I did a 37-inch vertical leap and pumped my fist. Running the other way, a jogger asked me what the Temple score was.

“28-24, they won,” I said.

“I’m Raheem Brock’s father,” he said.

“Are you Zach Dixon?”

“No, I’m his stepfather. Great news.”

Most of the time, though, I remember Donahue’s calls as going something like this:

“Mike McCann goes back to pass and it’s a touchdown! No, check that, it’s dropped.”

(Needless to say, when Temple moved to the MAC I could see all the road games on my laptop and stopped listening to the radio.)

Temple had another announcer named Don Henderson who pronounced Sid Morse’s name as “Sid Morris” for all four years of his Temple career.

I always thought Sid deserved better.

Temple football broadcasts can be traced way back to 1937 when the play-by-play guy was Ft. Worth Texas native By Saam, who became voice of the Phillies for 30 years.

Nobody knows if the famous Saam flubs existed back then but here were a couple of his with the Phillies:

Saam, who attended high school with golf legend Ben Hogan and college with Sammy Baugh, once created a beheading on air.

“Alex Johnson is going back. He’s going back, back. His head hits the wall. He reaches down, picks it up, and throws it into second base.”

Saam once opened a game by saying, “Hello, Byrum Saam, this is everybody speaking.” (This goof has also been credited to other announcers, including Lindsey Nelson and Phil Rizzuto.) Prior to Game 5 of the 1959 World Series, when Mel Allen introduced the NBC Radio audience to “amiable, affable, able Byrum Saam”, a distracted Saam unthinkingly replied, “Right you are, Mel Allen.” 

Would have loved to hear how By called some Temple games in the 1930s. Or would have loved to hear some tapes of the Sugar Bowl team on the radio in 1934.

Now the capable duo of Kevin Copp and Paul Palmer are doing the games but you won’t be able to get in your car to hear the post-game show anymore and I’m too stubborn to do the bluetooth thing. I’m guessing I’m not the only one.

For me, it’s been a great 50 years of Temple radio that will finally come to an end and there is no PR team alive that can polish that turd.

Monday: Translations