I first met Matt Hicks somewhere I guess it was in 1985 or 1986 maybe as we were both broadcasting high school football and teams we were covering were going to play each other in the Maryland state playoffs. It was Frederick High of Frederick County on my end against McDonough High of Charles County, the team Matt was covering.
He was an outstanding broadcaster then and remains that many years later as a radio broadcaster in his 11th year with the Texas Rangers. Matt has broadcast baseball play-by-play for 34 years and from 1989-1994 broadcast the games of the O’s Frederick Keys affiliate.
A Washington, D.C. native who grew up following his hometown Senators until they moved, Matt would later get his baseball fix attending games with friends and traveling to 33rd Street watching the Orioles at Memorial Stadium. He grew up in Prince George’s County, is a graduate of Bladensburg High and is a 1983 University of Maryland grad. This Terp is back in the state where he grew up. When we see each other this weekend, neither of us is covering high school football any longer, but those were fun days too.
The Rangers and Orioles play Game 1 of the American League Division Series tomorrow afternoon. The winner of the best-of-five series advances to the AL Championship Series.
The Rangers are on what amounts to a two-week road trip. Starting Sept. 25, they ended the regular season with three games in Anaheim against the Angels and four in Seattle vs. the Mariners. When they failed to win the AL West on the final day, it was a cross-country flight to Tampa where they would beat the Tampa Bay Rays two in a row, and they landed in Baltimore Thursday afternoon.