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Spits and Suds Drops the Mitts with the Stars "Bang" Guy | 'Spits & Suds'

From 'Spits & Suds' (subscribe here): Host Gavin Spittle introduces you to "The Bang Guy" Nick Moroch that you see at Stars games right behind the goaltender with his "Bang" sign. The two discuss the meeting held that stopped him from banging on the glass, why he switched to the "Bang" sign, how the reaction is to him around the arena, dealing with any hate and why you see him wearing the white suit.

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Broadcast on:: 17 Sep 2024
Audio Format:: other

Welcome to another edition of Spits and Suds. So glad you can be with us throughout this off season. You guys are incredible. The numbers that we've received the last few months. Oh my goodness, you keep us going. And the season is coming upon us. And so excited to bring you more and more contact as training camp comes along and as we make our way into the season special guest today. And you know, this is an interesting one. Started this podcast to grow the great game of hockey. And one of the things that I've loved about you, the stars fan, is that you've shown your love of hockey by selling out the lower bowl, for instance, by packing stars, by making it really loud in the arena to the point where other teams are now coming in and saying that it can be a tough place to play at times. Well, that led me to this interview. And I've known Nick Merock for a long time and you might know him as the bang guy. And I wanted to go through Nick's story and Nick is kind of a heat lamp and kind of a polarizing character. And we're going to talk about how the bang guy concept all came together, get right up on that microphone. Polarizing to say the least. Welcome to the show, man. How are you? - Thank you so much. I'm very excited. I don't know why you started the top interviewing me, but it's okay. - Well, because I think a lot of people want to know the bang guy's story. And if they don't, and they just say, hey, this isn't the podcast for me, that's fine. But I like stories that have to do with stars. For example, if Victory Green was available for an interview and actually talked, I would interview Victory Green. - I would too. - I mean, I did Jeff Kay last summer and it was a tremendous interview and just the aspect of how do you get the names down? Do you coordinate? There were just little nuances. So there isn't a game that goes by that people don't see you in the crowd. So let's go back. How long have you been a season ticket holder of the stars? - We have been season ticket holders since day one in the same seats for since '93. - Okay. - We've had those seats we found out about hockey through football as it was football on ice. And my dad didn't want me playing football. So he migrated me towards the idea of playing hockey and somehow came upon these seats in the very beginning and we haven't let go of them since. - Okay. And then the banging on the glass. Let's go back before we move forward, before you became like this polarizing character. You sit behind the net and many new stars fans won't know that you didn't always have the bang sign. In fact, you would bang on the glass. What was that just a natural thing where you just said, "Hey, I'm gonna bang on the glass." - No, it's a part of my passion for the game and for the team. I wanted to be a part of the game in any way I could. And if the beer helped a lot throughout the years, I'll tell you that much, double-fisting the beers. And, but I was more of a passion for the game and for the team in why I was banging on the glass and see if there's some sort of way that I could help them out. And, you know, maybe it got too far with banging on the glass. I did render the camera above me useless for four years. - That's why they approached you. And how did that go about? Did the stars contact you or did the TV contact you? - So, Fox Sports reached out to me and every year they'd reach out to me and it's one of those they come over and talk to me because they know that I'm an approach, they know that I'm an approachable person. And it was always, hey, can you pipe it down a little bit, you know, try and do this a little bit, maybe do it this way or do it this way. And they would come and ask me every year. And finally, they were fed up with it. They came up and brought me in and created a montage of my banging on the glass one season. I wish I had that tape. I really do because- - Now when it was a montage, was it the- - A montage of me banging on the glass- - Okay, not the camera angle and what it did. It was just me banging on a glass and rendering the camera useless and such. It was actually really funny, but it showed the type of banging on the glass and I wouldn't bang on the glass if the play wasn't in my end. I wouldn't do that. It's only if it's in my board. That's it. That's how I can change it. - I mean, banging out of the glass is not out of the ordinary and hockey by the way. - No, it's not, but I'm a passionate fan and I wanted to show that. And there's nothing wrong with being a passionate fan. The problem with screaming is you're screaming, you're cheering and screaming. The problem with me is I'm screaming into the glass and it's reverberating back to the people behind me. - Got it. Jim Light reached out to me. It was in 2012, I believe. It was my last year, last year at DBU. And Jim Light's reached out to me and he gave me the rundown. He said, Nick, you're gonna have to stop banging on the glass, banging the glass as hard as you can. You gotta stop that shit. And we're gonna start the process of asking you to morning then kick you out for a game, then suspend you and then finally revoke the seats. And that's when I was like, well, I wanna be a part of the game. So how do I do that in a way that's, you know, productive for me to stay on the glass and not being on it? Plus, the idea of making sure my hands are tied up, holding a sign just came to my head and then the idea, the name, the phrase bang came to mind. And instantly, I got it, you know, this little paper thing, paper board thing and wrote bang on it and it helped me. - Right. - But I mean, you didn't go down easy though, because if memory serves me right, when this happened, it kind of caused a little bit of a stir media-wise. It was being talked about, but then didn't you, I believe you flew to Arizona. - Oh my God. - And you were on the glass or I think that was the next star's game. You were on the glass against star's coyotes. I believe that was the case. - Oh God. - Isn't that scary that I know Nick Merock better than you know Nick Merock? - I've been, I went to Arizona State. - Okay. - I went to Arizona State, but not during the bang years. The Arizona State years was '03 to '08. And I had three or four people come with. I bought all the seats always because I was a part of the transition from America West to whatever it is now, America West to the Gill River. - Yeah. - And the main problem with the coyotes was that it was an hour and a half away in Glendale. - We've been chirping for that for years. - An hour and a half away from Glendale. - Has nothing to do with fan base. - People, yeah, it has nothing to do with the fan base. - I mean it's the equivalent here, Nick, of what? Put it in. - In Frisco. - McKinney, Frisco. - Yeah, absolutely. - If you put that arena in Arlington, there wouldn't be nobody going to the games. Nobody will go to the games. You put it in McKinney, Frisco. Nobody will go to the games. You have to put the arena in the downtown area and people. I heard all of the excuses in the world, the ownership, everything. I mean, I heard it all. - Yeah. - It came to the conclusion that it was geographically paying the ass. - Yeah. - So I had to buy three seats for my friends who, first off, me getting drunk and getting driven home. The DD driver getting drunk and accidentally getting drunk and having to get driven home. And then the third guy, being the second and the first guy getting drunk, he had to stay sober. So it was a... - Yeah, there's a pattern. - It was a comedy of errors. - So you come up with the bank concept and... - I come up with the bank concept because it kept your hands. - It kept my hands from banging on the glass. It really does. Even though it might not look like it or sound like it, now it really is because my hands are free and I could, you know, banging with two hands is a lot worse than kind of slapping it with one. - So when you go to the arena, what is the reaction from stars fans? 'Cause I see it mixed on social media. You know, like I said at the beginning of this podcast, there will be people that listen to this that are saying, why are you having him on? But I think the reality is you're a character and I think that every city for sports teams has various characters and you've turned yourself into - The Dallas stars. - But are bad. Yeah, you're the Dallas stars, bang on. - I'm the fan, I'm the leader, the fan leader of the Dallas stars. I'm like, oh I am, it's just a fan. - You're a fan. - So you're like publicity-wise, there is something there. I mean, you gotta admit, there's, you know, you enjoy it. - Yeah. - But I have seen you, you are a true fan. - I am, I am, I'm a fan through and through. And people who are at the games are very kind and gentle. Kind of me, they say hello and they know that I'm a fan. And the problem is that the people that haven't met me think I'm a jerk and consider it womanizing jerk. - That's, that's it, plain and simple. And, you know, it couldn't be any further from the truth. - Yeah. - It's just, it just is what it is. Wait till you meet me, then all of a sudden you'll love me. - Okay. (laughing) - Now, a lot of people take pictures with you in the arena. - They do, I mean, I take pictures with the, with everyone because it's, I just do it. I'm a fan, I'll take a picture. - I won't ever, I had people come up and ask me to sign their jerseys and sign something. And I'm like, I'm not signing, I'm not signing a jersey or anything. - What if someone comes up to you in a white sports coat? Will you sign that? - Yeah, I'll absolutely, I'll sign it. - Where did the white sports coat come from? - So I came from my dad, my dad over the course of his life. He, he, he needed to find a way to stand out, stand out from the crowd and the idea of everyone wearing a suit, it's just plain old suit. Come up with a white suit. And so he started wearing this cream, cream suit and, and it's ponytail. I don't know, I'm not doing a ponytail now. I tried that and didn't work. But the white suit kind of took off. You don't see anybody ever wearing white suits. That's just, you just don't. - Yeah. - And seeing, seeing that, I was like, well, you know, if he's, he's coming to the games, you know, wearing a white suit, maybe after I should start doing that. And he started to come less, less games. And I, I kind of donned the, the cream suit. And it's, and it's been an absolute awesome thing. Keeping the torch alive, especially with the white suit. - Yeah, yeah, and you travel as well. I mean, I've seen you, I've seen you in Vegas. I've seen you in, you know, Arizona, obviously. There are some other cities and does the, I've seen the bang sign actually travel. - It does travel. I've been to a bunch of, I've been to a bunch of arenas. - Excuse me, sorry. Usually what I do is I wait till the second half of the season and I see the teams that are tanking. I see there, there's, there's seats going down and all of a sudden the front row seats pop up and I'm like, well, I'll take those. I will only go see the stars. I will not go see any, any two random teams. I may, I'm a star's man through and through. And, and I want to sit as close to the action as possible. But also I, I, I, I make sure that the seat place, the seating of where I sit is, is known to. Have you ever like had eye contact with Jake Ottinger during a game? - Yeah. Yeah. In Minnesota last, well, every, well, then these skate around for the second period. Jamie and Tyler have just tapped the glass and everybody, you know, kind of just gets gnawed. It's, it's, it's really, really cool. I try and, I try and be there for second period, the second period skate because, because of that. And, and so many people, they sit there and they want to talk to me and meet me and I'm like, don't do it after the first, do it after the second because I won't talk to you. I got to go down to the seats and, and I'm not, as much as I want to talk, you know, hockey, I'm there for the game and I want to see the two points. It's just, you know, and people ask me to come see them. I'm like, absolutely not. I, I, and absolutely not. I'm here to see. You come see me. Come see me for a second. - Just for the simple fact, not, not your ego by saying that you're saying, I'm here to watch hockey. - I'm here to watch hockey. I'm not here to socialize. - Yeah. - I mean, I'm here to socialize, but what, what, well, I want to see the two points. - Right, what would you say then to people that say, if you're just here to watch hockey, why not just get rid of the white jacket, get rid of the bangside and enjoy the game? - 'Cause my dad, I want to keep the tradition. - Okay, that's good. I mean, that's good that you're saying that because people need to understand, as you just mentioned, the white jacket comes from the tradition. - Yeah, but now I've got alternates. (laughing) - Got the green, got the green suit, got the velvet suit, what else? - I got another suit too. - Right. - But it's just for fun and games, you know, I like it. - I will also say the follow. You've also been criticized sometimes for your guests that you have with you. I'm not gonna go into detail because it's not right, but I will say you have every right to bring whoever to the game you want. - I completely do. - The fact that you haven't brought me to a game, that's bad. - 'Cause I would wear the white jacket with you. - You have season tickets, did you know people dress up for me as Halloween? - That's great. - Everyone went on dress up as me for Halloween. - If someone contacted you via Twitter and said, "Hey, I want to experience the bang experience," would you take them to a game? - Is she female or male? - It doesn't matter, man. - He does to me. (laughing) (laughing) - On a K, I do, I do take-- - But you go to like Star's Watch Parties, too. - I do have. - I do have stuff. - I have, I have, not as many as I used to go to. I used to be the diehard, you know, Star's Watch Party. I mean, it's all become routine for me these days. And that kind of sucks in a way that you sit there and you kind of mosey on through August, I'm sorry, August, October and November to see where they're at. In December, you start to kind of look at the standings and maybe stay a little bit longer instead of leaving earlier. January, you start to where you kind of look at, look at and ramp things up February, March and April, or preparing for the playoffs. And then, you know, it's full, we'll go for the playoffs. - Has there been a player or person in the Star's Personnel Office or someone in hockey that has said like, oh, yeah, it's the bad guy. - Every one of them. (laughing) - Every one of them, it's, you know, it's, - You're a very polarizing figure. Did the, I'm so glad I've got the executive support and the player's support because those are the ones. - Yeah. - Those are the ones that matter most, doesn't care. I don't care what anybody says about my bang thing or do whatever. If Jamie said, "Stop doing it," I would stop doing it in a heartbeat. - Okay. - Well, if they tell you to stop doing it, switch out bang for spits and stuff. - Yeah, I would absolutely, absolutely spits and stuff. - Why it is S and S. (laughing) - I don't think anyone will know what that is. - Oh, yeah. - But that's okay. I mean, we're growing. We're growing. - Absolutely. - We'll get there eventually. - See, this has been fun. This has been painless. This is, it's amazing how fast it's already been 20 minutes. - Has it been 20 minutes? - It's been 20 minutes. - We've been talking about you and I just, as I told you before, I just wanted to humanize you. - Sure, sure, yeah. - Because you said some things that people will think are polarizing and it's like you don't have to do that, but I also think that there's a guy behind there that is a massive stars fan. - Yes. - And you're a character and you, you know, dressing up for you is like going to a game and like you're part of the action. - I wish I wasn't. It's just, I wish I was just there. I mean, I'm just, I'm a passionate fan and general. - Right. - Which is, you know, good at that. - So I have to point out that you play Club Hockey too. - I did, I did play Club Hockey. - So it's not like you're just a novice of this game, you know, you. - I grew up playing hockey. - Yeah. - I took the Texas progression, but it was a street roller then ice. So I didn't get on the ice for a while, but my dad rented, my dad rented the Addison isoplex. Like at 11 p.m. There's 11 p.m. where there's nobody's skating. He'd rent those, you know, every, you know, few weeks or so, we just go on skating and I played travel hockey and stopped when I was at Arizona State and then came back and helped start the hockey program for Dallas Baptist and ended up scoring the very first goal. - Nice. - Absolute garbage goal too. - Of all the people in the world. - Somehow I picture you as a scrapper. - Oh God, I'd get leveled every single game and the worst part about me getting leveled is you, I'd get back up and the goons, they hate that. They absolutely hate it when you get back up. But in 2012, this is funny. 2012, when Jim Leitz told me to stop hanging on the glass and I came up with the sign, I had a proposal for him. It was my senior year of Dallas Baptist and I wanted to skate the American Airlines, I wanted to skate for a game at the American Airlines Center. And Jim Leitz said, all right, fine, we'll give you an hour and a half of us, a vice time. And we ended up buying the other, 'cause this takes three hour, three hour purchase, three hours for the game. - So you use this as an negotiation, you got three hours. - It was just an, no, we got an hour and a half from them. And then we purchased the other hour and a half. - You got to play Club Hockey on the American Airlines. - Correct, correct. We got, we were the first teams to play on - Nice. - On the American Airlines service and the Zamboni came up to me, they said, man, we love you, the death will be here for you. And I was like, my goodness, you know, this is so cool. - Wow. - And then I got to skate my last collegiate hockey game at the American Airlines Center and we played Texas State and I got like two points. - Nice. - I get the points, I pass the puck tape to tape. - I'm a very, very accurate passer. I don't shoot the puck. I do not shoot the puck. - Yeah, like Matt DuShane. - I would much rather see the beautiful pass to the person that scores. - Yeah. - It is, the pass is so much better than the shot. - It's hilarious that you came in here and you're like, and now you're all comfortable and telling stories. - Oh man. - I told you, I told you, when you appear on Spits and Suds that this will be a comfort level. - I got stories for days. - The deal is stars fans is as like, whether you love them or hate them, I thought it was a good perspective to see what is Nick Merock, otherwise known as The Bang Guy, you will see him soon at Stars Games. So I thought it was kind of an interesting perspective as we make our way to the 2024, 2025. These are gonna have a big week of shows this week on Spits and Sudsos. - So stay tuned. - Wait, hold on, speaking of stayed tuned. I don't know. - You just stopped my show. - Just two for two seconds, for two seconds. Listen, I don't know if you remember me tweeting about getting tickets. I wanted to offer Friday, I wanted to offer Saturday's tickets to a fan that follows you guys, follows you guys and follows me and will randomly pick the winner on, let's say, you wanna do that, that's fine. - I wanna do that. - Yeah. - I can't do that, but you can. - I'll do it, I wanna make sure you guys-- - That's fine, if someone wants to tweet at Nick and mention Spits and Suds, then Nick can pick the winner and everything. - It's growing the show, growing the game, and growing for the magic plex. I wanna, and listen-- - This can be your contest, you, everything, so this is you. - It's my contest, I wanna make sure that you guys are, we fall under different rules and categories, sir. - What kind of rules? - Well, we're affiliated with a radio station, so therefore, you can't. - There's just two friends talking to me. - I do, of course. - Don't worry about that. But, all right, that's fine, they offer us up. - The offers, the offers up, and listen, it might be preseason, but man, there's still glass, we pay full prices. - There's nothing wrong with preseason. - We pay full prices. - That's right, yeah. - And I know. - We get full benefits, just as a preseason game, as you do a regular season game-- - Right. - You get the patrol lounge, you get the parking spot, and you get the glass seats. I wanna make sure to special Stars fans. You get a chance to experience that. - So, Stars fans, reach out to Nick Merock, what's your Twitter handle? @NickMerock. - @NMerock. - @NMerock. - Yeah. - And you'll see, he's the bang guy, and he'll be there in full effect this season, so I can finish the show now, right? - Sure, yeah, yeah, I was gonna say you can finish now. (laughing) - That's gonna do it for another edition of Spits and Sods, one of the more interesting editions of Spits and Sods. I'm Gavin Spittle, we'll talk to you soon. Have a great day, everyone.