Marv Albert easy choice to announce Barclays opener

• Albert, 71, is the perfect bridge from Brooklyn's sporting past to its present.
• As a teen in the late 1950s, Albert landed a job in the Dodgers tickets department.
• In 1967, Albert began calling Knicks games, and he did that for 37 seasons.

When TNT needed to name an announcer for the Brooklyn Nets' home opener against the New York Knicks in the new $1 billion Barclays Center, the choice was easy.

Brooklyn native Marv Albert, previously the home team play-by-play announcer for Knicks and Nets TV games, gets the honor for the nationally televised Nov.1 opener.

"No question it has a lot of significance to me, especially as one who called Knicks games for 30 years and did the Nets in recent years," Albert said. "The fact that Brooklyn has another major league franchise, it has tremendous meaning to me. I will get a real kick out of being part of that."

Albert, 71, is the perfect bridge from Brooklyn's sporting past to its present. As a high school student, he attended the final Brooklyn Dodgers game at Ebbets Field in 1957, the last time major professional team sports played in Brooklyn.

"It's going to be a huge hit for the Nets and for the NBA. It's a smash hit to me," Albert said. "By having their own home in Brooklyn, in a thriving area, it's going to be through the roof, not only in terms of basketball but concerts, too. It's going to be huge."

As a teen in the late 1950s, Albert landed a job in the Dodgers tickets department — an office boy who did errands. With the job came two tickets to every Brooklyn home game.

"That was the best part of the job," he said. "Employees sat in this overhang at Ebbets Field. I went to almost every home game their final season."

Broadcasting was already on his mind. He brought a recorder and a friend to each game, and they called the action.

"He was my color man, and we would do the game and annoy everyone around us," Albert said. "It got to the point where the vice president of the team moved us to another spot where we wouldn't bother everyone."

In 1957, the Dodgers played eight home games at Roosevelt Stadium in Jersey City as a tactic to get a new stadium in Brooklyn, near where Barclays Center was built. Albert used to ride the team bus to Jersey City with Dodgers players, including stars Gil Hodges, Duke Snider, Roy Campanella and Pee Wee Reese — the guys who became the focal point of Roger Kahn's seminal book The Boys of Summer.

In 1967, Albert began calling Knicks games, and he did that for 37 seasons. He called Nets games from 2005-06 through 2009-10. He is looking forward to the Nets developing a solid fan base and drawing strong interest.

"Even in East Rutherford or in Newark, when the Nets played the Knicks — even when the Nets were a better team — there were always more Knicks fans," Albert said. "Even when the Nets had magnificent teams and went to the Finals (2002 and 2003), I got the feeling the New York-New Jersey metropolitan area was more interested in the Knicks.

"The true mark will be when it sounds like a Nets crowd, and eventually it will be."