Who is Billy Packer? What is the Cause of His Death?

By Charu On Jan 28, 2023

Billy Packer, a well-known basketball analyst, and commentator has died. Billy Packer had lived for 82 years. For more than 30 years, Billy Packer was thought to be the voice of the NCAA tournament. Thursday night, Billy Packer passed away.

Who is Billy Packer?

Billy Packer was a well-known college basketball commentator for CBS Sports and, later, for CBS Sports Network. He was an American sportscaster and commentator. He started working in broadcasting in the 1970s, and for the next 30 years, he covered many NCAA Men’s Basketball Tournaments, including the Final Four.

In 2008, he stopped doing radio shows. Packer was known for his thorough knowledge of the game, his analysis of it, and his strong opinions about players and coaches. He was a part of the team that covered the 1996 Summer Olympics in Atlanta and also did colour commentary for the NBA on NBC.

During his career as a sportscaster, Packer covered football and golf, but college basketball was his main focus. After winning the Curt Gowdy Media Award in 2013, he was inducted into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame. His passing happened on April 5, 2018.

Billy Packer Early Life

Anthony William Paczkowski, whose Polish last name was later changed to Packer, grew up in Wellsville, New York. His parents later had his Polish last name, Paczkowski, changed to Packer.

Tony’s father was a great football, basketball, and baseball player at St. Lawrence University and was put in the school’s Hall of Fame in 1982. He was the coach of the men’s basketball team at Lehigh University for 16 years, from 1950 to 1966.

After he graduated from high school in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, in 1958, Packer went to Wake Forest University. He was there from 1958 to 1962. His last three years at the school were spent as a guard on the basketball team. During that time, he helped the team win two Atlantic Coast Conference titles and get to the Final Four in 1962.

He was in the Delta Nu chapter of the Sigma Chi fraternity. He was an assistant coach at his old school for a short time after he graduated. In 1972, he got his start in broadcasting when he was asked to fill in as the color analyst for a regionally aired ACC game. He was hired as a regular player for the next season.

Billy Packer Career

Billy Packer is a well-known name in the media. He worked for NBC from 1974 to 1981 and for CBS from 1981 to 2008. From 1975 to 2008, he wrote about every NCAA Men’s Division I Basketball Championship, even the Final Four. He also covered ACC games for Raycom Sports for a long time.

He helped make the video game Hoops, which came out in 1986. He won a Sports Emmy Award in 1993. In 2005, he won the Marvin Francis Award for “outstanding success and service in covering the ACC.” But in 2008, CBS said that Clark Kellogg would replace Packer on the network’s main broadcast team. This meant that Packer’s 35 years of covering the NCAA tournament on TV were over.

In March 2009, he and Bob Knight went back to the studio to talk about the NCAA tournament for the show Survive and Advance on Fox Sports Net. Packer was a color commentator for Putt-Putt Professional Putters Association TV shows in 1982 when he called the historic PPA National Championship.

What is the Cause of Packer’s Death?

Packer also wrote the books Hoops and Why We Win, as well as a number of other books about basketball. He was married to Barbara, and they had three children together.

Two of his children work in the sports business. Brandt is a producer for Golf Channel, and Mark is a sports radio host in Charlotte, North Carolina. In 1988, Billy Packer got into the National Polish American Sports Hall of Fame. Packer died of kidney failure on January 26, 2023, when he was 82 years old.

His son said in a tweet

“The Packer Family would like to share some sad news,” tweeted his son Mark, who hosts a show on the ACC Network. “Our amazing father, Billy, has passed. We take peace knowing that he’s in heaven with Barb. RIP, Billy.”