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<< Previous   of   Next >> (click to enlarge) Brian Hertzog of Everett is a contestant on today's episode of “The Price is Right."   ADVERTISEMENT   When to watch "The Price Is Right" airs from 10 a.m. to 11 a.m. weekdays on KIRO TV, Channel 7. Brian Hertzog of Everett is a contestant on today's show.   CONTACT THE HERALD Robert Frank, City Editor frank@heraldnet.com   Published: Wednesday, June 18, 2008 How an Everett man got on "The Price Is Right" By Julie Muhlstein Herald Writer Brian Hertzog has a name tag autographed "Drew Carey '08," I know that much. I also know where he'll be this morning. The 28-year-old Everett man vows that at 10 a.m. he'll be at a hotel room in Lancaster, Calif. -- with the TV on. He has to catch today's episode of "The Price Is Right." Hertzog already knows who'll win what, not that he'd tell. Because he's a contestant, whose episode was taped June 2, he is bound by rules of the CBS game show to keep details to himself until after the broadcast. I tried, but he dodged my probing questions, including "Can you park it out front?" It was thrill enough, he said, to hear his name and that command everybody in the studio audience hopes for: "Come on down." "It was a ton of fun," he said. It took two days of waiting in line, scrimping on sleep, and wearing a crazy T-shirt to make it as far as he did. His shirt had a picture of toilet paper and the quip "That's how I roll," but Hertzog suspects it was his job that actually caught the attention of Stan Bilts, co-producer and contestant coordinator for "The Price Is Right." Hertzog isn't your dime-a-dozen office worker. He's a Minor League Baseball umpire working this season in the California League, a Class A Advanced league two levels above the short-season Northwest League that includes the Everett AquaSox. That's what Hertzog is doing in Lancaster, Calif., where the Lancaster JetHawks are a Class A affiliate of the Boston Red Sox. Free tickets to "The Price Is Right," which is taped in Los Angeles, are available online at www.cbs.com/daytime/the_price_is_right. A ticket, though, doesn't guarantee getting into the studio audience. Hertzog endured two early mornings of waiting in line with tickets, and getting the required arrival numbers and priority numbers. At last, he got in for a quick interview. "The guy Stan does all the interviews, he interviews about 600 people a day. He knows what the show needs. He asked where I was from and what I do," he said. "Being a Minor League umpire is kind of a cool job." Comedian Carey became host of the show in 2007, filling Bob Barker's big shoes. Barker spent 35 years calling contestants to "Come on down." Way back when, in the black-and-white TV era of my childhood, it was host Bill Cullen who granted mostly female contestants their dream prizes, new refrigerators and washing machines. Now, sure there are dinette sets, but winners might also find themselves with a sailboat or a trip to Argentina. Hertzog said Carey cracked jokes about umpires, razzing him about how much they make in the major leagues. "He said, 'You'd think they'd get more calls right,' " said Hertzog. "It's a lot harder in real time. It's pretty easy to do when you see it in slow motion five times," Hertzog added. When it's not baseball season, Hertzog is a FedEx driver. He went to Shoreline Christian School and lived in Kenmore with his wife, Bonnie, before the couple bought a house recently in Everett. It was Hertzog's 25-year-old brother Michael, of Seattle, who talked him into giving "The Price Is Right" a try. "It was carefully planned by my little brother," he said. Staying at Lake Elsinore, Calif., the brothers and their wives got up at 3 a.m. to make it to the game show line. After not getting on the first day, they stayed up late that night at a Los Angeles Dodgers game. When the alarm went off at 3 a.m. the second day, Hertzog said he told his brother, "You're the ringleader. If you go back to bed, we'll all follow you." His brother, though, insisted it was a chance of a lifetime. "I'm glad we did it," said Hertzog, who barely made it on time to his baseball job the day of the show. When we talked Monday, he hadn't seen the episode. He wondered if his surprise will show. A woman called down before him had a name similar to his. Hearing that, Hertzog said, he started to get up. When his own name was called at last, "my brother jumped up so fast, probably the camera will go to him," Hertzog said. When you're up there guessing prices, there's no time to think. "You're up there, it's lightning fast," he said. "It was such a blur, I really want to see my face." Columnist Julie Muhlstein: 425-339-3460 or muhlstein@heraldnet.com.

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