Rex Hunt

Rex Hunt
Personal information
Full name	Rex Hunt
Original team(s)	Parkdale
Position(s)	Full-forward / Centre Half Back
Club information
Current club	Retired
Number	Rich. 43, Geel. 5, StK. 2
Career highlights
Richmond premiership side 1969 Richmond premiership side 1973
Sources: AFL Tables, AustralianFootball.com

for the British diplomat see Rex Hunt (governor)

Rex James Hunt (born 7 March 1949), is an Australian television and radio personality featured on his own fishing and wildlife programme on the Seven Network. He is also a former Australian rules football player, commentator and police officer. Hunt previously owned a restaurant, the D'lish Fish located in Port Melbourne. In recent times he has been in the media in relation to a range of incidents involving violent behaviour and a sex scandal.

Football career

Hunt, recruited from Parkdale, made his debut with Richmond in the then-Victorian Football League in 1968 . He was a key position player who was used usually at full-forward or centre half-forward, but later played at centre half-back. He was part of Richmond premiership sides in 1969 and 1973 . In the middle of 1974, Hunt moved to the Geelong Football Club due to his job as a policeman. The big strong forward played at Geelong from 1974–1975 playing only 32 games for the club, before moving back to the city and playing with St Kilda. He retired from VFL football at the end of 1978, but continued to play in the lower-level VFA in 1980 and 1981, with Sandringham.

Commentary career

After his retirement Hunt became a popular football commentator for 3AW, helping them surge up the ratings. He also hosted Sunday morning panel shows on the Seven Network, the Sportsworld Footy Panel and I'm Rex Hunt and You're Not. Early in the 2007 season, Rex celebrated his 1500th game as a commentator of VFL/AFL games.

Nicknames

See also List of nicknames used in Australian rules.

He is best known for his commentary on 3AW and has a penchant for making up nicknames for players such as 'Ot 'n' Sticky for Geelong footballer Brad Ottens; Yellow Brick Croad for Hawthorn footballer Trent Croad; "Oysters Kilpatrick" for Geelong footballer Glenn Kilpatrick; "Special Fried Rice" for ex-Carlton footballer Dean Rice; "The Mediator" for Kangaroos footballer Troy Makepeace; "Heavy Overnight Dew" for Hawthorn footballer Stuart Dew; "Horney Torney" for Richmond and Adelaide footballer Jason Torney; "Awesome Wells" for Kangaroos player Daniel Wells;"Hooligan" for Blues player Ryan Houlihan;Thomas the Tank for Collingwood player Dale Thomas; Yaaaablett!! for Geelong star Gary Ablett. He is also known for his fat lady sings impression and the build up that surrounds it when he (she) bellows out a tune declaring the match over.

Fishing journalistic career

In 1981 Hunt was giving regular radio fishing reports and had made two videos on the subject. His first television fishing show was Angling Action on the Ten Network. Two series of 13 episodes were made and were shown in 1981 and 1982 respectively. His 3DB radio fishing show began in 1982. Throughout the 1980s, Hunt continued to write for a number of newspapers and magazines. In 1991 a series of Rex Hunt's Fishing World was made and broadcast in Victoria on Channel Seven. A new and longer series of the show went national as Rex Hunt's Fishing Australia the following year. In 1992, the name changed again to Rex Hunt's Fishing Adventures, which remained on air until 2004.

Rex's two most famous catchphrases from these shows were 'Folks, it doesn't get any better than this!' as he reeled in a huge fish from the waters of one of Australia's most beautiful natural areas, and at the end of each episode, "It's yibbida-yibbida time!", a parody of Warner Brothers' cartoon character Porky Pig saying "Be-bidda be-bidda be-bidda be... That's all, folks."

Controversies

Airline incident

In May 2004, Hunt made a curious attempt to make a statement about airline security, which has been markedly increased in Australia after terrorist threats. Hunt was agitated at having to remove his pants and footwear after setting off a metal detector. He then took ten metal forks from the Qantas Club and took them on board a Qantas flight from Adelaide headed for Melbourne in an attempt to prove that airport security was totally flawed. A concerned passenger who did not recognise Hunt alerted the flight crew and he was detained on arrival in Melbourne, where he was questioned for approximately 30 minutes and let go without any charges filed against him.

Byron Bay fight

In 2005, Hunt and his son were involved in an incident in Byron Bay where he claimed to have been attacked by local teenagers. The teenagers involved, however, claim Hunt was extremely intoxicated at the time and his son had thrown the first punch.

Sex scandal

On 17 May 2006 News Ltd exposed Hunt's 15 years of secret sexual liaisons. When confronted Hunt confessed he had paid three women in succession for ongoing sexual relationships over a period of more than 15 years. The final relationship, with a beautician in her 30s, began in 1997 and cost Hunt $1000 a week. Hunt acknowledged he is a hypocrite given his repeated attacks on other media personalities for sexual infidelity. Hunt followed this by an interview with radio broadcaster Neil Mitchell on Melbourne radio 3AW. A quote from Rex Hunt's radio comments,

That's what a fool does. I'm invincible, I'm paying money ... uh ... The girl's happy, she's got no money, I got my rocks off. How good is this?

has gained its own notoriety when being featured repeatedly on national Triple M radio program Get This hosted by Tony Martin, Ed Kavalee and Richard Marsland. Robyn Hood, 40, one of the three women subsequently sold her story to New Idea magazine. Robyn was quoted as saying:

Rex was never unfaithful to Lynne. "We never had sex... he was affectionate, very touchy-feely... then he'd either, in the car or out of it, depending on how cold it was, fling off all his clothes. The more public, the greater the danger and the more exciting Rex apparently found it.

Rex Hunt's wife of thirty four years, Lynne, said she would stand by Hunt and also revealed she suffers from bipolar disorder, which had placed pressure on the couple's relationship.

Road rage incident

Hunt has been charged with assault over allegations he bashed a cyclist in a Melbourne road rage attack.

Personal life

Rex is married to wife Lynne and has one son, Matthew, and one daughter, Rachel.

External links

• Official site
• Rex Hunt at IMDb