by Amaury Pi Gonzalez

OAKLAND–The current NBA champions are enjoying their most success in their franchise history, as an unbeatable team breaking records, but even when they were not winning the
Golden State Warriors enjoyed the loyalty rarely seen for a
professional team in the Bay Area. The first pro team I
covered in the Bay Area where the Warriors  It was
in 1970 and they were playing at the Cow Palace in Daly
City, they were the San Francisco Warriors, later they moved
to Oakland and played at the Oakland Arena today
Oracle Arena and changed their name to Golden State
Warriors, Franklin Mieuli was their majority owner, Mieuli
a prominent Bay Area sports figure who also had a
stake of the San Francisco 49ers, was an eccentric but
gentle man who enjoyed sports to its fullest, and
was always at the arena cheering the Warriors. Hal
Childs was their Media Director and even then the Warriors
were a hot ticket getting loyal support from all over the
Bay Area. In those days I used to write for El Mundo
News, a bilingual weekly published in Oakland by
the Post News Group.

During the 1970’s when the Warriors won their first
NBA title 1974-75 the Bay Area success scene was all
happening in the East Bay, where the other team winning
championships. The Oakland Raiders, who also had a loyal
following, “cult like”to the present days, but the
Warriors enjoyed the strongest support. Also in the 70’s
the Oakland Athletics were winning World Series,

three-in-a-row, 1972-73-74, so yes, Oakland was
then appropriately named City of Champions.
Generations have passed and things shifted to the west side
of the bay, where the San Francisco 49ers were winning
Superbowls in the 1980’s, with the Bill Walsh teams, but
prior to that the 49ers were not really that hot of a
ticket. As a matter-of-fact, I remember doing an interview

for KIQI 1010AM radio back in 1980 with a young quarterback
fresh out of Notre Dame  who just turned professional
by the name of Joe Montana. The Bill Walsh era ushered in
and the 49ers were winning big time. Last Sunday at Levi
Stadium in San José, half of the stadium was empty to see
the 49ers end the month of November with a 3-8 record. The
years prior to the Joe Montana teams, it was even hard to
give away 49ers tickets for free on the radio.

In the 1990’s I had the good fortune of working for
the Warriors  as play by play(Spanish radio)under their
great Broadcast Director David McGahey(RIP)one of the best I
had the honor to work under, a man who knew and understood
the Bay Area media market, and truly enjoyed basketball. He
was always in tune with the marketing and broadcasting sides
of things and sent me to Secaucus, New Jersey(just minutes
from NYC)to an NBA Media Convention. The Warriors were a
very exciting team in the 1990’s with the likes of Chris
Mullin and they played during a time were many (to this
day)believe was when he NBA peaked with their best teams and
players, Bulls,Celtics, Jordan,Byrd,guys like Barkley,
K.Malone. The Dream Team (1992)was the first time active NBA
players represented the USA in the Olympics, their
coach was Chuck Daly and among the assistant coaches was P.J
Carlesimo, who later became head coach of the
Warriors. I always like Carlesimo for his great
enthusiasms for the game and traveled with him and
his Warriors teams during many games Warriors fans, San Francisco Warriors, or the current generation of Golden State Warriors fans has been as loyal
as any others in this Bay Area. Anybody that has followed
sports in this part of the country can agree with that.
When the team moves to San Francisco, they will more than
likely go back to their original name when they first moved to the west coast theSan Francisco Warriors, and there is no reason to believe that their fan loyalty would waiver. I can
only hear the great Bill King best professional sports
announcer in Bay Area history and once the voice of the
Warriors, and a man I truly enjoyed talking with ,
be with the nWarriors or with Athletics, saying from
heaven “Holy Toledo”!

Amaury Pi Gonzalez was the Warriors Spanish play by play announcer and does News and Commentary each week at http://www.sportsradioservice.com