Author: lleonardbw

Oakland A’s podcast commentary with Charlie O: A’s take game two to even series; Billy Burns helps out with .357 avg

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by Charlie O Mallonee

The Oakland A’s beat the Minnesota Twins at Target Field on and Tuesday was Cinco Demayo so they can celebrate the 2-1 win on Tuesday night. The A’s can say that evens this series up at 1-1. This being a four game series what your really trying to do is come out with a 2-2 split. The worse case scenario is get swept which won’t happen now and the worst that can happen is they could come out with one win and three loses.

The A’s have positioned themselves quite well going up against the Twins. The good news tonight is the starting pitching stayed strong starter Jesse Chavez pitched 7.1 innings and gave up four hits and gave up one run and that was not earned. He struck out seven and he won. Reliever Evan Scribner came on in relief and faced one batter and gave up a hit.

Manager Bob Melvin said “we got to get somebody else to pitch” and Tyler Clippard came in and worked 1.2 innings and with zeros across except for two strikeouts. So that’s good news for the A’s whose relief pitching has really been in question. That is something they really can hang their hats on having Clippard come through.

On the offense tonight Billy Burns whose just been tearing it up came into tonight’s game 5-14 at the plate. Burns has a three game hitting streak which now is a four game hitting streak going 2-5 tonight and raised his batting average to .357. Unfortunately Josh Reddick wore the collar tonight he went 0-4. However Billy Butler got back on track, Butler had been struggling and he went 2-4 tonight.

Notes: Coco Crisp is going to rejoin the team Coco tweeted out on his own twitter page that he was ready to go. He played a couple of games in Stockton over the weekend. The right elbow looks like it’s healed and is ready to go and they brought him back to Oakland to check in with the medical staff. The plan is for Crisp to be with the team on Wednesday in Minnesota.

Charlie O does A’s commentary each week for http://www.sportsradioservice.com listen to the podcast below

Manny Pacquiao (podcast) being sued by boxing fans; injured boxer presented was a bill of goods

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by Jeremy Harness

Two boxing fans Stephanie Vanel and Kami Rahbaran have filed a lawsuit on behalf of boxing fans who had paid $100 for pay per view last Saturday. They say that fight fans were duped when they learned after the bout that boxer Manny Pacquiao fought with a torn rotator cuff which needs surgery and would leave the boxer out of the ring for at least nine to 12 months.

The lawsuit seeks $5 million for fraud and fraudulent concealment, Vanel and Rahbaran who are leading the charge for pay per view customers who paid the $100 per household or business establishments to see the fight live. Vanel and Rahbaran say that they were misled to believe that Pacquiao was good to go only to find out later that he had an injured shoulder and needs shoulder surgery.

The Pacquiao team contends that when Pacquiao filled out the Nevada State Athletic Commission form regarding any existing injuries that Pacquiao let the Commission know about the injuries. However in the check marked boxes on the form he did not check off shoulder, hand, or elbow damage. Pacquiao also requested an anti inflammatory shot prior to the fight but was denied the injection by the Boxing Commission because he did not indicate the injury to them.

Pacquiao lost the fight on Saturday due to a unanimous decision and that Pacquiao’s punch count was down due to the shoulder injury. Watching the fight it didn’t seem Pacquiao was in any pain and no one commented on anything about an injury or any disabilities the fighter might have had during the match.

Floyd Mayweather said for good measure that he fought hurt too, “If (Pacquiao) had come out victorious, the only thing that I could have got up here and said was,’I have to show respect and say he was the better man. Both my arms were injured, both my hands were injured, but as I said before, I always find a way to win.”

Jeremy Harness did commentary during the Pacquiao-Mayweather bout last weekend at http://www.sportsradioservice.com

That’s Amaury’s News and Commentary: Curry the man, the superstar, and the MVP

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CURRY

by Amaury Pi Gonzalez

ANAHIEM–It’s big huge day for the Golden State Warriors Stephen Curry who was awarded the NBA MVP for 2014-15, anybody who follows the NBA this was not a surprise he’s by far the most valuable player in the league or on the Warriors. There was no way they were going to win without him, these days you don’t have dominant teams in the NBA. I’m here in L.A. with the Angels and we talked the other day in the L.A. area in the beginning of the season you could buy tickets for the Lakers because they were always in the playoffs with Shaq and Kobe way back in the day.

The Warriors are living in their best days now, they could very well win it this year. If they win it one of the main reasons will be the MVP. I know that LeBron is the most popular guy in the NBA and there are some other stars. This season there is any doubt that Curry is the most valuable player in the NBA. This is very good news for the Warriors and Bay Area fans.

The chances of the Warriors going all the way with Curry that’s paramount with Curry’s talent, the team believes in him he’s a leader on the court and he’s the man. That means the Warriors are the favorite to win this thing and they might very well sweep the Memphis Grizzlies in this round of the playoffs. There the team that could go all the way.

They play Memphis for game two on Tuesday and San Antonio as you know are out but you never know in the playoffs weird things happen in the playoffs. If logic prevails Curry could be the first guy since the 1974-75 Warriors who beat the Washington Bullets to win a championship. Curry being the MVP makes the Warriors in the eyes of the national media the favorites to win it all.

Curry gets on the front page of the paper almost every other day and his night in and night out performance is the mark of what a superstar does. I would say it’s nice to see a guy on the field who hits his shots consistently, a guy on the court dunking or throwing for three point baskets. In the end you have to be a good ambassador for the game.

The fans in San Francisco saw one of those ambassador type guys Sunday at AT&T Park when the Giants were hosting the Angels. A little Giants fan got hit with a foul ball. First aid came over and wasn’t sure how good she was doing and what happened the Angels Mike Trout the A.L. MVP speaking about MVPs came out and gave her a baseball bat and gave her a ball this is what being a superstar is all about.

Amaury Pi Gonzalez is the TV Spanish voice for the Angels, the radio Spanish voice for the A’s, the former Warriors Spanish radio voice, and does News and Commentary each week at http://www.sportsradioservice.com listen to Amaury’s podcast below

Cal Bears basketball podcast with Morris Phillips: Off season signings of Rabb and now Brown moves Bears status upwards

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by Morris Phillips

BERKELEY–Cal Berkeley last week became the only school in America to pull off signing two top ten prospects this year Ivan Rabb and Jaylen Brown both ranked in the top ten. They had an opportunity to go to Duke, North Carolina, Michigan, Arizona you name it they beat all those schools in terms of number one recruits.

They also beat all these schools for these two guys and the recruitment of Brown started six weeks ago he made an unofficial trip to Cal and he has the relationship with Rabb as they played against each other in USA Basketball. Once again you can minimize the acumen of head coach Cuonzo Martin and his staff in terms of recruiting.

So to put it in context this is considered to be the best recruiting hall and class that Cal has ever had and that includes football as well as basketball. When you think of all the professional athletes over the years that have come through the university you would have to put Jason Kidd right at the top of that list and the recruiting class that he came in with.

Any recruiting before that by the Bears has been surpassed by this class this off season, Cal basketball looks like it’s going to be a top 15 team this year. Your going to see a lot of NBA scouts around this year and Cal is going to see which one of them is going to imerge into the next NBA prospects. These kids that are highly rated prospects they get some much highly rated exposure in terms of playing.

Not only the relationship between Brown and Rabb, Brown from Georgia and Rabb from Oakland their high schools played each other this year in a big tournament. Anybody whose seen Rabb’s old school Bishop O’Dowd’s schedule from last season and what they did was just incredible. They slewed everyone and they did that everywhere they played.

Rabb and his school last season got on ESPN and had such tremendous exposure and that was just during the high school year. In the summer there’s a lot of tournaments and that’s how they create these lists of the top prospects. It’s because these athletes get to compete against each other in so many different forms. So when you see a list of high school players who are in the top ten or the top 15 the list is real thought out based on the competition.

Morris Phillips covers Cal basketball for http://www.sportsradioservice.com listen to the podcast below

Floyd Mayweather’s publicity agent says Rachel Nichols (CNN) & Michelle Beadle (HBO) were not banned from covering fight

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by Jeremy Harness

Floyd Mayweather won the fight but it is publicity team that is in turmoil. The Mayweather camp insisted they credentialed two members of the media CNN’s Rachel Nichols and HBO’s Michelle D Beadle who say they were not allowed access to cover the Mayweather-Manny Pacquiao fight on Saturday night. Nichols who interviewed Mayweather back in 2014 before a match asked Mayweather several serious questions regarding domestic violence.

In the interview Nichols asked Mayweather about dragging his spouse by the hair and hitting her in the head several times and he had threatened to kill his three kids one of his kids ended up calling the police. Mayweather plea bargained over the incident and was sentenced to two months in jail. Mayweather’s reponse to Nichol’s question about his past history of domestic violence was, “everything has been allegations nothing has been proven so that’s life.”

Sources say that Mayweather didn’t appreciate the kind of questioning that Nichols posed in the interview and that she was told by Mayweather’s team that she would not be credentialed for last Saturday’s fight. Mayweather’s publicity manager Kelly Swanson responded by tweeting, “no one including ME banned @Rachel_Nichols from covering the fight. She is already credentialed”

The popular CNN sports correspondent referred to her 2014 interview with Mayweather for the reason for her not getting access to cover the fight on Saturday, “after asking tough questions of Floyd Mayweather on my program I was not offered press credentials to cover tonight’s fight.” Nichols said that she received documentation dated April 23rd from Mayweather’s team that she would have access for events that led up to the fight but received a note in bold italic letters saying “you do not have any access Saturday to any services or events.”

A CNN producer tried to negotiate access for Nichols but was told that Nichols would be denied access into the MGM Grand in Las Vegas on the night of the fight. Nichols thoughout the week of the fight was free to access the weigh in and work outs and interview Mayweather or Pacquiao but was not allowed in for fight night.

After much publicity over Nichols interview with Mayweather as a reason for her not gaining access the Mayweather camp felt the pressure from the media to relent and allow Nichols and Beadle credentials, “it doesn’t surprise me now, after facing significant backlash the Mayweather camp has reversed it’s position.” said Nichols.

Beadle who did a program on domestic violence and mentioned Mayweather’s experiences with domestic violence at HBO was also banned but Swanson tweeted Beadle too had access for the fight on Saturday, “And @MichelleDBeadle isn’t even on the press list. She’s credentialed though @HBOboxing” tweeted Swanson.

Sports Illustrated later tweeted that the most recent seating chart just before the fight did not show either Beadle or Nichols access to the MGM Grand further Beadle and Nichols had left Las Vegas before the fight since they were not given access. Beadle was notified that she later was given access but said she was not going to fly back to Vegas to work the fight.

Jeremy Harness did commentary on the Mayweather-Pacquiao fight this weekend for http://www.sportsradioservice.com

Mayweather-Pacquiao podcast with Jeremy Harness: The most anticipated fight of all time has now arrived

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by Jeremy Harness

Floyd Mayweather comes into the ring tonight with a record of 47-0 and Manny Pacquiao has a 57-5-2 record so just based on the record Mayweather would obviously have the advantage. This fight should have happened three years ago when both fighters were closer to their prime. Mayweather who is undefeated is past his prime himself. At this point in professional boxing there is no one that can beat him.

Manny Pacquiao is known for his great offensive fight skills and his combination of punches which should give Mayweather a good run for his money. Mayweather is strictly a defensive fighter and he’s a very good defensive fighter he has to be the best of all time and Mayweather is arguably the best fighter of all time.

At the same time Mayweather has had problems with his hands with hand injuries and things of that nature. He used to be a very good offensive fighter but not anymore. Based on the level of skill I would pick Mayweather in this fight by a decision. Pacquiao knows some of Mayweather’s weaknesses and Pacquiao will end up throwing a lot of punches.

This is not to say that Pacquiao doesn’t play any defense but he will be on offense for this fight most of the time. It’s going to be a fight where Mayweather has to throw back. Pacquiao will come in with an offensive game plan and look for Mayweather to pick his spots. In this fight look for Mayweather to play defense.

Mayweather is going to try and frustrate Pacquiao by using any defensive tactic that he can. Mayweather can play rope a dope and he will try to frustrate Pacquiao in anyway that he can. Pacquiao doesn’t get frustrated very often, Pacquiao has had trouble against crafty boxers, Pacquiao has suffered a knock loss a couple of years back.

Juan Manuel Marquez has a little more punching power than Mayweather does and Marquez has a good chance of beating Mayweather if and when they book a future fight. At this point Mayweather isn’t going to be knocking anybody out soon Pacquiao doesn’t have to worry about that. This fight has got a lot of hype and it’s right up there with the top matches of all time, Ali-Frazier I, Leonard-Hearns, and Louis and Schmeling.

Jeremy Harness covers boxing for http://www.sportsradioservice.com and is doing commentary for the Mayweather-Pacquiao fight, Radio correspondent Eric He will be filing a story covering the fight. Listen to J’s podcast below.

Golden State Warriors podcast with David Zizmor: Warriors fans play huge role as the sixth man taking opponents out of their game

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by David Zizmor

OAKLAND–As we all know the Warriors had a historic season at home they were 39-2 in the regular season which ties for the best third best home record in NBA history. Then they added a couple more during the playoffs and make that 43-2 when you add in the first round of the playoffs. The Warriors will start this second round at Oracle on Sunday afternoon against Memphis Grizzlies.

So everything at Oracle has an impact on every game the fans are behind the W’s they are loud, their attentive, their knowledgeable, they know the exact spots to cheer. They know the exact spots to cheer when the things get a little bit rough which fortunately for the Warriors hasn’t been that often. When it happens the fans know when to pull it off.

This is the perfect case of home cooking all these the Warriors fans have struggled and the fans have been with them through all these struggles for 20 plus years the home fans have still come out. It’s always kind of amazing considering how bad the Warriors have been all these years during that time frame. The Warrior fans still came out and were still supportive and even in those lousy years the Warriors were always significantly lousy at home than on the road.

Now that their good their being rewarded and the fans are responding in kind and their every bit as awesome even like they were in the lean years. That enthusiasm is really paying off and it kind of rattles the opposing teams. Maybe it’s during free throws or any kind of noise that’s drowning out any signals that their trying to give to each other.

The fans give the Warriors as much support to show their behind them and the Warriors seem to thrive on it. There is no time that is better than when Clay Thompson or Steph Curry are in one of their historic scoring runs hitting threes. The crowd really responds to that, when Thompson scored 37 points in that one regular season game against Sacramento the fans went into an absolute frenzy.

David Zizmor does weekly Warriors commentary during the NBA Playoffs listen to the podcast below

Artist rendition of New Golden State Warriors Arena

That’s Amaury’s News, Commentary and Podcast: Willie Brown didn’t want political conflicts with SF Chronicle over Mission Bay Alliance

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by Amaury Pi Gonzalez and Jeff Hall

SAN FRANCISCO–Former San Francisco Mayor Willie Brown’s short commitment with the Golden State Warriors anti arena group Mission Bay Alliance was short lived primarily because of his commitment at the San Francisco Chronicle as a weekly columnist. Brown made it clear that he was not against the Warriors new arena at Mission Bay but wanted the Warriors to make some adjustments regarding the two towers and the arena itself.

Brown wanted to keep peace with the Chronicle where he does his “Willie’s World” column each week in the Sunday paper. Sources have said that Brown only wanted to be involved in the Alliance so that he could be a face to the movement and maybe the Alliance can get the Warriors to pay to get the Alliance out of the way. No one will ever know now as Brown has withdrawn his support.

The Mission Bay Alliance are not ruling out trying to stop the two towers that the Warriors want to build with the new arena and they have been considering getting an initiative on the ballot that would be in front of the San Francisco voters about environmental and parking issues regarding the Warriors new arena. Plus how an arena event during a Giants game would impede traffic for emergency vehicles from getting to nearby UCSF Hospital.

The Warriors if an initiative comes to fruition if the measure gets on the ballot there might be that wild card chance that the voters could vote down the Warriors new arena. San Francisco Mayor Ed Lee says that the voters, the waterfront neighborhood, UCSF, and City Hall are on board to get a new arena started. The Alliance have said environmental legalities could stop ground breaking at Mission Bay and delay the project up to year.

The other concern is that the neighborhood which they were concerned with development in the past voting down the 8 Washington condos and nearly putting an initiative on the ballot to stop a Warriors arena at Piers 30-32 until the Warriors thought the better of it and withdrew and later and bought the Mission Bay site for the arena from Salesforce. The neighborhood after the Mission Bay idea came up was behind the effort but sources say that there has been a split about development issues concerning traffic and emergency vehicle access for UCSF during arena events amongst the waterfront neighborhood.

The neighborhood could be concerned about the view, when Amaury first moved to San Francisco along time ago you bought an apartment in the City and one side of the building was facing the street and was $500 a month and the other side looking onto the bay was $700 an extra $200 for the view. That’s the beauty of San Francisco it’s a beautiful place to live and nobody argues that but there will be opposition to the new arena.

Amaury Pi Gonzalez is the Spanish TV voice for the Angels and the Spanish radio voice for the A’s; Jeff Hall is a Sacramento Kings beat writer both doing a podcast (below) on That’s Amaury’s News and Commentary

NHL Stanley Cup playoffs podcast with Joe Lami: Caps get 1.3 sec winner from Ovechikin to take game one; Ducks crash the nets on Flames

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by Joe Lami

NY Rangers vs. Washington: Game one was an absolute great game it came right down to the end of the wire as Washington won the game with 1.3 seconds left it was a great little pass from behind the net from Alexander Ovechkin passing it to Joel Ward for the buzzer beater. The Rangers Dan Boyle was hit by the Caps Nicklas Backstrom getting a concussion. Boyle has had concussions in the past as Boyle was slow to get up on that one.Hopefully Boyle is okay as the Caps were able to lock away a 2-1 victory going away in the final seconds.

Anaheim vs. Calgary: Game one with the Anaheim Ducks dominating with eight days of rest, the Calgary Flames had four days of rest. The fact of the matter is Anaheim is expected to win this series and their a lot better team than Calgary. Unfortunately for the Flames this looks like this is where the season will come to end. The Ducks are very good the Flames have had trouble at the Honda Center in the past.

The Flames last win in Anaheim was in 2004 and it’s a tough building to play in and its proving itself again on Thursday night. The Ducks are just obliterated the Flames and the Flames look like their lost in their own end.

Montreal vs. Tampa Bay: This is going to be a great series which gets underway on Friday night at the Bell Centre in Montreal. The series between the Lighting and the Detroit Red Wings in round one was a great series and it came down to the final game in Tampa and the Lighting had to take two third period goals to get by the Wings in game seven to win the series and win the game 2-0.

For the Canadiens they have the best goalie in hockey with Carrey Price, Price has had a phenomenal season he’s the best goalie by far in the NHL. Price had a good first round against Ottawa as Montreal won in six games. The Canadiens will win this series, it will probably go to six games. Tampa Bay might be a little slow footed to begin the series as the series starts Friday night and the Lighting have only a couple days rest before they get back into it.

Chicago vs. Minnesota: The Minnesota Wild who took out the St.Louis Blues in the first round the struggles continue for the Blues. They continued not to be able to get past the first round and it looks like the Blues are going to fire their coach Ken Hitchcock because of it. This bracket of the playoffs was the toughest because I predicted the Blues would beat the Wild in the first round.

In Western Conference side this series should be the best one with the Blackhawks and Wild, just because the Ducks should blow out the Flames. The Rangers and Caps it should be the Rangers in that one. The Wild are riding a hot goalie Devan Dubnyk and it’s entirely possible that a fourth seed team the Wild can get past Chicago.

Joe Lami is covering the NHL Stanley Cup playoffs each week for http://www.sportsradioservice.com listen to the podcast below.

That’s Amaury’s News and Commentary: Can an anti arena alliance put a halt to Warriors new arena?

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by Amaury Pi Gonzalez and Jerry Feitelberg

OAKLAND–Anti arena opponents Mission Bay Alliance is gearing up to stop two towers from being built at the UCSF location where the Golden State Warriors intend to build their new arena. The Warriors with the new arena plan to include the two towers the Alliance are considering putting a measure on the ballot blocking the Warriors from starting construction.

The opposition bill would be similar to that of the “No Wall on the Waterfront” campaign that stopped the 8 Washington condo plan. A ballot proposal would delay the W’s ground breaking which is planned for next year and could be pushed back until the election is decided on the arena project.

I remember the Oakland A’s trying to move to Fremont and there was opposition in stopping the A’s from moving there. Fremont had 210,000 living there. The space is there for the A’s, the stadium was supposed to be built on the west side of Fremont and BART doesn’t go to that location. The infrastructure is there but my point is there is always going to opposition.

Eventually the Warriors will end up playing in San Francisco, it might take awhile we’ll see what happens. When the Warriors wanted to build on Piers 30-32 there was significant opposition in the waterfront neighborhood because it was going to block the view of the Embarcadero. Mission Bay is the second choice for the Warriors to build in the City to find a site right near UCSF.

Their also building the street car line from Union Square to Mission Bay which is being added onto the existing transportation. They’ll have public transportation BART, Muni and light rail. The big problem that the arena project is going to face is parking because when they had the preliminary meetings on the structure they would have only 750 parking spots at the arena that would house the parking which inadequate for 18,000 people.

Using AT&T Park for example it’s an open air stadium with a beautiful view of the bay, when you build a basketball arena it’s indoors so there is going to be opposition because it’s indoor. I don’t remember much opposition to AT&T Park and we remember how many times the people of San Francisco voted on a new downtown stadium for the Giants and it was voted down.

Amaury Pi Gonzalez and Jerry Feitelberg talk about the opposition to the new Warriors arena on tonight’s podcast at http://www.sportsradioservice.com