Tag: 1010 KIQI San Francisco

That’s Amaury News and Commentary: A’s 2025 – Sacramento Twice as Hispanic as Oakland

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Sacramento radio station 990 KATD in Pittsburg has a signal that covers the greater Sacramento area one of the most powerful AM signals in Sacramento (image from 1010 KIQI San Francisco/990 KATD Pittsburg Multi Cultural Broadcasting)

A’s 2025: Sacramento Twice as Hispanic as Oakland

That’s Amaury News and Commentary

By Amaury Pi-González

Recent data shows Sacramento’s Hispanic population grew by 22 percent during the past two years. Approximately 378,000 Hispanics live in Sacramento; one of four in the State’s Capital are Hispanics. The area surrounding Sacramento is also rich in Hispanic culture.

In Stockton (just 48 miles from Sacramento), 43.13% of the total population is Hispanic, or about 150,000 people. Between these two historic cities, there are over 528,000 Hispanics.

A recent Census showed that Oakland lists 141,623 Hispanics. Hispanics are over-represented in the Sacramento, California area’s farming, fishing, and forestry industries; Stanislaus County, in particular, has a family farm that grows traditional Mexican food staples.

California leads the way, followed by Texas and Florida, with the largest Hispanic populations in the United States. These states have a significant impact on the nation’s demographics. As of July 1, 2023, the Hispanic population in the United States was 65.3 million, 19.5%.

This makes Hispanics the most significant racial or ethnic minority in the country. México is the only country in the world with more Spanish-speaking people than the United States of America.

According to Forbes, the Hispanic media market in the United States is large and growing, with a high rate of digital video penetration. Hispanics are the largest minority group in the US, and their buying power is in the trillions of dollars.

This past season, 2025 (the last one for the A’s at Oakland), a young bilingual family was given a tour of the Press Box at the Coliseum. One of the people visiting our A’s Spanish Broadcast booth noticed a decal on the door that read KIQI 1010AM San Francisco/ KATD 990AM Sacramento and said something to the fact, “You guys are ready for Sacramento, I see.”

Not really; these Multicultural Radio stations have been the Spanish radio station(s)for the Oakland A’s for years; they did not make this decal because they announced they were moving to Sacramento. I thought this was a good story since the KATD signal in Sacramento is intense and covers the Sacramento Valley and beyond, while the KIQI signal is based in San Francisco and covers the Bay Area.

In this social media world of Sports, Spanish is heard not only on AM/FM radio but anywhere on the internet; most network shows on television are also available via SAP.

SAP on television stands for “Secondary Audio Programming,” which refers to an additional audio track that can be broadcast alongside the primary audio, often used for alternative language options. Many professional sports teams in MLB, NFL, NBA, NHL, and other leagues take advantage of the SAP Channel, offering Spanish-speaking fans a way to listen in Spanish while they watch the game live.

Many Hispanics are proficient in both English and Spanish. However, Hispanics in the US often prefer to listen to shows in Spanish because it connects them deeply to their culture and heritage, providing a sense of identity and allowing them to engage with content that accurately reflects their lived experiences, including language nuances and cultural references that might be lost in translation to English, for many, Spanish is a way to stay connected to their family origin and traditions, even if they are fluent in English as well.

An Oakland A’s baseball player of the past, non-Hispanic, told me that when they were on the road and when the game was at night, he loved to listen to the Spanish-speaking soap operas in the mornings at the hotel room; he told me he learned some Spanish by doing that.

This past October 12, 2024, yours truly and Carlos Ramírez of COMCAST called the game on Los Tiburones Night in San José via the SAP NBCSCA plus @SharksAudioNet in Spanish. I have participated in this one-game production for the San José Sharks for six years, always on Hispanic Night with the Sharks.

This production has always been professional. The Sharks have shown leadership on this special night. I have received great responses from people who follow the Sharks. Some wanted the schedule for more games in Spanish. And yes, Goal still Gooooooool en Español.

Amaury Pi Gonzalez does News and Commentary podcasts Tuesdays at http://www.sportsradioservice.com

That’s Amaury News and Commentary: End of an Era-I feel I was Evicted

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Oakland A’s Spanish radio announcers left to right Manolo Hernandez-Douen, Jose Orellana (engineer), and Amaury Pi Gonzalez at the last MLB game ever played at the Oakland Coliseum between the Oakland A’s and Texas Rangers on Thu Sep 26, 2024 (photo furnished by the author Amaury Pi Gonzalez)

End of an Era -I feel I was Evicted

That’s Amaury News and Commentary

By Amaury Pi-González

OAKLAND–It ended on a Sunday afternoon in Seattle, the Oakland A’s run since 1968. The Seattle Mariners beat the Oakland A’s (last time we can say Oakland A’s): Seattle 6, Oakland 4. It has been an emotional hangover for most of us who worked at the Oakland-Alameda County Coliseum.

I do feel like I have been “evicted” for no fault of my own, and I know many feel the same way. I have been there from the Charlie O Finley ownership[ days to Joh Fisher’s days}. I met Mr. Finley, but never A’s owner Mr. Fisher.

I started broadcasting Major League Baseball at old Box 19, a broadcast booth at the Oakland Coliseum, in 1978. It has been a long time since then. In 1978, the NY Yankees beat the LA Dodgers in the World Series, and Bucky Dent was the MVP.

The highest-paid player in 1978 was third baseman Mike Schmidt of the Philadelphia Phillies, who earned $560,000.The US turned the Panamá Canal to Panamá. Louise Brown became the first human born from in vitro fertilization, and the average gas price in the United States was .70 cents per gallon.

But back to the Oakland Coliseum. A’s Manager Mark Kotsay and his players were a “class act” playing during a difficult season, not because they were trying not to finish last, they did not. They looked like a team that could be a .500 team starting next season, but because of all the circumstances with the team moving to Las Vegas, with an expected stop in Sacramento.

This time in history is not like it was back in 1978 when everybody got their news from three television Networks and a couple of local stations (no 500-plus cable channels like today). In the Bay Area, the San Francisco Chronicle, San Francisco Examiner, Oakland Tribune, and San José Mercury News were mostly our daily sources of information. That was when people actually read whole newspaper articles, not just a big-fat headline on YouTube.

Today, everybody has a cell phone in their pockets (including the players), and rumors, fake news, and innuendo move faster than the wind at old Candlestick Park in San Francisco during batting practice around 5 PM. As I remember, this includes the games during the Loma Prieta Earthquake in 1989.

I do not have an exact count of the many days, afternoons, and nights that I spend at the Oakland Coliseum, but I have called it “my second home” since the 1970s in the business. I not only called games on the radio but also covered games. In the 1980s, I broadcast games for Telemundo CH 48 San José, which was first a tiny station but is now part of NBC Universal.

No matter how you analyze the Oakland Athletics story, it is sad, and I, for one, feel like I was evicted from the Coliseum.

Adiós al Coliseo y todas las memorias.

Amaury Pi Gonzalez does News and Commentary podcasts Tuesdays at http://www.sportsradioservice.com

Oakland named as one of two expansion sites once A’s leave for Vegas in 2028

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Oakland Mayor Sheng Thao addresses the media during a Wed Feb 15, 2023 press conference at Oakland City Hall. Mayor Thao has said the City of Oakland would consider extending the A’s lease through the 2027 season if the city would retain the A’s name and the city gets an expansion team. (AP photo file)

By Amaury Pi Gonzalez and Jerry Feitelberg

OAKLAND–You might recall Oakland Mayor Sheng Thao said that if Oakland A’s are looking for extending they’re lease between 2025-27 before moving to Las Vegas the city of Oakland wants assurance of an MLB expansion team. According to USA Today reports two high officials in MLB said that Oakland and Nashville have been named as the top two cities for expansion.

The A’s ballpark is expected to be completed at the Tropicana Hotel and Casino on the Las Vegas strip by 2028. The A’s are committed to play at the Oakland Coliseum through the 2024 season. Then after 2024 where do the A’s play? Several sites have been suggested Salt Lake City, Las Vegas Aviators park, Reno, and San Francisco.

Mayor Thao said as long as Oakland is assured an expansion team when the A’s leave in 2028 the city would grant the A’s an extension to play at the Coliseum for an additional three more years until they pack up and leave for Sin City.

With the two high ranking officials saying Oakland is on the list for expansion Thao will most likely extend the A’s lease through the 2027 season. The officials who were not named said the city of Oakland needs to secure an owner who will build a new ballpark most likely at the Howard Terminal location. Mayor Thao would most likely need to identify an owner who will build the new ballpark and take charge of the expansion team to make it happen.

Thao had said that the city in part of extending the Oakland Coliseum lease for the A’s would retain the Oakland A’s name and brand. A’s owner John Fisher had said that the A’s will not relinquish the name when they move to Vegas and intends to keep the A’s brand.

It was also mentioned in the report that the city and the A’s were close to a deal in before the A’s announced they were leaving for Vegas. Thao had said the city and A’s were ten percent of the way to finalizing a deal but the A’s broke off negotiations and said they had a binding deal with the Rio in Las Vegas. The deal at the Rio was later broke off and now the A’s are trying to build at the Tropicana location which the A’s are waiting for MLB owners approval a vote that is expected to take place in December.

Amaury Pi Gonzalez is the lead play by play voice on the Oakland A’s Spanish radio network and Jerry Feitelberg is an Oakland A’s reporter at http://www.sportsradioservice.com