Barry Tompkins- Boxing HOF Commentator, Sportscaster, 4x Emmy Award Winner

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We go back to the early days of Barry’s life and what his first
aspirations were in life. A fun little conversation about his
brief stop at a City College and the why his GPA was good
considering….. well, you will find out. In high school he and
some friends formed a music group and toured a bit with a stop at
The Apollo in New York!


Career begin in advertising briefly before being named the
promotion director at KCBS, the breaks he got form the right
people at the right time which eventually led him to KPIX and in
front of the camera for the very first time at a big time network
at the time. 


Barry begin his broadcast career in TV in 1968 and his boxing
career in 1976 as he called the gold medal matches for
boxing and field hockey in the 76’ Olympics. His first tennis
broadcast was no other than Wimbledon and even did the 1978 Rose
Bowl! After being in NY and back to SF we talk about the days at
HBO and boxing. His famous fights he called that leads to a
great, rare story about the Marvin Hagler v Sugar Ray Leonard
MegaFight. You want to hear this!


Barry tells how he landed the role for Rocky IV, what that was
like, a behind the scenes story, the money he received for the
doing the movie and the checks that showed up later and still do.
Great stuff here. We discuss the hall of fames he is in that
includes the International Boxing HOF, his top memories that
includes a wonderful insight into the friendship with Arthur Ashe
and what lies ahead for Barry. This is a fantastic podcast!


 


Links:


Follow Barry on Twitter: https://twitter.com/barry_tompkins


Barry Tompkins Official Website: http://www.barrytompkins.com/


Video of Barry – Rocky IV:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-21i-OKCGYY


Leonard v Hagler Video of Fight:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zH1U1jC0Lgc


 


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Extra 5:


What is Barry’s favorite sport to cover? Boxing? Hmmm


Talks about writing a humor column for Marian Independent Journal
(Bay Area) for 16 years


Is there a book n the horizon?


Doing a live broadcast in all 50 states and which was the last
one


How he met his wife Joan Ryan who is an author and has new book
called Intangibles


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