Jose (Pepe) Mantilla is a Mexican sports broadcaster for the Los Angeles Lakers who also used to cover USC Trojans football. [1]
A graduate of UNAM in Mexico City, Mantilla has been a commentator for the Los Angeles Lakers since 1993 which included every year of Kobe Bryant's career. [2] [1] In addition to his work with the Lakers, he has also served as a commentator for a series of soccer games, including the World Cup, [1] NFL games and other events for Fox Sports, while also serving the network as a play-by-play man for MLB broadcasts. He is credited with helping to establish the Lakers' digital marketing to the Hispanic market. [3]
Mantilla was honored in 2017 as a Spanish Language Radio Analyst from the Southern California Sports Broadcasters Hall of Fame and received the National Hispanic Media Coalition Impact Award in 2014. [1] [4]
The Los Angeles Lakers are an American professional basketball team based in Los Angeles. The Lakers compete in the National Basketball Association (NBA) as a member of the Pacific Division of the Western Conference. The Lakers play their home games at Crypto.com Arena, an arena shared with the NBA's Los Angeles Clippers, the Los Angeles Sparks of the Women's National Basketball Association, and the Los Angeles Kings of the National Hockey League. The Lakers are one of the most successful teams in the history of the NBA, with 17 NBA championships, tied with the Boston Celtics for the most in NBA history. The Lakers were the champions of the NBA's inaugural In-Season Tournament in 2023.
Kobe Bean Bryant was an American professional basketball player. A shooting guard, he spent his entire 20-year career with the Los Angeles Lakers in the National Basketball Association (NBA). Widely regarded as one of the greatest players in the history of the sport, Bryant won five NBA championships and was an 18-time All-Star, a 15-time member of the All-NBA Team, a 12-time member of the All-Defensive Team, the 2008 NBA Most Valuable Player (MVP), and a two-time NBA Finals MVP. He also led the NBA in scoring twice and ranks fourth in league all-time regular season and postseason scoring. He was posthumously voted into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame in 2020 and named to the NBA 75th Anniversary Team in 2021.
Crypto.com Arena is a multi-purpose indoor arena in downtown Los Angeles. Opened on October 17, 1999, it is located next to the Los Angeles Convention Center complex along Figueroa Street, and has since been considered a part of L.A. Live. Owned and operated by Anschutz Entertainment Group (AEG), it is currently the home venue of the Los Angeles Lakers of the National Basketball Association (NBA) and Los Angeles Kings of the National Hockey League (NHL)—which are both owned in part by AEG's founder Philip Anschutz, as well as the WNBA's Los Angeles Sparks. The Los Angeles Clippers of the NBA also played in the arena from 1999 to 2024, before leaving for their new arena, the Intuit Dome, located in Inglewood.
The 2004 NBA Finals was the championship round of the 2003–04 National Basketball Association (NBA) season, and the conclusion of the season's playoffs. This season's NBA Finals was contested between the Western Conference playoff champion Los Angeles Lakers and the Eastern Conference playoff champion Detroit Pistons. The Lakers held home court advantage, and the series was played under a best-of-seven format.
Jaime Jarrín is an Ecuadorian-born American sportscaster known as the Spanish-language voice of the Los Angeles Dodgers. He began broadcasting for the Dodgers in 1959 and was the 1998 recipient of the Ford C. Frick Award from the Baseball Hall of Fame. One of the most recognizable voices in Hispanic broadcasting, Jarrín, "the Spanish Voice of the Dodgers" is also heard on Spectrum SportsNet LA's SAP channel.
Stuart Burrell Lantz is an American former professional basketball player who is a television commentator for the Los Angeles Lakers of the National Basketball Association (NBA) on Spectrum SportsNet. He played college basketball at the University of Nebraska–Lincoln.
The 2002 NBA Finals was the National Basketball Association (NBA)'s championship series for the 2001–02 season. The best-of-seven playoff was contested between the Western Conference champion Los Angeles Lakers, and the Eastern Conference champion New Jersey Nets. The Lakers swept the Nets, four games to none, to win the franchise's 14th NBA championship and third consecutive NBA championship. The 56th edition of the championship series was played between June 5 and 12 and was broadcast on NBC — the last NBA games broadcast on the network to date. Lakers coach Phil Jackson won his ninth ring, tying him with Red Auerbach for most all-time. During the series, he surpassed Pat Riley for most career playoffs wins with 156. Shaquille O'Neal of the Lakers was named the NBA Finals Most Valuable Player (MVP) for the third consecutive year, after averaging 36.3 points, 12.3 rebounds and 2.8 blocks per game.
Figueroa Street is a major north-south street in Los Angeles County, California, spanning from the Los Angeles neighborhood of Wilmington north to Eagle Rock. A short, unconnected continuation of Figueroa Street runs just south of Marengo Drive in Glendale to Chevy Chase Drive in La Cañada Flintridge.
Paul Benedict Sunderland is an American professional sportscaster who resides in Los Angeles, California. He worked as the indoor volleyball play-by-play announcer for NBC Olympics’ coverage of the 2016 Summer Olympics, and has worked for the NBC Sports Group covering the Olympics since the 1992 Summer Olympics. He is a former collegiate basketball and volleyball player, and played on the United States national volleyball team that won a gold medal at the 1984 Summer Olympics.
Bill Macdonald is an American professional sportscaster who is currently the TV play-by-play announcer for the Los Angeles Lakers of the National Basketball Association (NBA) on Spectrum SportsNet alongside color commentator Stu Lantz.
The 2007–08 Los Angeles Lakers season was the 60th season of the franchise, 59th in the National Basketball Association (NBA) and 48th in Los Angeles. During the offseason, the Lakers re-signed point guard Derek Fisher. The Lakers celebrated their 60th anniversary, thus the Laker jerseys wore the 60th anniversary patches on the leftmost part. They finished the regular season with 57 wins, finishing with the most wins in the tightest conference race in NBA history. The Lakers clinched the top seed in the playoffs for the 29th time in franchise history. This 15-game turnaround from the prior season has been attributed to the progress of the team's bench players and the mid-season trade for Pau Gasol. The Lakers sold out all 41 home games for the season. After 12 seasons in the NBA, Kobe Bryant was named the 2008 NBA Most Valuable Player for the first and only time in his career. The Lakers had the third best team offensive rating and the fifth best team defensive rating in the NBA.
The 2001–02 NBA season was the Lakers' 54th season in the National Basketball Association, and 42nd in the city of Los Angeles. The Lakers entered the season as the two-time defending NBA champions, having defeated the Philadelphia 76ers in five games in the 2001 NBA Finals, winning their thirteenth NBA championship.
The 2010 NBA Finals was the championship series of the National Basketball Association's (NBA) 2009–10 season and conclusion of the season's playoffs, held from June 3 to 17, 2010. A best-of-seven playoff series, it was contested between the Western Conference champion and defending champion Los Angeles Lakers and the Eastern Conference champion Boston Celtics. It was their twelfth Finals meeting overall.
The 2009–10 Los Angeles Lakers season was the 62nd season of the franchise, 61st in the National Basketball Association (NBA) and 50th in Los Angeles. During the offseason, the Lakers signed free agent and former defensive player of the year forward Ron Artest. Coming off from winning their fifteenth championship in the NBA Finals defeating the Orlando Magic in five games, the Lakers successfully defended their title. They spent the most money of any team on player salaries that season, totaling $112.7 million. The Lakers once again sold out all 41 home games for the season at Staples Center.
Games held by the National Basketball Association (NBA) on Christmas Day, December 25, have been an annual tradition since the league's second season in 1947. Since 2008, five games have been played on Christmas. Unlike the National Football League (NFL)'s traditional Thanksgiving Day games, the NBA's Christmas Day games have no fixed opponents; rather, they feature some of the best teams and players. Since 1995, the current NBA champions play a game on Christmas Day.
Spectrum SportsNet, formerly Time Warner Cable SportsNet, is an American regional sports cable and satellite television network owned by Charter Communications through its acquisition of Time Warner Cable in May 2016, with the Los Angeles Lakers maintaining editorial control over the content, including team-assigned reporters and anchors, as well as team-related programming. The network is based near the Lakers' team headquarters in the Los Angeles suburb of El Segundo, California.
On January 26, 2020, a Sikorsky S-76B helicopter crashed in the city of Calabasas, California, around 30 mi (48 km) northwest of Downtown Los Angeles, while en route from John Wayne Airport to Camarillo Airport. All nine people on board were killed: retired professional basketball player Kobe Bryant, his 13-year-old daughter Gianna, baseball coach John Altobelli, his wife Keri, his daughter Alyssa, Payton Chester, her mother Sarah, basketball coach Christina Mauser, and the pilot, Ara Zobayan.
Dieter Ruehle is an American musician who is the stadium organist for Major League Baseball's Los Angeles Dodgers and National Hockey League's Los Angeles Kings. As of October 2020, Ruehle has played for three championship teams in three different sports: Dodgers in 2020; Lakers in 2002, 2009 and 2010; and Kings in 2012 and 2014.
Michael Eaves is an American sportscaster. He serves as an anchor for ESPN's SportsCenter and was a co-host of NBA Countdown for shows preceding NBA Wednesday. He began working at ESPN in 2015.
Vanessa Marie Bryant is an American businesswoman, philanthropist, and model. She is the widow of American professional basketball player Kobe Bryant. With her husband, she founded the Kobe and Vanessa Bryant Foundation in 2007 to provide scholarships to minority college students worldwide. Bryant leads the Mamba and Mambacita Sports Foundation, an organization dedicated to supporting child athletes who are in need.