Barry David Tompkins (born May 2, 1940) is an American sportscaster. He is better known for his work as a

boxing Boxing (also known as "Western boxing" or "pugilism") is a combat sport in which two people, usually wearing protective gloves and other protective equipment such as hand wraps and mouthguards, throw punches at each other for a predetermined ...

commentator, but he has covered

football Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kicking a ball to score a goal. Unqualified, the word ''football'' normally means the form of football that is the most popular where the word is used. Sports commonly c ...

and other sports.

Early life

Tompkins was born and raised in San Francisco.

Career

KCBS, KCBS, WNBC, NBC Sports and KRON

He began his broadcasting career at

San Francisco San Francisco (; Spanish language, Spanish for "Francis of Assisi, Saint Francis"), officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the commercial, financial, and cultural center of Northern California. The city proper is the List of Ca ...

radio station KCBS in 1965. Tompkins was hired as sports director at the San Francisco

CBS CBS Broadcasting Inc., commonly shortened to CBS, the abbreviation of its former legal name Columbia Broadcasting System, is an American commercial broadcast television and radio network serving as the flagship property of the CBS Entertainmen ...

television affiliate,

KPIX-TV KPIX-TV (channel 5) is a television station licensed to San Francisco, California, United States, serving as the San Francisco Bay Area's CBS network outlet. It is owned and operated by the network's CBS News and Stations division alongside CW ...

. In 1974, he moved to

New York New York most commonly refers to: * New York City, the most populous city in the United States, located in the state of New York * New York (state), a state in the northeastern United States New York may also refer to: Film and television * '' ...

to join

WNBC-TV WNBC (channel 4) is a television station in New York City, serving as the flagship of the NBC network. It is owned and operated by the network's NBC Owned Television Stations division alongside Linden, New Jersey–licensed Telemundo station WN ...

as a sports anchor and feature reporter, before moving to

NBC Sports NBC Sports is an American programming division of the broadcast network NBC, owned and operated by NBC Sports Group division of NBCUniversal and subsidiary of Comcast. The division is responsible for sports broadcasts on the network, and its d ...

in 1975 to host weekly radio shows as well as television play-by-play for basketball and football. Tompkins spent five years at NBC. Tompkins returned to San Francisco in 1978 and joined then-NBC affiliate

KRON-TV KRON-TV (channel 4) is a television station licensed to San Francisco, California, United States, serving the San Francisco Bay Area as an affiliate of MyNetworkTV. Owned by Nexstar Media Group, KRON-TV maintains studios on Front Street in the c ...

as sports director, while continuing to cover

Pac-10 The Pac-12 Conference is a collegiate List of NCAA conferences, athletic conference, that operates in the Western United States, participating in 24 sports at the NCAA Division I level. Its College football, football teams compete in the NCAA D ...

basketball for NBC as well as feature stories for its NFL pre-game show. He left KRON in 1980 to join the then-fledgling cable channel

HBO Home Box Office (HBO) is an American premium television network, which is the flagship property of namesake parent subsidiary Home Box Office, Inc., itself a unit owned by Warner Bros. Discovery. The overall Home Box Office business unit is ba ...

HBO

At HBO, Tompkins joined ''

HBO Boxing ''HBO World Championship Boxing'' (in later years stylized in its title card as ''HBO Boxing – World Championship'') was an American sports television series on premium television network HBO. It premiered on January 22, 1973 with a fight that s ...

'', with

Larry Merchant Larry Merchant (born Larry Kaufman; February 11, 1931) is an American sportswriter, a longtime commentator for HBO sports presentations of ''HBO World Championship Boxing'', ''Boxing After Dark'' and HBO pay-per-view telecasts, called "the great ...

and

Sugar Ray Leonard Ray Charles Leonard (born May 17, 1956), best known as "Sugar" Ray Leonard, is an American former professional boxer, motivational speaker, and occasional actor. Often regarded as one of the greatest boxers of all time, he competed professiona ...

. He called fights at HBO for many years and some of his commentaries became famous, such as his call when

Alexis Argüello Alexis Argüello (April 19, 1952 – July 1, 2009) was a Nicaraguan professional boxer who competed from 1968 to 1995, and later became a politician. He was a three-weight world champion, having held the WBA featherweight title from 1974 to 19 ...

was hurt by

Aaron Pryor Aaron Pryor (October 20, 1955 – October 9, 2016) was an American professional boxer who competed from 1976 to 1990. He was a two-time light welterweight world champion, having held the WBA title from 1980 to 1983, and the IBF title from 1984 ...

in round fourteen of their Battle of the Champions (''Arguello...oh! Arguello is hurt!!''), when

Héctor Camacho Héctor Luís Camacho Matías (May 24, 1962 – November 24, 2012), commonly known by his nickname "Macho" Camacho, was a Puerto Rican professional boxer and entertainer. Known for his quickness in the ring and flamboyant style, Camacho compet ...

was buckled by

Edwin Rosario Edwin "Chapo" Rosario Rivera (; March 15, 1963 – December 1, 1997) was a Puerto Rican professional boxer who competed from 1979 to 1997. He is a world champion in two weight classes, having held the WBC lightweight title from 1983 to 1984, ...

in round five of their fight (''Camacho had never been hurt before!'') and when

Mike Tyson Michael Gerard Tyson (born June 30, 1966) is an American former professional boxer who competed from 1985 to 2005. Nicknamed "Iron Mike" and "Kid Dynamite" in his early career, and later known as "The Baddest Man on the Planet", Tyson is cons ...

won the WBC world Heavyweight title with a second-round knockout of

Trevor Berbick Trevor Berbick (1 August 1954 – 28 October 2006) was a Jamaican professional boxer who competed from 1976 to 2000. He won the WBC heavyweight title in 1986 by defeating Pinklon Thomas, then lost it in his first defense in the same year to Mi ...

(''And we have a new era in boxing.''). Tompkins also co-hosted

's baseball program, ''

Race for the Pennant ''Race for the Pennant'' is a weekly sports show focused on Major League Baseball; it premiered on Home Box Office (HBO) in 1978. It is hosted by Len Berman, Tim McCarver, Barry Tompkins, Bob Gibson, Maury Wills Maurice Morning Wills (October ...

''. Even though Tompkins had two years remaining on his contract, HBO replaced him in 1988 with

Jim Lampley James Lampley (born April 8, 1949) is an American sportscaster, news anchor, film producer, and restaurant owner. He was best known as a blow-by-blow announcer on ''HBO World Championship Boxing'' for 30 years. He also had covered a record 14 O ...

. Tompkins spent ten years at HBO. In 1992, he won the

Sam Taub Award The Sam Taub Award is a yearly award presented by the Boxing Writers Association of America for Excellence in Broadcasting Journalism. The award is named after Sam Taub, a journalist and radio broadcaster who is best known for his work covering box ...

for excellence in boxing broadcasting journalism.

''Rocky IV'' and ESPN

Tompkins made his acting debut in

1985 The year 1985 was designated as the International Youth Year by the United Nations. Events January * January 1 ** The Internet's Domain Name System is created. ** Greenland withdraws from the European Economic Community as a result of a ...

, when he portrayed a

USA Network USA Network (simply USA) is an American basic cable television channel owned by the NBCUniversal Television and Streaming division of Comcast's NBCUniversal through NBCUniversal Cable Entertainment. It was originally launched in 1977 as Madison ...

sportscaster during the ''

Rocky Balboa Robert "Rocky" Balboa (also known by his ring name The Italian Stallion), is a fictional title character and the protagonist of the ''Rocky'' film series. The character was created by Sylvester Stallone, who has also portrayed him in all eigh ...

''-''

Ivan Drago Ivan Vasilyevich Drago (russian: Иван Васильевич Драго, ) is a Soviet-Russian fictional character from the ''Rocky'' film series. He first appears in the 1985 film ''Rocky IV'', in which he is the central antagonist and riv ...

'' fight in ''

Rocky IV ''Rocky IV'' is a 1985 American sports drama film written, directed by and starring Sylvester Stallone. It is the sequel to ''Rocky III'' (1982) and is the fourth installment in the ''Rocky'' franchise. It also stars Talia Shire, Burt Young, Ca ...

''. Later he moved to the

ESPN ESPN (originally an initialism for Entertainment and Sports Programming Network) is an American international basic cable sports channel owned by ESPN Inc., owned jointly by The Walt Disney Company (80%) and Hearst Communications (20%). The ...

network, where he did play-by-play on Thursday Night Fights alongside Al Bernstein. He also did college basketball, The French Open and many other tennis tournaments, the Tour De France, World Track and Field and Swimming and Diving Championships as well as the World Gymnastics Championships. During that time he continued to be "The Voice" of Pac 10 (now 12) Conference football for various syndicators. Tompkins spent eight years at ESPN.

Fox Sports

In 1995 Tompkins left ESPN to join Fox Sports as the play-by-play announcer of ''Sunday Night Fights'', and he began traveling through the United States alongside Sean O'Grady and Rich Marotta. Tompkins continued as the lead play-by—play commentator of FSN's coverage of Pac-12 football with Petros Papadakis and basketball with Dan Belluomini, Marques Johnson, Don MacLean and Ernie Kent through 2011. He also commentated much of FSN's poker coverage, including the

Aussie Millions The Australian Poker Championship, commonly known as Aussie Millions, is a series of poker tournaments held at the Crown Casino, in Melbourne, Australia. The Main Event of the series is the Southern Hemisphere's richest poker tournament with a ...

and

Poker Dome Challenge ''The MANSIONPoker.net Poker Dome Challenge'' was a 43-week series of speed poker tournaments offering a grand prize of US$1,000,000. The tournament aired in the United States on Fox Sports Network from May 2006 to March 2007. The tournament featur ...

. Tompkins spent fourteen years at Fox Sports.

Western Athletic Conference

In July 2011 it was announced that Tompkins would leave Pac-12 football broadcasts and instead be the new play-by-play man for the WAC Sports Network, going into its second season. Tompkins' fight duties and college basketball games with FSN continued. Tompkins called nine broadcasts with Joe Glenn during the 2011 season.

Mountain West Conference

The WAC Sports Network folded after 2011 allowing Tompkins to become a free agent in terms of college football sports broadcasting for 2012. He was hired by the

Mountain West Conference The Mountain West Conference (MW) is one of the collegiate athletic conferences affiliated with the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Division I Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS) (formerly I-A). The MW officially began operations o ...

to serve as their #1 play-by-play broadcaster for the new MWC regional package on Time Warner Cable SportsNet (started after Mtn folded after spring 2012). He was assigned

Jay Leeuwenburg Jay Robert Leeuwenburg (born June 18, 1969) is a former American football offensive lineman in the National Football League for the Kansas City Chiefs, Chicago Bears, Indianapolis Colts, Cincinnati Bengals, and the Washington Redskins. He pla ...

as his color analyst.

ShoBox and ShoExtreme

Tompkins joined

Showtime Sports Showtime is an American premium television network owned by Paramount Media Networks, and is the flagship property of the namesake parent company, Showtime Networks, a part of Paramount Media Networks. Showtime's programming primarily includes t ...

on February 18, 2012, as blow-by-blow voice of the network's ShoBox series and ShoExtreme series with veteran analyst Steve Farhood.

Dominican University

In 2013, he joined the faculty at Dominican University of California as a professor for the university's Communications Department. He continues to do college football and basketball for Time-Warner Network and Comcast.

Personal life

Tompkins' wife is Joan Ryan, a sports writer, and son is Ryan Tompkins.

References

External links

Profile of Tompkins
from the

Tennis Channel Tennis Channel is an American sports-oriented digital cable and satellite television network owned by the Sinclair Television Group subsidiary of the Sinclair Broadcast Group. It is devoted to events and other programming related to the game of ...

website {{DEFAULTSORT:Tompkins, Barry 1940 births Living people American radio sports announcers American television sports announcers Poker commentators Boxing commentators College basketball announcers in the United States College football announcers National Football League announcers Tennis commentators Television anchors from San Francisco Mixed martial arts broadcasters American horse racing announcers Golf writers and broadcasters Major League Baseball broadcasters San Francisco Giants announcers Los Angeles Raiders announcers Cycling announcers Figure skating commentators Track and field broadcasters Gymnastics broadcasters