Chris Haynes

Chris Haynes is a born and raised Fresnan and alum of Edison High School, class of 1999.

Chris is a huge basketball fan. His best Fresno State memories were during the Jerry Tarkanian era. He loved watching guys like Kendrick Brooks, Terrence Roberson, Dominick Young, Chris Herren, Melvin Ely, Rafer Alston, and his favorite Bulldog of all-time, Courtney Alexander.

“Say what you want about Tark, but he brought good basketball games and players to the valley,” says Chris. If it wasn’t for Tark, the Save Mart Center wouldn’t be here Not sure if that’s a good thing though.”

Chris’s favorite teams are the San Francisco Giants (Will Clark has the sweetest swing ever), Miami Heat, and any team Terrell Owens plays for. Go Bills!

After high school, Chris chased that elusive dream of playing professional basketball, playing junior college ball for three years at Sacramento City College and Columbia Junior College, respectively. He received a scholarship to play at Fresno Pacific University, but Chris quickly realized during the season that sitting on the bench in the GSAC would not accomplish that professional goal. Changes had to be made!

The next phase of his life took him into the media (something he said he would never do). He worked as a producer/on-air talent and blogger for FOX Sports Radio 1340 in Fresno for two years, competing against then rival George Takata to no avail.

So if you can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em!

Takata asked Chris to join the VSP family, putting all the rivalry animosity to the side. Chris proudly accepted, but I guess that’s not saying much since he switches NFL teams every other year. He won’t be switching jobs again anytime soon.

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Megan Poindexter

Megan Poindexter is the only female writer at valleysportspulse.com and the youngest member at 19-years -old.  Born in Ventura, Ca she moved to Clovis with her family in 1993 and has since been active in community sports.

She graduated from Clovis High School in 2007 where she was a cross country and track runner.  As a long distance runner she was All-Valley in both sports and found herself with the opportunity to run at the collegiate level at Fresno State. However, due to a career ending foot injury she has been unable to compete while still contributes to the Bulldog program.

As far as her writing, Megan began covering high school sports while at the age of 16. She has done freelance work with the Fresno Bee, Bakersfield Californian, Sacramento Bee, Tacoma Tribune and many other media outlets. Working at valleysportspulse.com has been her most exciting adventure yet. Working side by side with George Takata she has contributed to the development of the site and is now learning many new things about the advertising realm of things.

Megan plans to graduate with her BA in journalism in December and then head to down to L.A. to hopefully pursue a career in journalism and/or public relations. She has high goals and aspirations for a career in sports media and a desire to work with professional athletes through various charities.

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Andrew Marden

Andrew Marden knows he can never take the place of George Takata’s long-time partner at CBS 47 (and fellow valleysportspulse.com contributor) Paul Loeffler, but since he is always around the valley sports scene and he has a pulse, he figures he’ll be a good fit to work with George on his latest venture.

Andrew is an east coast guy. He grew up in central New Jersey and went to college in upstate New York. So you might be wondering what he is doing in California. He likes to say he is pursuing his dream of being a sportscaster. But so far that “dream” has taken him to South Dakota and Idaho. Some dream, eh?

Andrew’s interests include playing ultimate frisbee and collecting Superman comics. He asks that you not judge his writing based on his apparent maturity level of a 12-year-old.

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Mario Gomez

Despite popular belief, Mario Gomez is not a Fresno State homer. Yes, he was born and raised in Fresno, obtained his degree from CSUF, and has been Bulldog fan since the young age of six. However, he is first and foremost a passionate college football fan, and he does his best to call it as he sees it. He is the original Fresno State football blogger, launching the Fresno State Football Blog in 2005. Furthermore, he was also one of the original college football bloggers sought by AOL for its NCAA Football’s FanHouse in 2006. The same year, he signed on with Scout.com as publisher of BarkBoard.com – the Fresno State website on the Scout.com network. In 2008, he added publisher of CalSportsDigest.com – Scout.com’s Cal website – to his duties. He covers Central California high school football fervently for GoldenStatePreps.com, and is the football correspondent for 96.1 Sporting News Radio, which will be back better than ever in HD.

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Roger George

A long-time dedicated Valley angler and ex-Olympic Class Decathlete, Roger George set the official Millerton Lake striped bass record of 50.3 pounds in 1998, and  has been a noted fishing report writer since 2001 for the central California region. He has also been recognized  as an expert on Millerton stripers, having fished for them for over 40 years, and does many local seminars on the topic. Roger grew up fishing for almost anything that swam, and after several decades of actual on the water experience, his mission  to bring a timely and accurate fishing report that anglers can depend on,is backed by a desire to provide the same trusted information he would expect to rely on as an angler himself.

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Ryan Scott

“Let the seasons speak for themselves.”
Chef Ryan Scott, who has received critical acclaim for his California Mediterranean dishes, is known for creating amazing food and for infusing his events with great energy and fun. He believes in letting the seasons speak for themselves, and draws inspiration from produce picked at its peak of vitality. Besides offering his services as a caterer and instructor, Ryan donates many hours of his expertise to charitable organizations in the Bay Area. He is a catalyst for amazing culinary experiences and he gives generously from a place that is truly joyous and abundant.

Ryan expressed his desire to be a chef at the early age of nine when the “toys” at the top of his Christmas list included kitchen utensils, a wok and food dehydrator. Growing up in Modesto, California, he developed a passion for the culinary arts and, at the same time, shaped his well-honed competitive side as a star player on the Los Banos High School varsity basketball team. Seeking to be the best at any early age, he entered the prestigious California Culinary Academy (CCA) in San Francisco in 1999. Ryan’s professional career began with a one-year internship at the acclaimed Bistro Roxy in Reno, Nevada. In 2001 the enchantment of Hawaii and its array of opportunity compelled him to move out of the landlocked Central Valley to the island of Maui, where he dove head-first into Polynesian cuisine and took full advantage of his surroundings, eventually working with two of Hawaii’s finest chefs, Peter Merriman at Merriman’s Bamboo Bistro and a brief and formative stage with Alan Wong.

Following his dream to learn from the legendary Gary Danko, owner and executive chef of the celebrated Restaurant Gary Danko in San Francisco, Ryan continued his education with the CCA and became an intern in Chef Danko’s kitchen in 2002. Soon after achieving his accreditations and continuing as a part-time instructor at CCA, Ryan realized his dream and worked as a line cook at Gary Danko for three years. This experience gave him the often sought-after Five-Star culinary protocols and fueled his creative spirit, bestowing him with structure and culinary spontaneity.

Returning to the Central Valley in California, a place close to his heart and childhood home, Ryan accepted a position in Fresno as Consulting Chef for David Milutonvich, owner of the Manhattan Restaurant, during its reopening in 2005. Eventually the siren song of New York’s culinary scene and his goal to work with the country’s best chefs were too compelling to ignore, and Ryan moved to Manhattan itself. There he embarked on an ambitious and very successful adventure that took him up and down the East Coast and across the country on Greyhound buses, hitchhiking and staying with friends while staging in the country’s best restaurants with their acclaimed chefs. In New York he served for several months under the mentorship of Daniel Boulud, the award-winning chef, author and restaurateur; in Chicago he worked in the kitchen with Charlie Trotter at Trotter’s, as well as Tru, Blackbird and Avec; at Jasper White’s Lobster Shack, Radius, and Cleo in Boston; at Primo with Melissa Kelly in Rockland, Maine; with Chef Bob Kinkead at Kinkead’s in Washington, D.C; with Suzanne Goin at Luques and A.O.C in Los Angeles; and at the restaurant Alex with chef Alessandro Stratta at the Wynn Las Vegas. This whirlwind escapade covered thirty-three restaurants on the East Coast and mid-America, cementing Ryan’s talents, skills and vision as a chef.

In late 2005 Ryan moved back to San Francisco to become the Chef and Manager of Myth Café, which was instantly deemed a “hot” dining spot by the surrounding neighborhood’s media, advertising, and marketing elite. The Café was recognized as the city’s number one dining destination by San Francisco magazine (2006). In spring 2008 Ryan competed as one of 16 chefs on Bravo’s top reality show, Top Chef: Chicago. Ryan joined Mission Beach Café in June 2008, a perfect showcase for his New American cuisine.

Fall of 2008 marked Ryan’s 2nd annual “Thanksgiving Bag Lunch Giveaway,” where he and a team of volunteers created, from scratch, 1,500 bag lunches for people in need. Besides this event of his own creation, Ryan devotes time and cuisine to many local charities, including Meals on wheels in San Francisco, Inc., Make-A-Wish Foundation, the American Heart Association, Share Our Strength, and the Guardsman Association.

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Raj Mathai

Two-time Emmy award winning Raj Mathai serves as sports director for NBC Bay Area.

Raj anchors the nightly sportscasts and is among the Bay Area’s most well-known TV personalities. He is also part of the Giants broadcast team joining Jon Miller and Mike Krukow when the Giants are on NBC Bay Area. In addition, Mathai hosts the top-rated ‘Sports Sunday’ program, which airs weekly and attracts the Bay Area’s highest-profile sports figures. You can also catch Raj on the Network level as an occasional sideline reporter for NBC Sports.

Viewers, critics and colleagues have praised Raj’s unique style. He’s been honored by the Associated Press for Outstanding Sports Segment and has also been awarded two Emmys for Outstanding Sports Program. Raj has reported on-location from the Olympics in Italy, Greece and Salt Lake City. He’s been chosen to run the Olympic Torch three times (1996, 2002 and 2008).

Raj is “at home” in the Bay Area. He grew up on the Peninsula and graduated from Los Altos High School. He went on to graduate from San Diego State University with a degree in journalism and political science.

He’s also no stranger to the NBC family. Before arriving at NBC Bay Area, he worked for NBC stations in Fresno, San Diego, and Arizona. Prior to his career in television, Raj served as a public relations assistant for the San Diego Chargers for five seasons. He also worked for NFL Properties — the marketing wing of the National Football League.

Raj and his family contribute to the Stanford Cancer Center, Juvenile Diabetes Research Fund, College Track, Indian Community Center, East Palo Alto Boys & Girls Club and various other Bay Area charities.

He is the emcee for dozens of events, including the annual ATP Tour tennis tournament in San Jose that has featured Andre Agassi and Andy Roddick. Raj is also a popular guest speaker in the community.

Raj was born in Trivandrum, India.

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Paul Loeffler

Paul Loeffler is now Sports Director at KMJ, and feels privileged to follow in the footsteps of legends like Lon Simmons, Bill Thompson, Gus Zernial, and Bill Woodward as the “Voice of the Bulldogs.” Paul has been handling the play-by-play for the Fresno State baseball team since 2001, and was thrilled to be behind the microphone in Omaha when the Diamond Dogs won the College World Series championship in 2008. He’s even written a book about that: www.wonderdogsbook.com.

A Los Banos native, Paul returned to the San Joaquin Valley after graduating from Syracuse University in 1998. He and his wife, Tonia, have been blessed with two darling daughters, Avery and Mallory, who have both grown fond of the red licorice in the Beiden Field press box.

Spending nearly a decade as a sports anchor and reporter at Fresno’s CBS affiliate, Paul has filled a variety of roles on television, including an annual assignment with ABC and ESPN for the Scripps National Spelling Bee. Translating his award-winning television work with World War II veterans into radio, he has hosted Hometown Heroes on KMJ since October 2007. Now airing Saturday afternoons at 1 p.m., Hometown Heroes shines a spotlight on history through the voices of those who lived it, those who fought on the frontlines of freedom. To tell Paul about a hero in your hometown, e-mail him at paul@kmj580.com or go to www.trueheroestv.com

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Marcas Grant

Marcas Grant spent the first 17 years of his life in the San Francisco suburb of Vallejo. When he wasn’t out playing little league baseball or youth soccer, he was usually watching cartoons. At an early age, he dreamed of being a writer – until hearing stories of authors dying penniless and insane (not an exciting prospect). Instead, he settled on the profession of journalism. most of them seemed to die penniless as well. But at least they had their sanity.

Upon graduation from high school, he relocated to Los Angeles and the University of Southern California. It was here that he was first introduced to radio. After graduation, he spent a short stint working as an internet scribe, but ultimately boredom (and an undying need to always work for an underdog) led to him resuming his radio career.

For the next seven and a half years, Marcas’s love of sports and radio took him to the Central Valley. After spending a year as the voice of the Visalia Oaks and the Stockton Ports, he landed in Fresno. For the next five and a half years, Marcas was became immersed in Central Valley sports and was fortunate enough to be the play-by-play voice for many of them.

Years later, not much has changed. Marcas is still working in radio and more importantly, still a cartoon junkie. He’s working for Sporting News Radio in Santa Monica which gets him closer to his beloved USC Trojans and Los Angeles Dodgers. His likes include Arsenal football, a finely crafted stout and a nicely turned double play. His dislikes include reality television, wet socks and any Bruin victory.

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James Gilliland

Mixed Martial Arts columnist James Gilliland is a central valley native and a graduate of Fresno State with a Bachelor’s degree in Broadcast Journalism.

He knew he wanted to be a journalist since high school. During Gilliland’s senior year, he knew he wanted to be a Mixed Martial Arts (MMA) broadcaster after watching the Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC).

He has been a life-long fan of combat sports and is now learning Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu to know more about MMA.

His dream job is to be a commentator for the UFC. James is currently the weekend editor at CBS 47 On Your Side.

Aside from MMA, James loves playing his Xbox 360, watching stupid movies, reading comic books and learning random information. For example, the plastic end of a shoe lace is called an aglet.

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