Tony Bruno

For Tony Bruno, the musician, see Tony Bruno (musician)

Tony Bruno (born June 13, 1952) is an American sports talk radio personality. He is currently with WIP in Philadelphia co-hosting the Afternoon Show with Josh Innes.

He is a sports radio veteran, having worked for national American sports broadcasters including ESPN Radio, Fox Sports Radio, and Sporting News Radio during his career.

Early life

Bruno is a Philadelphia native. He graduated from St. John Neumann High School and then from Temple University.^[1]

When Bruno was 10 years old his father died from leukemia. His mother, Angelina Bruno, is an Italian immigrant who came to this country when she was 18.

Radio career

WCAU, KFI, and WIP

Bruno has been involved in news, talk, and sports in his career and has hosted general talk at WCAU 1210 in Philadelphia where he was the morning host and KFI in Los Angeles as a fill-in host. When WCAU abandoned talk in 1991 Bruno returned to Sports Talk as a co-host of 610 WIP's Morning Guys show with Angelo Cataldi and Al Morganti.

ESPN Radio

When ESPN decided to launch its own radio network in 1992, they tagged Bruno to be one of the co-hosts. Bruno co-hosted ESPN Radio's Gamenight on weekends and continued to co-host The Morning Guys on weekdays. During the 1996 NCAA tournament, Bruno vowed to walk from Bristol, CT to Syracuse, NY if Syracuse advanced to the Final 4; though he would ultimately welch on this promise after the Orangemen upset Kansas in the Regional finals. In 1995, Bruno joined ESPN Radio full-time and co-hosted the Bruno-Golic Morning Show with former NFL Player Mike Golic. (Bruno left the morning show in 1999 and was replaced by current co-host Mike Greenberg.)

Fox Sports Radio

In 2000, Bruno moved to Los Angeles, launching the Fox Sports Radio network. Once again, Bruno played the role of a pioneering host for an up-and-coming sports radio network. Bruno hosted The Tony Bruno Extravaganza morning program with Andrew Siciliano. During this time, Bruno was frequently a guest host on Fox Sports Network's The Best Damn Sports Show Period. Prior to heading west to California, Bruno hosted a morning show on 620 WDAE in Tampa.

Bruno would eventually be unable to come to a contract renewal agreement with Fox. He left radio for 9 months to tour the world and entertain offers.

Sporting News Radio and KNBR

In 2006, he signed with Sporting News Radio. The Tony Bruno Show appeared on Sporting News Radio and on XM Satellite Radio on weekdays. He hosted there from 2006 to 2008, in the same morning show time slot. He was carried on XM Sports Nation for most of the show's run on Sporting News. Bruno also did a daily half-hour with Gary Radnich on the Gary Radnich Show on KNBR in San Francisco.

In January 2008, it was announced that Bruno's show on Sporting News Radio had been cancelled, though KNBR hoped to have him continue working with Radnich.^[2] He did return to working with Radnich, until August 1, 2011 when Radnich announced KNBR management has decided to drop the half-hour segment with Bruno after 16 years.

New show and return to Fox Sports Radio

On September 29, 2008 Bruno got a new show called Into The Night with Tony Bruno which first aired live on the West Coast from 7 to 10pm on am 570 KLAC, the top ranked Sports station in Los Angeles. After one month exclusively on KLAC, it was syndicated around the country on November 3. Bruno aired the show from various locations around the country depending on the event going on, such as the Super Bowl, the NCAA Final Four and other various major sporting events.^[3]

On July 30, 2009, Premiere Radio Networks announced it had partnered with The Content Factory to distribute Bruno's show across the Fox Sports Radio network beginning August 10.^[4] Bruno took over the same 10 PM to 1 AM timeslot on the east coast, while former timeslot host JT "The Brick" moved to overnights, replacing the pre-recorded clip show, Fox Sports Soup. On October 22, 2009, the program was sold to DirecTV as well. The Dan Patrick Show was bought in the deal as well and Bruno has filled in for Dan Patrick on the show numerous times.

Return to Philadelphia

On January 18, 2010, Bruno, paired with Harry Mayes, returned to a daily show from noon to 2 PM on ESPN 950/97.5 The Fanatic in Philadelphia. The show was originally broadcast bi-coastally from the Fanatic's studios in Bala Cynwyd, a suburb of Philadelphia and Bruno's then-home in Venice, California. Bruno would make occasional trips east to Philadelphia, where he would work with Mayes in the early afternoon before doing his evening show, which was still broadcast on Fox Sports Radio. After September 9, 2011, when "Into the Night" ended its run on Fox Sports Radio, Bruno continued his co-hosting duties with Mayes on their show, which anchors the Fanatic's midday lineup, even doing his show in the middle of his relocation back to Philadelphia in October, 2011.

On August 5, 2011, during a game between the Philadelphia Phillies and the San Francisco Giants at AT&T Park in San Francisco, Giants pitcher Ramon Ramirez hit Phillies batter Shane Victorino with a pitch. The play led to a benches-clearing brawl between the teams, with Ramirez, Victorino and two other players ejected.^[5] Following the play, Bruno published a comment on his Facebook page, which automatically posted a shortened version on his Twitter account, referring to Giants manager Bruce Bochy:

gutless #!@%*# Giants, Bochy is a coward for having his illegal alien pitcher hit a guy since mighty Frisco boys getting their asses handed to them.^[6][7]

According to a San Francisco Chronicle story,^[8] Bruno removed the message, but it had already spread as it was quickly re-Tweeted by several Immigration Rights organizations. Bruno subsequently published an apology on his Facebook page stating: "None of this defends what was posted in a moment of anger on Friday night and I immediately realized how it looked and the stupidity of a bad analogy by removing it, acknowledging it and have felt horrible about it ever since".^[9]

On June 26, 2014 Tony Bruno announced on his Facebook page that he had resigned from 97.5 The Fanatic due to a contractual issue. The circumstances behind his departure were long rumored amongst fans of his shows. The nature of the dispute was revealed in an episode of the podcast "Crossing Streams," part of the philadelphia-based website CrossingBroad.com ^[10] just before Bruno debuted his own podcast in October.

On October 13, 2014, Bruno debuted "The Tony Bruno Show" podcast, with the first episode originating from the Jug Handle Inn, a New Jersey restaurant that had been a long time sponsor of his previous show. Since its debut in October, His show became a hit with both his local and national fans. Bruno has made a number of remote broadcasts of the podcast, including from Radio Row at Super Bowl XLIX in Glendale, AZ.

On January 30, 2015 he announced his return to WIP in Philadelphia. He and new co-host Josh Innes took over the 1:00 - 6:00 P.M. afternoon slot on the station. Their show began on February 4, 2015.

Other work

Madden NFL

Bruno is the host of EA Sports Radio, a show that has appeared on the 2005, 2006, and 2007 versions of the Madden NFL video game. The show has Bruno listing statistics and accomplishments from the previous "week" of play. In addition, he "interviews" players and coaches, takes calls from listeners, and even asks trivia questions.

Personal life

Bruno is divorced with three grown children and lived in Venice, California, but has moved back to Philadelphia, PA as of September 2011.

References

External links

• Tony Bruno @ Myspace