Mutnansky grew up a basketball junkie in Pepperell MA, and went to UConn simply for its basketball programs. While there he wrote for the UConn’s Daily Campus covering and traveling with the men’s basketball team for two years. During his Jr year he interned with Big Show at WEEI. He graduated a bachelor’s in journalism and communications.

After graduation, Mutnansky moved back to MA.  He tried to get a job at a few of the local papers with no luck, and  was days from going into pharmaceutical sales when he met Marty Tirrell. He had just left his evening show at 1510 the Zone, and was starting a sports show on the then 5000-watt 1590-AM WSMN in Nashua, NH. Mutnansky was able to land a job as a “flash guy/co-host” on an afternoon sports show Monday – Friday and a Saturday morning show. He also helped launch and execute “Friday Night Lights – NH High School Football in Action.”

WSMN and land of station was sold in early 2004. A summer of landscaping work followed for Mutnansky. Then, late that summer,  Tom Monahan funded a similar sports show with Tirrell and Mutnansky on 900-AM Nashua. Monahan purchased the station soon afterwards and went to an all sports format. The show continues, and landed number of regular guests, including Bob Ryan.

In late 2005 Dennis & Callahan producer Steve Ciaccio called Mutnansky and offered him a chance to start doing occasional sports flashes at WEEI. By early 2006, Marty Tirrell had left the Nashua station and headed for the green pastures of Springfield. Mutnansky then assumed the lead role in Nashua.

He continues to work at WGAM (900-AM Nashua and 1250-AM in Manchester), hosting a weekday afternoon on show Mon-Fri 3:00-6:00pm while also filling in at WEEI. Last year, Mutnansky got the chance to start hosting and co-hosting at WEEI. It was mostly on weekends, and then this summer had the chance to host solo and also fill in on WEEI’s weekday programming, leading to the announcement about the WEEI.com Radio Show this week.

As for his philosphy on his job: “I am extremely, extremely lucky to be doing what I’m doing. The crew at WGAM and WEEI has been very supportive. The passion and energy of the New England fans is unmatched. I just try and match their energy and passion in any shift that I have. I’m not looking for anything scripted. Organic sports conversation that informs people, makes them laugh, makes them think. I like to argue. Hopefully I bring a bit of a younger voice to the station amongst all these “old guys.”

I still kind of have to pinch myself – I essentially grew up on Glenn and the Big Show. Now I get to take heat from them and their listeners on the Whiner Line. It’s a bit of a trip.

I’m fired up for the WEEI.com Radio Show Saturday mornings with Blogford, er, Mr. Bradford. Guys are out taking care of their honey-do lists and errands for the day. It’s a great time to talk sports. I’m thrilled at the chance to be a part of this new show.”

Who Are These Guys? – Mike Mutnansky is a post from: Boston Sports Media Watch

He grew up in Rhode Island, and went to URI for a a bachelor’s degree in journalism. During his time in school he covered the URI basketball team in the Jim Harrick/Lamar Odom era while interning for the Newport Daily News. In his senior year, he did a co-op at The Boston Globe during the 2000 election.

After graduating from URI, he went to Chicago to work on his master’s degree at Northwestern University’s Medill School of Journalism. He lived five blocks from Wrigley Field and covered Chicago sports for the Medill News Service.

After grad school he moved back to Falmouth for a time before moving to Hendersonville, N.C., and becoming the Prep Sports Writer at The Times-News in that town. He covered mostly high schools, but occasionally covered the Carolina Panthers (coincidentally during their run to Super Bowl XXXVIII vs. the Pats). He was recognized by the North Carolina Press Association with an award for sports feature writing in 2004.

He escaped the mountains of North Carolina after two years and returned once again to Falmouth, where he was hired by the Standard Times. He’s covered a number of sports for the paper, eventually landing on the Patriots beat alongside the late Danny Pires. He also covered the Red Sox World Series run alongside Jon Couture last fall.

In his time with New Bedford, Brown has been honored with three awards from the New England Associated Press News Editors Association (NEAPNEA) and two from the New England Press Association (NEPA). Last spring, he was recognized by the Associated Press Sports Editors (APSE) for an enterprise series on the Massachusetts Interscholastic Athletic Association (MIAA).

He describes his philosophy towards writing as this:

“I’m obligated to produce something that I would want to read. Because if I have no interest in my copy, then I can’t expect my readers to. Also, I’m a big fan of sleeping until noon and getting paid money to attend the Super Bowl. I can’t stress enough just how awesome that is. My greatest ambition at this point is to get paid more money to sleep until noon and attend the Super Bowl.”

For a couple examples of his work, he cites his Patriots training camp preview, as well as a piece on  Al “Bundy” Martinez, a mixed martial arts fighter from New Bedford.

Who Are These Guys? – David Brown is a post from: Boston Sports Media Watch

He grew up in Massachusetts, and then went to Brown University, earning an honors degree in History as well as a second degree in Afro-American Studies. He then accepted a fellowship at Ohio State in a doctoral program in military history. He gave that a year before decided he had enough of school.

Coming back to New England, he wasn’t sure what he actually wanted to do, so he started working in sports information at Brown, then stringing for a number of papers. His first full time sports reporting job with with the Daily Transcript in Dedham, where eventually served as sports editor.

He moved to the Metrowest Daily News in 2000, where he was put on the Bruins beat. This is probably where you might’ve first come across his work, and even now you might think of him as a “hockey guy.” While on the Bruins beat the paper was purchased by the Boston Herald, and Flynn wrote the Bruins Insider blog and Sunday NHL notes for the Herald, while remaining on beat coverage for the MWDN.

Once the paper was sold again, this time to Gatehouse media, and at the same time, Albert Breer left the Patriots beat to go to the Dallas Morning News. This allowed Flynn to move over to the Patriots beat. He says:

“As much as I love hockey and enjoyed my time covering the B’s (which I still get to do, though not as much with the Pats now my primary focus), I’m even more passionate about football. I actually only started following hockey (other than the B’s) as a kid when the NFL went on strike and I needed to fill the void (still miss those days of the battle of Alberta, Philly and Hartford in the long sweatpants and the Caps led by Randolph’s own Rod Langway). Still, getting to cover the Pats has kind of allowed me to come full circle back to my first love.”

Flynn followed some big names on the Pats beat at the MWDN, including Tom E. Curran, Mike Reiss and Breer, and hopes that he’s been able to learn from each one of them. He notes that his own style is “to focus primarily on the game itself and not get too embroiled in the soap opera storylines that seem to get so much attention in Foxboro, but hopefully still manage to entertain with some unique story angles, insight and humor.”

Some recent examples of his work include A job for the fearless – a look at the job of the gunner on special teams and Proven draft strategy – examining the draft philosophy of Scott Pioli.

Flynn still covers the Bruins when the Patriots season is over, and also writes about baseball on occasion.

Outside of print work, Flynn has done quite a bit of radio work, co-hosting the Inside Hockey Show on 1510 (and later XM Radio) with James Murphy for two years before turning his focus to football last year. He’s done some TV guest spots on CN8’s SportsPulse and NECN’s Sports LateNight and other radio spots both locally and in other markets discussing the Bruins and Patriots.

Who Are These Guys? – Douglas Flynn is a post from: Boston Sports Media Watch

He writes for The Sun Chronicle out of Attleboro, and is pretty prolific at cranking out the coverage, singlehandedly putting out 4-5 articles on the day after a game. His daily coverage of the team is top notch, and this season he’s also been Blogging Fearlessly on the SC web site.

As a high school student, Farinella actually covered the first game ever played at then-Schaefer Stadium in August 1971 for the Mansfield News.

In the late 1980’s, Farinella spent two years at the Patriot-Ledger, backing up Ron Hobson. He also worked for the AP as a stringer from 1982-2003.

Who Are These Guys? – Mark Farinella is a post from: Boston Sports Media Watch

Maybe because I read, listen to and observed all their work almost each day, all the names I put up were very familiar to me, and I thought would be to most observers of the Boston sports scene.

This was part of the reason the approval ratings were discontinued, more and more it was becoming difficult to put up a name that I could be assured that most readers would be familiar with and thus be able to give a valid approve/disapprove. We went through around 75 media people, so that was certainly a good start.

Periodically, I’m going to spotlight some of the media types who didn’t make the approval ratings list. Hopefully this will increase their exposure to you a little bit so that you can be on the lookout for their work, or know a little something about them as you review something that they’ve done.

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Today we’re going to spotlight longtime Quincy Patriot Ledger writer Mike Fine. If you don’t know who he is, you definitely should.

Fine’s time with the PL dates back to 1968 when he landed a co-op with Northeastern. He started with high schools, and then colleges before landing on the Boston Celtics beat in 1977. His first year was also the rookie year of Cedric Maxwell, and it was the last year for John Havlicek.

He was on the beat full time for 21 years, until the PL was sold, and the new owners switched to only home coverage of the team, which he has done for the last 10 years. All told, Fine has 31 years on the Celtics beat. 

In the offseasons Fine would serve as a columnist for the paper, and would also do quite a bit of Patriots coverage.

Since 1999 Fine has also covered the Red Sox for the paper.  Before the advent of WEEI, and shows such as Sports Final and Sports Xtra, Fine did a lot of radio and TV interviews, and did pregame reports on WRKO.

Since Gatehouse Media purchased the Patriot Ledger, the paper’s status has fallen immensely. Once boasting a sports staff of 18, the paper has now dropped all road coverage of the local teams, though Fine was in Detroit to cover the Eastern Conference Finals this season. He was not sent to Los Angeles to cover the NBA Finals, however.

If you’ve only been following the Boston sports scene for the last 15 years or so, you might have no idea who Mike Fine is, or how extensive his experience and background are.

Hopefully now you have a little better idea.

Who Are These Guys? – Mike Fine is a post from: Boston Sports Media Watch