Sports Brooklyn Boro

John Cirillo, ‘Kid from Sheepshead Bay,’ is sports media guru

February 9, 2021 Andy Furman, Special to the Brooklyn Eagle

Sheepshead Bay sports media guru John Cirillo and former President Bill Clinton. Photo courtesy of Cirilloworld

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Dedication – or the road to destruction. You make the call.

John Cirillo did – and it turned out to be the right one. Almost.

It was Sept. 28, 1984 – the day he married Fran – his wife of some 37 years.

Make that his wedding night.

“The New York Knicks opened training camp that day,” he told the Brooklyn Eagle, “and I had to work. We got married that night.”

It wasn’t supposed to be like this.

Cirillo, the kid from Sheepshead Bay who attended St. Mark’s Grammar School and later Nazareth High School (Class of ’74), applied for the Knicks’ PR job in July – and was called to work when camp opened in September.

To be more exact – on his wedding day.

“I got a big thank you from then Madison Square Garden Chairman Sonny Werblin for working,” Cirillo remembered.

He didn’t mention if Werblin received an invite to the evening’s affair.

But John Cirillo was destined for fame – he was a born promoter – even before the wedding date.

“I’m the second most famous person from Sheepshead Bay,” he proudly said, “trailing only Vince Lombardi.”

The famous Hall of Fame football coach for the Green Bay Packers.

In high school he did basketball play-by-play on the closed-circuit system for the Kingsmen.

“Mike Dunleavy was in my typing class when I was a freshman, and he was a senior,” he said. Dunleavy went on to an NBA career as a player and coach.

But Cirillo’s career path wasn’t too far behind.

When it was time for college, young Johnny turned to WNBC sportscaster Bill Mazur for advice.

“I wanted to go to a school where I’d get the most experience in sports broadcasting,” he said. “I heard Vin Scully went to Fordham – that was my choice.”

Of course – Fordham is the pathway to media heaven.

“We had the non-commercial 50,000-watt WVXU-FM signal at Fordham,” he said. “And nothing pre-empted sports.”

He called play-by-play for basketball, football, hockey and baseball in the ‘70s. He was sports director for WVXU in his senior year, 1978.

When he needed an air check for future employment – again John Cirillo went way out of the box.

“I called the New York Rangers and their PR man John Halligan,” he said. “John set me up in the upper press box at the old Garden, gave us press notes and even got us Emil Francis as a radio guest between periods.”

Did we forget to mention Halligan was a grad of Fordham?

The contacts continued – one in particular, Tim Rooney owner of Yonkers Raceway. “I loved harness racing,” he said, “and asked Tim for a recommendation for an opening at Hollywood Park.”

All Rooney does is respond and say, “Hey, why don’t you work here with us?”

At Yonkers he co-hosted the Racing from Yonkers TV show with the late Stan Bergstein and Spencer Ross.

Next stop – New York Knicks in 1984 and he stayed with the Garden through 1997 as a Senior VP.

The mind was churning – a new challenge was in the offing.

Boxing called.

“I noticed, we had no banners in the Garden for boxing,” he said. “He told then Garden boss Dave Checketts, ‘Let me handle this.’”

He did.

Within a year – by Dec. 15, 1995 — Oscar Della Hoya was fighting Jesse James in the Garden. The HBO series Boxing After Dark followed with Lennox Lewis, Holyfield and other front-liners.

Cirillo World’s sports media contacts combined with its athlete and broadcast relationships provides a unique combination for media coverage and creative special events.

John Cirillo takes his expertise back to his alma mater – Fordham – once-a-week to teach a sports communications course.

“We touch on PR, marketing, broadcasting, writing and advertising all in sports,” he said, as he keeps the Fordham tradition of feeding the media world with talent.

“I’ve been doing this for some 20-plus years,” he proudly says.

The man they dubbed Johnny Cigar has given back.

Oh, by the way did we ever learn how he got that moniker?

“We used to hang out at Elaine’s after games in the Garden,” he said, “and Bob Raissman of the New York Daily News called me ‘Johnny Cigar’ after I lit one up. And it stuck.”

And I’ll smoke to that.

Andy Furman is a Fox Sports Radio national talk show host. Previously, he was scholastic sports columnist for the Brooklyn Eagle. He may be reached at: [email protected].