Hispanic Heritage Month 2026: Adrian García Márquez, play-by-play broadcaster

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Welcome in San Diego, it's Jade Hindman. On this episode of KPBS Midday Edition, a familiar voice joins us to celebrate Hispanic Heritage Month. Hear from award-winning sportscaster, Adrian Garcia Marquez. This is KPBS Midday Edition, connecting our communities through conversation. As we celebrate Hispanic Heritage Month, we're highlighting voices across the community. This next voice will be familiar for soccer fans.

It's Chucky Lozano. Chucky on approach. Chucky delivers into the box. Dangerous. And it's going to be a goal. Goal! Jeff Petershoff! El Capitan! El Jefe!

How can you not be hype after that? That is Adrian Garcia Marquez. He's the play-by-play radio announcer for San Diego FC. He's also the Spanish play-by-play voice for the Chargers in Los Angeles. But it's not all soccer. His Emmy-winning career has taken him to the NBA, the NFL, several World Series, and the Olympics. Adrian Garcia Marquez joins me now to talk about it. Welcome to Midday Edition.

No, no, thank you. Thank you, Jay. I'm just happy to be here.

Glad to have you here. So listen, you grew up right here in Chula Vista. What was the sports scene like then? What do you remember?

Well, it was one of the best sports teams, I think, ever in the history of San Diego. If you look at how competitive it was, you know, growing up right between Chula Vista, Imperial Beach, San Ysidro. So it was especially on the baseball side, it was highly competitive. That's where Benji Gill came out of, obviously, that whole generation. Jose Silva, later on, you get Adrián González. Before that, Oscar Robles. So the baseball scene was red hot as far as sports were concerned. And then for football at Southwest High. We ran a very good program, Coach Parrick there at Southwest. Sorry, I almost dropped my phone. And it was just always a very competitive environment from the time we were playing flag football right there at the South Bay Rec Center and playing basketball, flag football, you name it, soccer from AYSO to the Boys and Girls Club right there in Imperial Beach. So it was very much a great time to be a kid growing up in the 80s, 90s there in San Diego.

And I hear your interest in sports broadcasting began in the sixth grade. Tell me about that story.

You know, I have to thank Mrs. Jen Sherrill. She was my sixth grade teacher there at Berry Elementary. And what she used to do, she was such a great, and this is just a