Ray Allen
Ray Allen
Executive Producer
Born July 20, 1975; Walter Ray Allen, Jr. is widely known as one of the most gifted shooters in the history of the NBA. After a successful college career as a shooting guard for the University of Connecticut Huskies, Allen made the seamless transition from collegiate athlete to professional athlete in the National Basketball Association with the Milwaukee Bucks, Seattle Super Sonics, and Boston Celtics. In 2008, Allen won an NBA Championship, defeating the Los Angeles Lakers in six games. This win brought Banner 17 to the Boston Celtics. One of the most accurate three-point and free-throw shooters in NBA history, Ray is a 10-time NBA All-star and gold medalist after having won an Olympic gold medal as a member of the 2000 United States Men's Basketball Team in Sydney, Australia. On February 10, 2011, Ray became the NBA's all-time leader in regular season three-point goals made surpassing Reggie Miller's mark of 2,560. On March 11, 2011, Allen also surpassed Miller's career total of 6,486 three-point field goal attempts. In addition to his stellar professional basketball career, Ray devotes an enormous amount of time, personal resources, and passion to the community. An accomplished actor, Allen has acted in two feature films including a co-staring role opposite Oscar winner, Denzel Washington in the 1998 Spike Lee drama, He Got Game. Allen started the Ray of Hope Foundation in 1997 to support sports related and community based programs to provide opportunities, which youth can "hope" to realize their full potential. Ray is also an active member of the Joslin Diabetes Center's Board of Trustees in honor of his son Walker's daily battle with Type 1 diabetes, a potentially life threatening condition that increasingly affects millions of children and adults all over the world. ;
Shannon Allen
Shannon Allen
Executive Producer
After leaving Shades to pursue her acting career, Shannon made guest appearances on "Sex and the City" and "Strangers With Candy," and has performed in recurring roles on "Blues Clues" and "Century City" and "Sesame English." She currently resides outside of Boston, Massachusetts with her husband Ray Allen of the Boston Celtics, and their four children, Tierra, Ray III, Walker, and Wynn. In 2008, Shannon and Ray's 17-month-old son Walker was diagnosed with Type 1 Diabetes while the family was in Los Angeles during the Celtics' historic win over the LA Lakers at the NBA finals. Since their son's diagnosis, both Shannon and Ray have become activists within the diabetes community. In their efforts to both find a cure as well as raise the level of awareness of this potentially life-threatening disease, Shannon and Ray are dedicating their life to this cause in Walker's honor. Shannon is a member of the Executive Committee of the International Board of Directors of the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation. The couple actively devotes their time and efforts by fundraising through family centered signature events and work with extraordinary organizations that offer real hope for a brighter future to children through Ray's Foundation of over 15 years, the Ray of Hope Foundation. Shannon and Ray have real hope for a day when all children, regardless of race, sex, religious or socio-economic background; are healthy, well nourished, fit, loved, encouraged and supported in their journey to live their dreams. ;
Brian Pines
Brian Pines
Executive Producer
Brian Pines is the founder and President of Hypomania Content, a multimedia production company. In addition to "The Pre-Game Meal", Hypomania is currently producing "Savage U." a series for MTV which will premiere in 2012. Brian previously headed TV production and development for Josephson Entertainment ("Bones") and ran Heel & Toe Films, where he was Executive in Charge of Production for the first 37 episodes of the series "House". Prior to Heel & Toe Films, Brian worked for the actresses Susan Sarandon and Julia Ormond, and was an entertainment publicist at the firm Nancy Seltzer & Associates. He lives in Los Angeles. ;
JoAnn Cianciulli
JoAnn Cianciulli
Culinary Producer
Cook, culinary producer, and author, JoAnn Cianciulli (chan-chew-lee) has become known as one of the food industry's top insiders. A pioneer in her field, Cianciulli's experience ranges from co-creating and producing old-school Food Network shows such as Food 911 with Tyler Florence, co-authoring cookbooks with world-renowned chefs like Michael Mina, serving as an industry expert on television shows including Bravo's Top Chef Masters and most recently, as author of her own cookbooks, L.A.'s Original Farmers Market Cookbookand The MasterChef Cookbook. A witty, whirling-dervish hailing from New York, JoJo (as she is fondly called,) grew up in an Italian-American restaurant family. She began her appreciation for food at the age of twelve; her father Dominic took over acclaimed chef/restaurateur Lidia Bastianich's first restaurant, Buonavia, in Queens. Translated, the name means "the good way," which has become JoJo's mantra ever since. ;
Orin Mayers
Orin Mayers
Business Manager
Over 17 years of experience working on NBA matters from both the athlete, agency and team sides. In 1993, Orin worked for the Milwaukee Bucks Basketball Team in Sales, Promotions, Marketing and Player Programs. In 2002, he worked as Executive Assistant with Ray Allen Enterprises and was promoted, in 2005, to Business Manager. Orin's responsibilities include coordination of financial affairs, marketing and charitable endeavors. In 2008, he served as a Sports Consultant with the law firm Williams & Connolly, assisting with basketball player recruiting. Orin has a B.S. in Business Administration from Indiana University. He enjoys golf, playing basketball, and movies. ;
Stephanie Laffin
Stephanie Laffin
Producer
Stephanie began her television career working as the casting associate on projects including "Law and Order: SVU" and on the pilot of "Six Feet Under." After moving to Los Angeles, Stephanie worked as the casting associate on the television series "Monk" and "Century City" as well as the films Little Black Book, Nine Lives, Keeping up with the Steins, and Saw 2. For the past six seasons, Stephanie has been a casting director on "House" (Emmy nomination, 2006; Artios nomination, 2009) as well as numerous pilots and feature films. ;
Karen Warman, MD
Karen Warman, MD
Nutritionist
Karen is a registered dietitian working in the field for 30 years. Her career has focused on nutritional health of children, adolescents and young adults. She is currently providing care at Children's Hospital Boston. She has provided nutrition care at Johns Hopkins in Baltimore, Children's National Medical Center in Washington D.C and Rainbow Babies & Children's Hospital in Cleveland, OH during her career. In addition to direct client care she has worked as a research dietitian with focus on lowering sodium to control blood pressure and providing low glycemic load meal plan to assist with maintaining healthy body weight and improvement in athletic performance.;
Brandyn Cooper
Brandyn Cooper
Director of Marketing
Brandyn began his career at Nike Inc., where he served in various capacities in Entertainment Marketing, PR, Digital Brand Marketing and finally Pro Basketball Sports Marketing. While at Nike, Brandyn had the opportunity to work with some of the world's best professional athletes and coaches. A former athlete himself, Brandyn played collegiate basketball at Fordham University, where he received his B.S. in Business Administration and is an advocate for healthy lifestyle and exercise. ;
Nick Corrado
Nick Corrado
Asst. Marketing Director
Nick is a Northeastern University student fulfilling his Co-op credit working for LAB Entertainment. He studies biology and business at Northeastern. Nick loves to share his knowledge and experiences of healthy eating and exercise, which he learned growing up as a wrestler. His major contributions to the show have been designing the Pre-Game Meal website, helping with the launch party for the show, as well as implementing non-traditional marketing to increase viewership for the show. ;
