Bradley Moisés Küntz Samaniego
- Actor
- Director
- Writer
Bradley Moisés Küntz Samaniego is a German-Panamanian-American actor. He was awarded the AT&T/WarnerMedia Veterans Fellowship on the December 27th edition of NFL RedZone (2009).
Bradley Moisés Küntz Samaniego was born in Fort Riley, Kansas, his father a German-American Soldier and mother a Panamanian-American Federal Civil Servant, daughter to Panamanian legendary troubadour Moisés Samaniego and cousin to World Champion boxers Roberto Durán and Santiago Samaniego. He was raised multi-culturally due to his family's many overseas duty stations, including Panama City, Panama; Frankfurt, Germany; Seoul, South Korea; and Tokyo, Japan; as well as stateside stations in Washington, D.C. and Fort Riley, Kansas. He also spent significant time with his parents and step-parents families in Tahlequah, Oklahoma and Greenwich, Connecticut.
He spent his early adult life pursuing his dream of following in the footsteps of his Panamanian relatives as a boxer. He began training with the Army Combatives program during high school by joining the Army Reserves and then enrolling in the ROTC program at Kansas State University. During college, his combat career began to surge and he would be offered a job as a Military Trainer for the U.S. Air Force in Kyrgyzstan, ending his tenure in the military. He would use his free time to begin training and fighting in Thailand and the Netherlands before joining the Golden Glory kickboxing team in Essex County, England, under Horia Radulescu in November 2012. Deciding he wanted a stateside home, he would move to the Washington, D.C. area during his off-season. While there he would meet his future-wife as well as attempt to reconnect with his mother who he had not lived with since he was six years old. This attempt would be in vain but she would connect him with Benny and Oscar Checa, the final coaches of Roberto Durán. Upon entering the Checa brothers' gym in Belfast, Northern Ireland, he would fall in love with boxing and begin competing in both sports. This would ultimately lead to a falling-out with his kickboxing manager on how to split his time between the two sports, choosing to walk away from kickboxing with a record of 32-3, 27 KOs in August 2014.
He began his boxing career by descending into the amateur ranks with the hopes of making the U.S. Olympic team. Splitting his time between Belfast and Washington, he would get an invitation to a 2015 Olympic Trials Qualifying Tournament, failing to make weight for the tournament due to miscommunication with his DC area coaches. He would later be unable to get his then-fiancée a U.K. visa as they were awaiting her U.S. permanent residency, therefore being unable to return to train with the Checa brothers. He would fail twice more to make the Olympic team in 2016 and go on to begin his path towards the 2017 World Games. Feeling unprepared with only one sparring session in the DC area, he would cancel his appearance for the Golden Gloves and end his chances of advancement towards Worlds. He saw little hope in going professional in Washington due to the political climate of the areas boxing gyms and no chance of ever becoming World Champion without the Checa brothers in his corner, whom he considered uncles. Compounded with a child on the way, he made the decision to hang up the gloves in July 2017, with an amateur record of 36-1, 23 KOs.
Needing a change in scenery, he moved his family to Los Angeles, California, during which he would later be spotted by a casting director while playing with his son and be talked into pursuing acting. He would later be awarded the highly competitive AT&T/WarnerMedia Veterans Fellowship on the December 27th edition of NFL RedZone (2009) in order to gain the knowledge and skills to produce his own projects.
Bradley Moisés Küntz Samaniego was born in Fort Riley, Kansas, his father a German-American Soldier and mother a Panamanian-American Federal Civil Servant, daughter to Panamanian legendary troubadour Moisés Samaniego and cousin to World Champion boxers Roberto Durán and Santiago Samaniego. He was raised multi-culturally due to his family's many overseas duty stations, including Panama City, Panama; Frankfurt, Germany; Seoul, South Korea; and Tokyo, Japan; as well as stateside stations in Washington, D.C. and Fort Riley, Kansas. He also spent significant time with his parents and step-parents families in Tahlequah, Oklahoma and Greenwich, Connecticut.
He spent his early adult life pursuing his dream of following in the footsteps of his Panamanian relatives as a boxer. He began training with the Army Combatives program during high school by joining the Army Reserves and then enrolling in the ROTC program at Kansas State University. During college, his combat career began to surge and he would be offered a job as a Military Trainer for the U.S. Air Force in Kyrgyzstan, ending his tenure in the military. He would use his free time to begin training and fighting in Thailand and the Netherlands before joining the Golden Glory kickboxing team in Essex County, England, under Horia Radulescu in November 2012. Deciding he wanted a stateside home, he would move to the Washington, D.C. area during his off-season. While there he would meet his future-wife as well as attempt to reconnect with his mother who he had not lived with since he was six years old. This attempt would be in vain but she would connect him with Benny and Oscar Checa, the final coaches of Roberto Durán. Upon entering the Checa brothers' gym in Belfast, Northern Ireland, he would fall in love with boxing and begin competing in both sports. This would ultimately lead to a falling-out with his kickboxing manager on how to split his time between the two sports, choosing to walk away from kickboxing with a record of 32-3, 27 KOs in August 2014.
He began his boxing career by descending into the amateur ranks with the hopes of making the U.S. Olympic team. Splitting his time between Belfast and Washington, he would get an invitation to a 2015 Olympic Trials Qualifying Tournament, failing to make weight for the tournament due to miscommunication with his DC area coaches. He would later be unable to get his then-fiancée a U.K. visa as they were awaiting her U.S. permanent residency, therefore being unable to return to train with the Checa brothers. He would fail twice more to make the Olympic team in 2016 and go on to begin his path towards the 2017 World Games. Feeling unprepared with only one sparring session in the DC area, he would cancel his appearance for the Golden Gloves and end his chances of advancement towards Worlds. He saw little hope in going professional in Washington due to the political climate of the areas boxing gyms and no chance of ever becoming World Champion without the Checa brothers in his corner, whom he considered uncles. Compounded with a child on the way, he made the decision to hang up the gloves in July 2017, with an amateur record of 36-1, 23 KOs.
Needing a change in scenery, he moved his family to Los Angeles, California, during which he would later be spotted by a casting director while playing with his son and be talked into pursuing acting. He would later be awarded the highly competitive AT&T/WarnerMedia Veterans Fellowship on the December 27th edition of NFL RedZone (2009) in order to gain the knowledge and skills to produce his own projects.