Perez Records ESPN Deportes’ Pan American Games Anthem “Respira El Momento”

René Perez is having a moment

The 37-year-old Puerto Rican singer and Calle 13 member, better known by his stage “Residente,” has recorded the track “Respira El Momento,ESPN Deportes’ anthem for the 2015 Pan American Games.

René Perez, Calle 13 Residente

The sports network premiered a promo video on Monday featuring Perez singing in New York’s Electric Lady studio, intercut with scenes of athletes training.

“Respira el Momento” is a track from the Grammy-winning 2014 album Multi_Viral, but it seems tailor-made for the international sporting event.

“It’s a song about life and about seizing the moment and the momentum to achieve something,” Pérez tells Billboard. “It seemed like the perfect song for the games.”

ESPN will broadcast over 270 hours of the Pan American Games in Spanish and English. Coverage will include the opening ceremonies, which have not been show on English-language television since the 1970s. ESPN has exclusive U.S. rights to the games.

Santa Brito, director of consumer marketing for ESPN Deportes, says that coverage of the 2015 Pan Am Games is a priority. The network is increasing its broadcast hours of the event on its Spanish and English-language stations after its coverage of the 2011 Games in Guadalajara received notably high ratings. The video promos featuring the music, the athletes, and Pérez himself, will be used in- and off-channel, across Pan Am programming and multiple platforms.

The Pan American Games have historically been crucial for athletes in Latin America, and a must-see event for audiences there, and by extension for U.S. Hispanics. The games were first held in Buenos Aires in 1951.

In preparation for the promo campaign, called “Yo Digo Presente,” ESPN Deportes crews traveled through the U.S. and Latin America interviewing athletes.

“There was a common theme,” Brito says. “In their training, the athletes were visualizing themselves in the Pan American games. They were breathing the moment.”

A lifelong baseball fan, Pérez grew up playing the game in a field across the street from his house in Puerto Rico. Last year, he drafted the great Willie Mays to appear in the clip for “Adentro,” another song from Multi_Viral.

“I thought I was going to be playing in the major leagues,” says the rapper, singer and songwriter, who currently lives in Brooklyn. “But in the end I had to decide between baseball and art. And I chose art.”

Herrera’s Got Game in His Next Big Project…

Mexican singer and actor Alfonso “Poncho” Herrera is preparing to bend it like Beckham on TV…

The 28-year-old former member of the Mexican pop group RBD will portray a professional soccer player seeking glory in the first original scripted series on Spanish-language sports cable network ESPN Deportes.

Alfonso Poncho Herrera

Entitled El Diez, the 10-episode series centers on Chava Espinoza, a young Mexican soccer player whose performance in the Under-20 World Cup makes him a star sought after by all of the world’s most important clubs.

“I played soccer since I was a little kid. I love soccer, and having to play this role is awesome,” says Herrera. “It’s a very realistic script and I truly believe nobody else has ever showed what’s behind the soccer industry the way El Diez does.”

The sports-themed novela will delve into Espinoza’s rise to fame—the highs and lows of being a superstar—and how he deals with the enormous burden of his fans’ expectations.

“In the story, Chava plays for a fictitious Mexican soccer team called Los Lobos del Atlético Nacional, but other than that all the stories showed in the episodes are completely real,” says series creator and producer Mauricio Quintana. “They show what happens inside the locker rooms and outside the field with the people that manage this incredibly profitable industry.”

The series—based on the real life experiences of former players, soccer team executives and sports journalists from Mexico, Spain and Argentina—will highlight issues like corruption, under-the-table negotiations and the invasion of privacy a soccer star faces.

“We show the audience all they want to see from the perspective of Latinos’ passion for soccer. There have been other movies that show the life of a soccer player in the British league or the league from Spain,” says Herrera. “But El Diez is completely made to give our audience what they want to see: Las Chivas, América teams and much more related to our Latino culture.”

The Spanish-language El Diez will be transmitted with English subtitles on Sundays at 9:00 pm ET on ESPN Deportes.