Almost the end of the week here as Friday gets closer by the second. Tonight I’ve got a couple links and items to discuss. Pretty much they are all MLS based, with some reactions to stuff that people wrote earlier in the day.

First up I want to get into a post that Steve Goff wrote earlier today about the lack of quality on Tuesday night’s FSC broadcast of the CONCACAF Champions League. I bring it up first since it is really a couple days old but I felt it was worth repeating since FSC as we all know is getting loads more soccer coming its way this fall with the Champions League and what not. Sorry if it is old news to you but I enjoy a good rant about FSC as much as the next guy.

Here’s what Goff had to say:

For those of you who did watch…..

I think we are all in agreement that Janicki was a disaster — poor footwork, no confidence, slow reaction. The second-worst performance of the night was offered by Fox Soccer Channel play-by-play announcer Christian Miles, who…..

…..continues to refer to former DCU goalie Louis Crayton as “Luiz” or “Luis” Crayton. He’s Liberian, not Brazilian.

…..promoted the Galaxy-United game on FSC Saturday by saying Los Angeles would be without David Beckham. He’s sitting out Wednesday at Chicago.

…..suggested that Devon McTavish was in an “unaccustomed role” on the right side of midfield. McTavish has played there often the past few years.

…..said in the second half that the referee had yet to issue a yellow when he had already given two.

Not Miles’s fault, but the DCU lineup graphic included “No. 99 Mario Rodriguez.”

Look, I love FSC as much as anyone and appreciate the network’s commitment to the sport and the variety of matches. In defense of the announcers and behind-the-scenes folks, calling and producing a live game taking place in Central America from a studio in Los Angeles is not easy. That said, we deserve better.

The last sentence says it all in my opinion. I’ve been saying a lot of the same things about FSC for years. I love the passion they put into their work but time and time again it comes up empty, unprepared, and over pronounced.

Now calling a game from a studio has always been the downfall of FSC though, which a majority of their broadcasts are from a LA studio. Few guys can pull off a good studio broadcast and not sound like they are calling the game from a hollow cell. If I were the executives at that network I would find them.

But enough bitching about FSC for one night…I know a couple of those guys aren’t too bad in real life, while a couple are as big of douche bags as you’d think.

Moving on… Continue Reading…

This is a subject near and dear to my heart due to my history of being in the broadcast world over the last few years. I’ve been working on coming up with some sort of guide for people for when it comes to who they will probably be listening to on a broadcast of a Major League Soccer game.

I’m going to be real honest about some broadcasters on this list. If you don’t like a broadcaster of your club or a national one, that’s fine. You can always voice your opinion below. Also, I just got to a point over the last few weeks of watching/listening to games that I felt I had to say something about some of these guys in one, long post and not in some short mention in a weekend recap or something like that.

Why am I doing this? Mainly because of my history in the broacast world and because I’ve done enough soccer broadcasting to understand what it takes to have a good duo on a call.

I will say this too, I didn’t find information on all clubs here. Some were real easy to find while one or two clubs I had real trouble. So if you know who does those games and have a clue about how good they are I want to hear it as well. And saying that, it also means I haven’t seen or heard everyone on this list. I’ve made an effort to but I know for the life of me I haven’t heard everyone. A good reason may be because there probably are more national broadcasts these days and on MLSnet.tv you tend to get the same clubs’ feeds over and over again.

For time purposes and my own sake since I don’t speak the language, no Spanish broadcasters are included on here. I hardly ever listen to those guys anyways if they are the only option for a MLS game. Usually my telly is on mute in those cases. One day I swear I will learn Spanish and actually listen though.

Let’s start with the big boys first. The national broadcasters. Continue Reading…