mr. furley
Footballguy
i'm having a hard time listening to the announcers on US games.Furley, just watch the US team play and you'll get a pretty good sense of who's who and where they play their club soccer. They're pretty spread out right now though ... a lot are in MLS (USA), some are in Liga Mex, some are in the EPL (England) and several key players are in the Bundesliga (Germany). But if you try to watch all of them to start you'll drown in soccer. Best to just pick a league you think sounds interesting and start there. Or just pick several of the world's best teams (Barcelona, Real Madrid, Liverpool, Juventus, Bayern Munich) and watch them. You'll get a steady stream of great soccer that way and get more familiar with players on other teams as you do.
when compared to the guys calling European (etc.) games it's a totally different experience.
you can hear the inexperience in their calls. it's so formulaic and boring. all the color guys go to the same broadcast school.. whatever they call the training when guys go straight from the sport to the booth.... and it shows. they all sound exactly the same. the same narratives, the same shtick, cadence, etc. it's boring listening to them fumbling through canned anecdotes and pre-packaged one-liners.
their depth of knowledge seems to be lacking, too. maybe because it's being dumbed down for the American audience? i dunno.
when listening to the experienced guys calling EPL games, or even the non-Americans at the World Cup, there's a totally different rhythm to the call. they aren't constantly talking, trying to fill every single second with conversation. they let the game breathe. they talk about individual players club play. about their previous performances in other tournaments, etc. they feel more familiar with the game. more certain in their knowledge. they're discussing soccer history, players fitness, contracts, transfers, etc. it feels like you're more immersed in the experience.
i don't feel like i'm really learning anything about the game or players that isn't obvious on the surface to anyone who just happens to turn in that may have zero contact with the sport.
listening to American soccer calls is like overhearing some guy at the bar explaining the game to his wife while she reads Cosmo and yells at the kids.
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