If you, like me and the other 1.2 billion people, have been religiously watching the 2006 World Cup of Soccer – getting up early on Saturdays, taking time off work, calling in sick, taking long lunches, or just sneaking out to the TV room – you have undoubtedly been cringing while listening to the ESPN commentators.  I know for a fact that I’m not the only person that have been grunting “shut the f*** up!” at least once every game.

American soccer commentators have been nothing short of awful.  In fact, even the Wall Street Journal has acknowledged the growing public dissatisfaction, nay – repulsion! – with work of Dave O’Brien, Marcelo Balboa, and the rest of the clowns.  For years ESPN (who also handles the sports broadcasts for ABC) has been trying to dumb the game down, in order to attract more of the “casual” fans.  Now, with the World Cup audience in America nearly DOUBLING from 1998, the network executives seem to think that these people need to be retained and entertained the only way their commentators know how:  by irrelevant stories and anecdotes during broadcasts.

O’Brien, the leading play-by-play ESPN broadcaster, has never covered a soccer game before this world cup – NEVER!  He is a baseball commentator.  And he is covering games just as he does baseball.  But soccer is the exact opposite of baseball.  In baseball, there are more pauses than plays, with plays lasting several seconds, and one simply must come up with quasi-related stories and analyses, just to fill the blanks.  In soccer, there is only one intermission; the play is continuous.  Action on the field should provide the TV crew with plenty of material to discuss.  But not O’Brien & Co.  They talk about everything in the universe – except the action on the field.  Countries that border Germany and Ecuador, population of Trinidad & Tobago, Shevchenko’s and Beckham’s wives, and political situation in Iran – all of those vital soccer topics are covered.  U.S.’s performance is brought up in every game – even long after U.S. has been eliminated.  But who has the ball on the field and what is he going to do with it – that is usually beneath the commentators.  During the second semi-final, O’Brien repeated that “the winner of today’s contest will go on to face Italy to play for the Cup and the loser will go home” seven times.  Trivialities run rampant.  But one story NOT mentioned is the fact that both Christiano Ronaldo and Wayne Rooney, involved in what was perhaps the most controversial episode of the tournament so far, both play for the same team, Manchester United.  And the only person with a semblance of soccer knowledge, Irish-accented Tommy Smyth, only did a couple of games in the group round.

And the endless criticism of teams and players!  If one were to go by their comments at the beginning of the tournament, one would assume that USA was the best team the world, with only Brazil as their rivals.  France and Czech Republic were deemed “old” (“old” Czechs kicked USA’s ass and “old” French are now in the final), Germany – “inevitably about to collapse” (“collapsing” Germany made it to the semis, as they always do), Ukraine – “Shevchenko + 10 others” (Shevchenko scored two goals, “others” – six), and Beckham – “not scoring and not leading the team” (Beckham almost single-handedly won two games for England).  And so on and so forth.

ESPN, evidently, could not find any real experts to discuss games (soccer in America is still looking for its Barry Melrose and Dick Vitale), so they got the only people they could find:  former members of the national team, both men and women.  Wrong choice!  Good players aren’t always good game experts, and, even with Alexi Lalas still trying to look appealing to Hollywood, their discussions are boring, trivial, and also very negative (Eric Wynalda being the sole exception).  Almost nobody I know watches the half-time reports.  At the end, for adequate coverage, many people switch to the Spanish-language channels.  At least commentators there are passionate and knowledgeable about the game, and when they screw up – I can’t understand them.

In addition, the video replays on ESPN are a travesty and a lesson on how not to do them.  All they show is the final kick or header, with the ball crossing the goal line, completely omitting what is a lot more important for every real fan:  the combination that led to the goal.  I was never able to see the full beauty of Spain’s goal against Ukraine, when they went from their own goal to the opposing in seven crisp passes.  In every highlight I only saw the final shot.

So, even though we, American soccer fans, are grateful to ESPN for bringing us all 64 games of the Most Important Sporting Event in the World, their coverage definitely has room for improvement, especially in the personalities department.  But, to be fair:  I don’t think American commentators are the worst in the world.  Russian commentator Tvaltvadze can make anybody look like a college professor in communications.  I am happy he has not been hired by ESPN.