The Commentator Conundrum

Written by: Gabe

Last night, DC United was gracious and savvy enough to provide a live online video feed of the US Open Cup match against Columbus. As the feed was a service provided by DC, the franchise provided the game commentator as well.

This created a somewhat fiery situation between DC and Crew supporters, manifested publicly on Twitter and Facebook, on the topic of the announcer’s biased commentary. He was a “homer,” as many Crew fans claimed, and I admit I was among the complainers. His chief offense was second-guessing the referee, unilaterally in favor of DC—from the penalty, to the red card, to repeated events involving Frankie Hejduk. He said for example (paraphrasing a comment he made late in the second half), that if the home crowd disagrees with the referee, then it’s clear the referee is wrong (the game was in DC). Ironic or not, the sentiment was at least divisive.

The unanswered question is, who wants biased announcers anyway? Do home fans really want another dude complaining about “blown calls” and disparaging the other team? I have plenty of biases, and will likely provide my own subjective commentary during matches… only mine is louder and with more curse words (i.e., better). A professional commentator at any level should enhance the action with insight, intonation, facts, and neutral, reasoned critique.

To be clear, I am opposed to most subjective commentary in sports. The Crew’s local broadcaster, ONN, employs a staff guilty of the same offenses as DC’s commentator and is equally annoying. By contrast, national broadcasters FSC and ESPN announce from a noticeably more objective point of view (except bad boy John Harkes) and hence I enjoy watching nationally-televised MLS games most. Assuming money doesn’t buy objectivity in the field of sports commentary (does “I’ll pay you more if you stop picking sides” sound plausible to you?), there is no reason we shouldn’t hold our local affiliates to the same standard.