Jon Tannenwald of Philly.com’s soccer blog The Goalkeeper joins the show to talk about USA-Brazil. But first…

Don’t think for one min that I haven’t been taking mental notes of everyone taking shots at me this summer. And I mean everyone!

Is this, before our eyes, a real-life heel turn? We mentioned this before with regards to Tiger Woods. He’s made enough money, so why not go heel and try something new. At the very least, he can be himself and wouldn’t feel beholden to corporate interests. And, think about how many people love the villains (see: nWo) so the endorsements may be just as lucrative as a bad guy.

This, it seems, is LeBron’s marketing strategy. It’s fantastic. Or, if he’s not trying to do this, it’s a continuation of one of the worst summers in the history of public relations.

Thanks to the folks at ESPN, I was able to talk with Ian Darke about his call of Landon Donovan’s amazing goal. For a transcription of this conversation, please visit The Sporting Blog. In addition to the call, we talk about John Harkes’ reaction in the booth, the importance for American soccer and a bit about the situations in England, Italy and France.

Thanks to the folks at ESPN, I was able to talk with Ian Darke about his call of Landon Donovan’s amazing goal. For a transcription of this conversation, please visit . In addition to the call, we talk about John Harkes’ reaction in the booth, the importance for American soccer and a bit about the situations in England, Italy and France.

And since Darke is now officially part of the fabric of American sports with this call, would he ever want to branch out and do some college football?

Again, go to TSB to read, or listen above. Thanks and Go Go USA!
And since Darke is now officially part of the fabric of American sports with this call, would he ever want to branch out and do some college football?

Again, go to TSB to read, or listen above. Thanks and Go Go USA!

Rather than listen to us talk about Landon Donovan’s goal in stoppage time to get the United States into the second round of the World Cup, we thought we could do that tomorrow. Today, listen to the incredible call by ESPN’s Ian Darke. Darke had a wonderful play-by-play call and, with John Harkes too choked [...]

It’s a soccerific show. We talk about the USMNT match against Algeria, discuss if Mexico should play for the tie against Uruguay just to advance — and be forced to play Argentina – or if they should play to win, even if trying to win may open themselves up for a loss. We also talk [...]

We talk about three things today. First, a rundown of the U.S. Open, focusing a lot on NBC’s coverage but a good amount on the actual tournament itself. Second we talk about the World Cup. I’ll admit I had hoped to talk more about England and France than we did. I’m still really worked up [...]

We’ve started to talk a lot of soccer on this show, and will continue to do so during the World Cup. Sometimes it will be just one segment at the end of the show. Other times, like today, it will be the whole focus.

Matthew from The Shin Guardian joins the show to talk about the start of the World Cup, the likelihood that the USMNT could actually go out and beat England on Saturday and, well, gets us primed for this:

First, we talk a lot about what this means to America and to ESPN. How important is the World Cup for the WWL’s future soccer business. We don’t expect to see as many plugs for MLS as in the past, but will the announcers be charged with simply calling the matches, or does ESPN have a stake in capturing more and more soccer fans who only care every four years? Can this lead to increased exposure (and ratings) for future Premiership matches on ESPN? Could this help MLS? And does ESPN need to worry about that, or can they just revel in the fact that people are actually watching what’s on now?

We discuss US Soccer’s role in growing the game in America, which includes being progressive in social media and a heavy involvement with blogs. As a blog that covers soccer, does he feel more welcome than he anticipated? It’s easy for me to say US Soccer is doing a good job, but for those who do this every day, how helpful are they?

In Philly I spoke with Clint Dempsey and Tim Howard about how much pressure they feel going into the World Cup. Landon Donovan has been quoted as saying the average American doesn’t really care if the US doesn’t fare well, which is different than the pressure they feel in England. While true, has that changed from past years? Are there higher expectations on the US team this time around?

And can they win on Saturday? More important than that…can they get out of the group? And if they don’t, how devastating will that be?

We talk a great deal about the injuries in the World Cup and try to figure out . Essien? Drogba if he’s unable to go? Ballack? Nani? We run down how tough it will be for some of teams to replace their injured stars.

Continue reading and listen to the show…

First, Andy Hutchins hops on (from what sounds like the back of a truck) to talk about the weekend. Andy is the weekend editor at The Sporting Blog — as well as writing a ton during the week — so we talk about the big storylines from Saturday and Sunday.

Andy feels the Celtics are the biggest story, so we briefly discuss that. We then talk about Rafael Nadal, and if at some point it becomes ridiculous when an athlete falls to the ground after winning what seemed like a pretty easy match. Come on, he won in three sets and was never challenged in either of them. Does that really warrant laying on the ground? Sure it was a culmination of triumph after a tough yet, but doesn’t it show just a little lack of respect for the opponent, and the moment?

Maybe that’s my biggest issue with it…the crowd was just politely applauding. It wasn’t an Oh My Gawd moment, so Nadal’s “I’m overwhelmed by my own greateness” moment seemed out of place.

That spins to talk about ESPN and the USMNT, where we talk at great length about Martin Tyler, John Harkes and the call of the match against Australia. The call fell flat, and perhaps it was because of the lack of energy in the stadium. Could this happen again or will a stadium that’s bigger and presumably louder help?

Also, are we concerned about Tyler calling the USA England match on US TV? Do we want our announcers to be homers?

More on this in Press Coverage later today.

We do talk briefly about game five of the Stanley Cup finals where it looks like I’m going to owe Kaduk some Tastykakes.

Thanks to Andy for hopping on last minute. We end with a talk about the pressure for the USMNT. I had the chance to ask Clint Dempsey and Tim Howard about that last week. We end with their thoughts. They are at the 26:00 mark.

Thanks for listening.

What a holiday weekend in sports. We start with a conversation about Roy Halladay’s perfect game, but rather than discuss the game between us – full disclosure, I was watching the hockey then switched over and tracked back to watch after the fact while Nick had the foresight to watch both – we thought it would make more sense to talk with one of the men who had the opportunity to call the 20th perfect game in Major League history.

Scott Franzke, radio play-by-play man for the Phillies, joins the show to talk about that amazing performance, and what it was like in the booth. At what point did they start to think they might be witnessing something special? How was Larry Anderson during the game, and were they conscious of superstition throughout the broadcast? How many times did Franzke mention the word perfect? Did he say “perfect game” before it happened?

We also discuss the historic nature of calling something like a perfect game. After Dallas Braden’s perfect game this season, Nick and I talked about beat writers crafting the “perfect game story” knowing that more people will be reading that day than, perhaps, any other in a writer’s career. For someone doing play-by-play, Franzke doesn’t have the luxury of thinking out what he’s going to say, and hitting a delete key. So how perfect did he try to be? Did he have something in his mind for the last out should Halladay complete the perfect game?

And seriously, how nervous were they in the booth? More on this later today on The Sporting Blog.

The Weekend that Was:

Nick and I rundown the weekend in sports, including the Stanley Cup finals (and the ratings for game one that some people — looking at you John Gonzalez — thought wouldn’t be good because of the holiday). We also discuss the rest of the series, and if the Flyers should be worried or feel fine with the fact that, on the road, they were in both games.

Next, we spend a lot of time talking about the game both of us attended on Saturday at Lincoln Financial Field. The U.S. men’s soccer team defeated Turkey in their final Send-off Match before heading to South Africa for the World Cup.

I worked the match for Sporting News, so we give a rundown of some of the storylines that came out of the even. I also try to convince you, Nick and myself, that soccer is now for the cool kids. If a member of the media says they don’t watch soccer now because it’s boring, that’s an old and tired meme that will, finally, make them look stupid. Soccer isn’t boring, we just weren’t any good at it. Now, we might be.

Housekeeping:

We talk about Lakers Celtics and if we’re rooting for the Lakers (and Kobe) or just rooting against everything related to Boston. We also talk about which is a more lame way to win a game, a walkoff balk or a walkoff grand slam where you break your leg.

Thanks to Scott and click here to listen…

This is totally two shows crammed into one, which is always fun and something we haven’t done in a while.

First, Jon Tannenwald of Philly.com’s soccer blog The Goalkeeper joins the show to talk about the USMNT following their pre World Cup match against the Czech Republic last night. What did we learn? Who will make the final squad and hop on the plane to South Africa?

We run through the night, the players and take a look at Saturday’s match in Philly where, presumably, the starting 11 will take the field.

Following that, at around the 19 minute mark for those only interested in one of our two topics today (please listen to both), joins the show, not to talk baseball, but to talk PUCKS. We run through the recent history of the Blackhawks and talk about bandwagon jumpers this time of year (which I am probably one).

I’ll be honest, I thought we’d talk more trash, but it became a pretty reasonable conversation. Oh, and we do have our bet mayoral bet set up for the Stanley Cup….Eli’s Cheesecake vs. TastyKakes.

Continue reading and listen to the show…

We start with some talk about the Flyers making it to the Stanley Cup Finals, but in no way do we gush like we have in the past about the Phillies. We’re unabashed bandwagon hoppers this year.

Oh, we’re having a mayoral bet with Kevin Kaduk of Yahoo’s Big League Stew. What should be ask for from Chicago? We’re putting up some TastyKakes. And for the record, , but do not expect them to do so.

PRINT’S NOT DEAD

We talk about the Dwayne Bowe story that’s circulating from ESPN the Magazine about a chicken in every pot, or in this case, a woman in every room. Should this get him in trouble with the team? Is his “bad judgement” as Nick put it the fact that he was a part of this or that he told the media about the clandestine situation that has been going on for FIFTY YEARS? And that’s our question: when did this start to become news? Hasn’t this kind of thing happened since professional sports began, but what wasn’t news decades ago — a secret kept by the media from the public for the players — is now front-page stuff.

And this story didn’t come from a gossip blog. This was testimony in a national magazine. We discuss the transition of the media going from being on the player’s side of this imaginary line to being on the public’s.

We also touch on the story from Friday on Deadspin about the woman who defecated in a trash can (due to, what she claims, were medical circumstances). Why is that on Deadspin? Because it happened at ESPN. Nick and I take both sides of the way Craggs handled the story.