Another rant

I have to say, that Marcelo Balboa, the main color commentator on the World Cup coverage, is the absolute worst sportscaster I have ever heard in my life. He is worse than Tim McCarver, Joe Morgan, and Marv Albert. He is worse than Dick Vitale, and that idiot that WJCW has calling local basketball games back home. You know....the guy who has had the same catch phrase since 1991 ("He Roars, Soars, and Scores"). Well, Balboa is worse.

To give you an example, in today's England-Portugal match, prodigal striker Wayne Rooney got tangled up with another player and proceeded to step on his nuts. He then pushed his club teammate Christiano Ronaldo and the ref red carded him. Balboa's comment, when Rooney removed the need for the guy to have a vasectomy, was "That's a no no."

You think? You really think that the average American viewer, watching the quarterfinal of the World Cup between England and Portugal, needs to know that stepping on a guy's old boys is illegal? Granted, if it was legal a lot more Americans would watch, but still I think most people know that.

As a follow-up, at some point in the last ten minutes of regulation when the score was tied, he made a statement to the effect of "England needs to score a goal to win."

Damn! I didn't know you had to score goals to win soccer games. I thought Beckham would just win on style points if there was a draw. Geez o pete.

Seriously. This guy is the best that ABC could find to showcase soccer as US soccer is trying to draw more fans? He absolutely sucks. I don't care how good of a player he was for the US, he has no business behind a microphone in a soccer match unless he is talking on his cell phone.