There has been consternation on the internet that American broadcasters will be limited to commenting from the studio during the breaks. Some bloggers and message boards have chalked ESPN's decision up to Eurocentrism. (No, that doesn't really work, although it is technically correct. Anglophilism. I don't even think that is a word. At any rate.) There is a belief or worry that ESPN put Martin Tyler on because of a prejudice that English soccer announcers are inherently better than U.S. announcers.
I have no idea what went into ESPN's decision, but, other than such a prejudice certainly exists, I see no reason to suspect that distaste for U.S. sportscasters was ESPN's motivation. Martin Tyler is, quite simply, one of the best, if not the best. He is well-respected and has considerable experience in World Cup play-by-play, not to mention soccer play-by-play in general. The U.S. does not have announcers with the experience, nor the quality, nor the eloquence of Martin Tyler. It is arguable whether England has any other announcers of his caliber. ESPN did not pick up a couple of Brits who normally cover the Championship League. ESPN picked, yes, a Brit, but a Brit who covers the biggest, most popular league in the English-speaking world. They picked him because virtually any English-language channel would love to have him cover the World Cup.
They aren't having him do play-by-play for the MLS from studio in London. I wouldn't want him, he's not an American. He doesn't know the cultures of the cities, supporters' groups, or history. There are American announcers for the MLS; they are improving and are not the worst soccer announcers that I have heard. Sometimes the Brits used by Fox Soccer Channel for the matches between weaker teams seem closer to Eugene Levy in Best in Show than they do to Martin Tyler, BBC accents or no. But ESPN's MLS play-by-play commentary is sloppy (As an aside, does Alexi Lalas need a female soccer star in the studio with him? He was ridiculously jittery for some reason). Last night, for the MLS's opening game for 2010, they made numerous references to Philadelphia's match against DC United next week (it is two weeks away), clearly had no idea who Andrew Jacobson was after he took a shot - waiting until they could see his number and name on his jersey, and misidentified players on numerous occasions. All these things happen. I am in no way saying that I would do better. I'm a DC United fan and I doubt that I could pick Andrew Jacobson out of line-up. They are sloppy though. Do British announcers make similar mistakes? Absolutely. The idea or hope is that Martin Tyler will make fewer, having seen so many of these players play previously and having considerable first hand-knowledge of World Cup tournaments past and that he will demonstrate the eloquence that he typically shows that will improve our game experience.
I admit, I am a sucker for some of the British expressions, Tommy Smyth's color commentary (before he jumped his own shark), and the generally more esoteric language used by many British announcers. It can add a sense of exo-cultural experience to watching a soccer game. Certainly, that can be mistaken for "authenticity," or superiority; maybe ESPN did make that mistake, but even if they did, I think they arrived at the right decision for the wrong reasons.
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