Hope Springs a Leak
Posted on July 29, 2012 3:37 pm
In a minute I’m going to tell you exactly, word for word, what Brandi Chastain said, but first, let’s just say it up front:
Hope Solo needs to shut the hell up.
No more “We were drunk as hell on the Today Show”. No more “We snuck men past Olympic Security”. No more “winkie winkie” about banging some guy in the Olympic Village the same day you won the Gold.
And for God’s sake no more crapping on other teammates, commentators, coaches and anyone else who fails to grant you the adoration Solo feels is rightly hers.
If for no other reason than, frankly, she’s making it more and more evident with each passing incident that, to put it bluntly, people are going to start seeing her as just another boorish, obnoxious, self-aggrandizing ego-besotten athlete who everyone will be glad to see replaced.
Now that I’ve gotten that out of the way, in the interests of actually looking at the facts – which seems to most commentators to be largely if not entirely unnecessary – let’s review what happened and who said what about whom and why:
Meghan Rapinoe got the ball roughly in the center of the US half and the rest of the team is trying to transition into an attack.
To buy a few seconds as well as to maintain unchallenged possession, Rapinoe played a very simple backpass to US left back Rachel Buehler, who was directly behind her maybe 10 yards back.
Buehler takes a controlling touch and then, inexplicably, plays a slow, lazy roller at about a 45 degree angle towards the sideline.
There was no US player even remotely near where she sent it. Unfortunately, there WAS a Columbian player, who appears startled to receive such a lovely and gentle pass from an opponent, but she quickly recovers and starts an attack from well inside the US half.
Brandi Chastain, working the game for NBC, says the following:
“Defend. Win the Ball. And keep possession. That’s something that Buehler actually needs to, I think, improve on in this tournament.”
Period. End of statement. Most people – including, as I heard in an interview this morning, even Julie Foudy – took no notice of what was, to almost anyone’s ears, a simple, not particularly derogatory statement from a person who is paid to, you know, say such things.
But not to our girl Hope who hopped on her smart phone almost immediately after the match and – of course – proceeded to prove once again why most athletes should not be allowed to have Twitter accounts.
She wrote:
“Its 2 bad we cant have commentators who better represents the team&knows more about the game @brandichastain!”
First of all, do they teach English at the University of Washington? I don’t mean to be the grammar police here but that’s pretty embarrassing.
Secondly, Chastain’s job is not to “represent the team”.
Thirdly, to suggest that Chastain doesn’t understand the game is, to put it bluntly, laughable.
But even after laying that egg for all the world to see, Solo obviously continued to stew on the topic and a few minutes later added this gem:
“Lay off commentating about defending and gking until you get more educated @brandichastain the game has changed from a decade ago.”
First of all, no, the game has not fundamentally changed since Chastain played it and, in any case, she was still an active professional (FC Gold Pride) up until two years ago.
Second of all, Chastain was primarily a defender.
Was she done? Of course not.
“I feel bad 4 our fans that have 2 push mute, especially bc @arlowhite is fantastic.@brandichastain should be helping 2 grow the sport”
Let me point out that I have heard from exactly no “fans that have to hit mute” while watching a match Chastain is working. Is she Andy Grey or even Ray Hudson? No indeed. But there are far worse than her.
What Hope is apparently saying is that she feels Chastain’s role is to be Little Mary Sunshine, delivering a steady stream of cheerful patter, flattering descriptions and rah-rah-USA! palaver aimed at convincing the viewing public that what they’re watching is better than it actually is.
I’d like to suggest, however, that NBC is actually paying her to tell the truth as she sees it. If the USSF and Miss Solo need PR fluff, let them pay for it. Perhaps her pal Dan Borislow can find it in his budget.
Otherwise, she ought to just play the game.
If not, she won’t be the first athlete who finds out that she’s just not worth the trouble.
The Christine Brennan, world’s dumbest woman, follow up article was equally precious.
Christine Brennan isn’t dumb- she just allowed USAToday to pigeonhole her into writing a bunch of Lifetime Channel crap (tho, to her credit, she’s done a couple of decent op-eds on racial issues that creep up in sports) instead of hard sports journalism. I’ve been saying for years that she needs to demand to be transferred out of Sports and into the Life section.
She’s in the lifetime channel pigeonhole because she’s an idiot. There wasn’t one angle of this situation that didn’t totally confuse her.
Ok, so I didn’t need to see a replay to know that that “helping to grow the sport” business was dumb. But thanks for making it absolutely clear.
Well Hope was right about one thing: on games where Chastain is the commentator, you have to hit the mute button. 80% of her commentary consists of “here’s what I liked about that play” and “this is what I didn’t like about that play.” Memo to Chastain: nobody cares whether you “liked” it or not. Just give us analysis that is worthy of your soccer knowledge and experience.
Hitting the mute button wouldn’t be a bad idea with Hope, too. Her goalkeeping speaks fabulously well for her. She shouldn’t try to drown it out by bringing the weakest part of her game, her mouth, to the fore.
I would say her mouth is not to shabby either….;-)
And Solo’s made some mistakes in the two games so far. Luckily that hasn’t resulted in a loss. If she’s not careful people will start actually watching her play carefully and start criticizing that and, well, then some fun fireworks will start.
Why are the best commentators from other leagues not saying such remarks? Why can’t American commentators just describe the game? No one wants their advice. We want to watch the game. I think the the closest thing to advice being given was one EPL match where the commentator said something about Torres like, “Sometimes, you want the perfect goal, but sometimes you just have to hit it.” Point made, but Chastain would phrase it obnoxiously.
Look at all journalism these days. No one reports anymore, they give opinions. Cronkite never gave an opinion until LONG after he retired. He simply reported the news. Lost art.
I’ve watched a lot of games on Spanish-language networks over the years, even though I don’t speak Spanish. I got started on that almost 30 years ago because they did games without commercials. I liked the announcers, because they said the names of the players as the ball went to them (and I learned a little Spanish along the way). However, they don’t seem to do that anymore. Are they, and announcers in other countries, beginning to mimic the American talk-about-anything-but-don’t-describe-the-game model?
I’ve noticed the same thing on German soccer telecasts. It used to be one announcer, just rattling off a string of names as passes were made. Now it’s always done in the American style of having an announcer and analyst. I guess it has a lot to do with the technical quality of HD TV signals. I can now easily tell who has the ball and who is making the plays. I think the old style of announcing dates back to grainy black & white broadcast days.
What’s even worse is trying to listen to the audio feed, without having the video. I tried listening to a Euro cup game on Sirius ESPN radio, but all the provided was the broadcast feed. There was no way of figuring out what was going on. I bet radio sports broadcasting is a totally lost art.
Sorry Bill, love Brandi the player and ambassador, really don’t love the commentator. I make ample use of the mute button when watching her. Bolts2 says she comments on what she likes and doesn’t like … my take is there is rarely much she likes about the U.S. game. I always think that if I was a new-to-soccer viewer, I would come away thinking “wow, they won that game but according to the commentator they did just about everything wrong.” I envy the British technique, which Kate Markgraf seems to embrace, of allowing a moment or two of silence to exist here and there in a game. Not every sequence needs constant voice over!!!
Within our gang of soccer viewers, Brandi’s commentary has become the topic of Dear Brandi emails amongst ourselves, begging her to shut up.
I believe that U.S. broadcasters bring in commentators who can talk to the fairly un-soccer educated audience. While our team still has lots to work on, they are no nearly as bad as listening to Brandi implies. And when she gets on rants (finishing the game v. France, all the different lineups Pia has used in the last X number of games v. Colombia) it just gets unbearable.
Disclaimer: This is in no way in support of Solo’s behavior. I completely agree with your assessment of Solo’s behavior.
That’s completely fair and thanks for the contribution.
In fairness though, the overwhelming majority of US network soccer commentary is also dreck. Just terrible.
It’s not just Chastain but the other players, male and female, deal with it like professionals, ie they ignore it.
The only real example I can think of where a player has said anything about being criticized by a former player/broadcaster is Donovan’s occasional comments about Wynalda… and those only seemed to come out when he was asked directly about it.
Watch the the online feed from NBC:
http://www.nbcolympics.com/online-listings/day=july-29/index.html
No commentators!
It’s Colombian player not columbian player.
Which makes, I think, an even hundred times that I’ve made the same mistake.
Sorry.
1) Inquiring minds want to know who thought it would be a good idea to pass Chastain’s comments on to Solo?
2) I think Solo’s at greater risk of perpetuating unfair stereotypes about women than about athletes. Just a thought.
Dempsey said something similar towards Harkes before the World Cup. Now, it wasn’t on twitter and he didn’t go on a long rant. Solo is perhaps one of the most marketable US Women’s player’s next to Wambach and Morgan.
For her sake and the team’s sake the focus should be on the tourney not commentators or the press. You’re in the middle of an important tournament which is the 2nd most important in the women’s game besides the Women’s World Cup. So that means 1)stop tweeting it’s a huge distraction, save it for afterwards. 2) ignore comments from the media, sure you want to say something but it’s better not to.
A long rant on twitter was not necessary even if said commentator is harsh or annoying. Solo is talented but her mouth get’s her in trouble. Save the F-U Chastain for AFTER the Olympics. Solo is pretty weak mentally or insecure to respond in such a manner.
Ahhhh, just the subject I can sink my teeth into.
This is what we’re going to see a lot more of as those little pre-teen players we’ve been awarding for simply participating in any sport even if they do nothing as their team loses a tourney, begin their pro careers.
But that’s for another blog.
I would like to take this opportunity Bill to say that I didn’t like Solo the day she chastised the choice of GK not so long ago. Bad upbringing or not, by her age she should at least have the respect to not besmirch her team publicly because she didn’t get to play. Especially since she proved herself to be a choker anyway.
She’s a cancer and overrated. Her fanboys will forever hold her up on her looks alone, but as the cliche goes, beauty is only skin deep. But to an observer who is neither fan or foe, Hope Solo is part of the abstract ugliness which pervades sports these days.
I wouldn’t have anticipated such a thing, but Solo has unseated Foudy as my least-likeable female athlete – even if Foudy is retired.
First off, I hope this doesn’t keep me from having Olympic sex with Hope, but she really does need to keep her foot out of her mouth. And that was a bone headed play play by Buehler.
You have to be very careful what you say or write down now at this point in time. On twitter or tell people and on facebook.It could come back to bite you on the butt. We have seen that happen time and time again. That nis why I don’t do any of that. But I have always been paranoid with good reason. Remember lose lips sing ships.
when did she say they were drunk on the today show?
Google “solo drunk today show”
Incidently Solo does not pass enough on her distributions. She bangs the ball up field way to much
Hopefully she doesn’t find out you wrote that. You might be the next subject of one of her rants.
Evidently she bangs more than the ball upfield.
lol.lol.lol.
I agree with her that Arlo White is fantastic. I think that is the point she was trying to make;)
Arlo has called the wrong player’s name on multiple occasions. He’s got to step up his game a bit, too.
Hope-fully when she’s retired, someone gives her a chance in the broadcast booth. Then we’ll see if she can walk the walk.
Thx,
Jay!
Come on, Bill. To be honest the game HAS changed since the 99′ers played.
US women’s soccer was heads and shoulders above anyone that even dreamed about taking second place back then. This is not the “Women’s International Soccer” that those ladies played.
But that minor point mentioned…what was wrong with Hope’s comment? Brandi gave us an inane comment, what’s next…the goalie is supposed to keep the ball out of the goal?? Hope stood up for a teammate…an opinion very similar in nature to Chastain’s comment. Why so we deem one plausible and the other a farce?
You’ve gotta be shitting me, Chastaen. If you don’t see what’s wrong with Hope’s argument then there’s really nothing that can be said to lead you in the right direction.
You are right, nothing is going to make me say Brandi can have an opinion and Hope can’t.
Neither delivered a particularly well thought out comment, but then again not all opinions are anyways.
First of all, if even Foudy thinks its a bad idea, IT’S A BAD IDEA!
Chastain is the female version of Balboa. Just because one has years of experience and is willing to talk doesn’t mean they will be good at it during a game.
I believe getting a better presentation (announcers/commentators) is more important to the growth of the league than ref issues.
Chastain’s no peach commentating ( she suffers from a bad case of Harkesism) but Solo is making sure Wambach has the 2nd worse black eye on the team.
Dear Hope Solo:
When you have as many World Cup medals as Brandi Chastain, you can argue with her.
No one is touching on the real faux pas that both commentators made during the match —-
That being both started chirping in with retaliation trash talk after Wambach got poll axed off the ball.
VERY unprofessional and exactly the wrong message sent out to the younger viewers and newer coaches.
As I’ve said elsewhere, Solo hasn’t seemed to grok that she’s received almost kid glove treatment from the sports media up til this point. But I sense that’s about to stop. Mike&Mike (yeah, I know) called her out this morning. Which, maybe in the ‘all pr is good pr’ view is great but they weren’t complimentary.
Solo’s play this tournament has not been “best keeper in the world” level. She’s made some on field mistakes but hasn’t been punished for them. Yet. How will Solo deal w/ real criticism?
Who the hell cares about what two egotistical women are trading cat paws at each other? This issue means nothing until Bill Archer gets on his high horse like the douchebag he is.
It was just Solo making ‘attacking’ comments. Not two women trading verbal barbed comments.
Judging by what I’m reading on the Internet, everyone on the Internet cares.
Bill, you did leave out one little detail that I thinks ads a bit of context to the most recent outburst by Solo. She has a book due to release days after the Olympics. She’s got to get in the ‘news’ so that people know about her so that she gets post Olympic interviews to promote her book.
Is it an illustrated Olympic kama sutra?
Do you mean that an athlete criticized a member of the media (right now that is what Chastain is) because a comment said athlete did not like?
Oh no, the horror, when has that happenned, totally unprecedented and uncalled for; criticizing the media back, unbelievable and crazy.
:rolleyes:
When Hope Solo has two Gold Medals and two World Cup wins – she can chime in whenever she wants. From what I remember this current group choked in last year’s World Cup Final.
I think there is way too much positive talk. If that is criticism that is too much to bear then we need to teach our players how to grow a thicker skin. That would probably be the nicest criticism Landon Donovan or Freddy Adu ever got. Dempsey knows better too. He plays with the big boys and should know criticism comes with the territory.
Sally Jenkins agrees:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/sports/olympics/hope-solo-could-learn-a-few-things-from-brandi-chastain/2012/07/29/gJQAXms6IX_story.html
So, she’s the female Charles Barkley without the charisma?
you lost me when you bashed Ray Hudson…..
Brandi has begun channeling Ray Hudson, screaming when a ball goes into the net. Oddly enough, she didn’t when Morgan scored the header.
I volunteer to be Solo’s banging mate between a game and another
“Defend. Win the Ball. And keep possession. That’s something that Buehler actually needs to, I think, improve on in this tournament.”
You don’t say?
I can’t say I’m an expert on women’s soccer but it has changed. There are better players for the USA and they aren’t the only team around now. Besides Japan and Brazil, Great Britain and France are looking really good in this Olympics. It’s just like people bringing up how many trophies their nations have. That’s great and all but both Men’s and Women’s have advanced by a lot.
I’m just curious, before everyone just starts bashing Solo because they can… has anyone actually heard Chastain’s commentary. It’s so unbelievably, teeth grindingly bad. She absolutely fawns over Wombach and loses her cookies and goes into long winded reminiscences about her. It’s horrible.
And how she is constantly cutting off her partner and completely contradicting everything he says, no matter what. She always plays 1up. It’s annoying hearing her talk about what they could/should have done, or what would have happened if this happened, when Wombach made that happen.
And lastly, the woman says “Again,” before every single effing sentence she starts. It’s effin’ torture. Seriously, she needs to go to school for broadcasting and learn some basics. Solo is justified to say whatever she wants in this case. 100% behind it.
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