DC United front office, or lack thereof

Discussion in 'D.C. United' started by NattyBo, Apr 23, 2015.

  1. Rick77

    Rick77 Member

    Apr 25, 2001
    DC
    Club:
    DC United
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    A blogger isn't exactly the same thing as a paid beat reporter employed by a major metropolitan daily. Plenty of the former, not too many of the latter.
     
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  2. JayRockers!

    JayRockers! Member+

    Aug 4, 2001
    “As a bush league sport, team, and league overlooked often in favor of a big four narrative.” is how that sentence should end.

    Thx,

    Jay!
     
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  3. roadkit

    roadkit Greetings from the Fringe of Obscurity

    Jul 2, 2003
    Fornax Cluster
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
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  4. Cavan9

    Cavan9 Member

    Nov 16, 2011
    Silver Spring, MD
    Club:
    DC United
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
  5. NicktheGreek

    NicktheGreek Member+

    Feb 15, 2001
    Only a thousand or so beat reporters unless you restrict it to soccer beat reporter then maybe 30 (DC is #22 of the top 50 cities)
     
  6. GumbyG

    GumbyG Member+

    DC United
    Mar 22, 2007
    Chesapeake, VA
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    True and true. Goff has experience and interest in the sport he's covering and reports for a major newspaper. His reporting provides free advertising on a national platform for DC and gives us consistent, if selectively independent reporting. Both things have value, and I'm thankful we have that.

    We just need to recognize that that platform and level of access comes with strings. But he's a good reporter, and he indicates pretty clearly when there are lines to be read between. He's clear about his sources and methods, and when he doesn't know whether to believe something, he quotes and attributes. In those cases, we need to look to more independent sources to follow the trail Goff leaves untraveled.

    But he's a bit like the 6 term representative on the appropriations committee. It takes time to get where he is, and when he's gone, there's a danger your infrastructure will crumble.
     
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  7. shawn12011

    shawn12011 Member+

    Jun 15, 2001
    Reisterstown, MD
    Club:
    DC United
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    So Barra boys where are we?????
     
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  8. Cavan9

    Cavan9 Member

    Nov 16, 2011
    Silver Spring, MD
    Club:
    DC United
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    I'll be at the game this upcoming Saturday with a beer to sip on while I scream my lungs out. (I can't make Wednesday games this season due to having an infant son at home.)
     
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  9. Dizi

    Dizi Member

    Feb 13, 2015
    Club:
    DC United
    Totally in character from what I've seen. Nobody hacked his account
     
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  10. sitruc

    sitruc Member+

    Jul 25, 2006
    Virginia
    Damn. I had already forgotten there is a game on Wednesday.
     
  11. Dizi

    Dizi Member

    Feb 13, 2015
    Club:
    DC United
    All was not as rosy as the team wanted us to believe:

    The Ultras expressed to the City Paper last night that they don’t intend to have an "official" presence at the stadium until August 12th. The club, in its release, erred when it said that “all supporters’ groups will be present” for United’s match against the New York Red Bulls this coming Wednesday, something which a club official acknowledged in an email to City Paper last night.

    1020531656627834880 is not a valid tweet id


    I'm not on FB but saw this on twitter

    1020540586112225280 is not a valid tweet id


    My gripe with Goff is that he blew them off when he could have been breaking the story. But he doesn't care due to his personal bias. A bias that skews heavily in favor of whatever the FO wants, and whatever will make DC look good.

    I don't need a beat reporter like that
     
  12. song219

    song219 BigSoccer Supporter

    Apr 5, 2004
    La Norte
    Club:
    DC United
    Nat'l Team:
    Vanuatu
    I like and apppreciate that DC United has a beat writer (really he is a soccer beat writer) but lets not pretend he is the only person who could do the job.
     
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  13. Dizi

    Dizi Member

    Feb 13, 2015
    Club:
    DC United
    Immediately unfollowed him on twitter after this but that'll be much easier to do (completely) when he stops covering my favorite team.

    I don't actually hate him as a human...he thinks he's just doing his job, and definitely cares about soccer. Goff has dedicated years of effort to cover the sport regularly. Can't deny that, and actually I love most of his USMNT/WCQ pieces or longform profiles of our players. He's also usually the first to break transfer news...which is occasionally useful.

    But, in my opinion, his normal weekly coverage of DCU is biased and/or negligent most of the time. While he was on WC duty we had a refreshing amount of coverage from a variety of writers asking questions on topics he would never dare to explore (e.g. Bacic and Hunt's conversation).

    I won't miss him for a millisecond when he retires whether he's replaced on the beat or not.
     
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  14. shawn12011

    shawn12011 Member+

    Jun 15, 2001
    Reisterstown, MD
    Club:
    DC United
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    I suspected that it was not all peaches and cream just yet.
     
  15. Dizi

    Dizi Member

    Feb 13, 2015
    Club:
    DC United
    You missed the point. Of course somebody else could cover the story.

    But for the folks who think he deserves more respect for covering the beat than a blogger...he just ignored a newsworthy lead because of his personal feelings toward a group of diehard fans.
     
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  16. Dizi

    Dizi Member

    Feb 13, 2015
    Club:
    DC United
    Like Srdan said, I understand why they may have done it but DU are not the petty villains they are being made out to be by some folks who read the press release and their cautionary tweets a few days ago.

    This also leads me to think that the non-sellout on opening night had more to do with Tom's departure than the actual SG dispute or supposed lack of noise from SE.
     
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  17. Rick77

    Rick77 Member

    Apr 25, 2001
    DC
    Club:
    DC United
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    Yeah agree he totally missed this obvious important story. Part of it I'm sure he was in Russia but I was tweeting him about this months ago and he was dismissive.

    Don't agree here. Also, I'm under the impression -- perhaps erroneously! -- that many MLS markets don't have a dedicated beat reporter for their MLS teams. The NYT certainly doesn't and the NYDN just laid off 2/3rds of its sports desk today (no clue if it covered NYCFC or the Scum or not). Talking about a dedicated sports writer on staff and not some stringer on contract. Again could be mistaken here.
     
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  18. Q*bert Jones III

    Q*bert Jones III The People's Poet

    Feb 12, 2005
    Woodstock, NY
    Club:
    DC United
    I have a feeling we're going to be seeing that a lot for the rest of the year. DC has 6 games in hand on some teams.
     
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  19. NicktheGreek

    NicktheGreek Member+

    Feb 15, 2001
    Hopefully Thursday the game will go to the remember, not the forget bin. Having more than 2 games a month is a new experience this season.
     
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  20. PSURoss

    PSURoss Member+

    Sep 30, 2002
    DC Burbs
    #3670 PSURoss, Jul 24, 2018
    Last edited: Jul 24, 2018
    I don't know if its Hunt's fault, but they missed the market by a good bit IMO, with respect to the format of the club level. There are 9 club level sections, not including the field level seats. I would comfortably say that at least 2 were empty when you add up the few occupied seats in the 2 end sections and look at the other empty blocks of seats throughout the club level. And I am sure plenty of looky-loos bought club seats for the opener. Those seats should have been filled at any price for the opener. Like there weren't employees from Audi, our departing shirt sponsor Leidos or one of the other sponsors who could have filled those seats for free? I think the club played themselves there.

    When I picked my seats, there was ~50% of the club level still available. My mid-field preferred seats have a face of $50 according to the app, which coincidentally means there is no discount for being a season ticket holder. Odd? The club failed to represent a sufficient value for Levy catering and free beer/wine against a $75 per seat/game price difference for the cheapest club seats. I'd have been much more interested in it, had they had a CapOne Arena club level format, obviously at a lower price where the concessions are better and you have access to the sit down restaurant. Its hard to call it premium when they couldn't even guarantee parking within 3/4 of a mile of the stadium at decision time.

    Getting back to that face value thing ... so there are literally no perks to owning season tix beyond a free plastic bag, that they announced at the last minute, when anyone who was going to need one, would have already had to have ordered one on Amazon.
     
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  21. DecadeOfDCU26

    DecadeOfDCU26 Member+

    May 2, 2007
    DC
    Club:
    DC United
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    Remember when the BB were talking shit about the Eagles pricing and saying they wouldn't mark anything up if they had tickets? o_O

    upload_2018-7-24_13-58-5.png

    What's the backstory here?
     
  22. Cavan9

    Cavan9 Member

    Nov 16, 2011
    Silver Spring, MD
    Club:
    DC United
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    In our email, the Barra "elders" specifically tell the membership to only buy tickets to use and not to put them on Stubhub at a markup. I would guess (I have no inside info) that the $25 and $30 prices were agreed upon by both the FO and the Barra. From what I understand, those tickets can only be accessed through a link from the Barra website. Since they're on Ticketmaster, the FO probably has some sort of emergency control option.

    I'm guessing that the FO asked for $5 more per ticket for a more desirable Saturday game. The FO-Barra relationshipo is a work in progress and both the FO and the Barra are figuring out the new system/how many tickets should be available. The FO does not want to do things the way they did last season at RFK and we in the Barra are glad to be a presence at Audi Field now.

    This is a work in progress and while it's not complete yet, things are a LOT better than they were a week ago.
     
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  23. Cavan9

    Cavan9 Member

    Nov 16, 2011
    Silver Spring, MD
    Club:
    DC United
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    Work in progress. Much better than a week ago.
     
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  24. DecadeOfDCU26

    DecadeOfDCU26 Member+

    May 2, 2007
    DC
    Club:
    DC United
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    That all makes sense and I'm certainly glad things are progressing. I was just cheekily pointing out how they were pricing their tickets the exact same way the Eagles are (likely with FO direction as you had said), but yet I saw a shit ton of comments blasting the Eagles for this online (i.e. being referred to as the Scalpin' Eagles, among many others), but yet no comments now.

    I could be mistaken here, but I don't think the tickets are restricted because a friend of mine bought one through Ticketmaster shortly after this post went up (not the Barra site). I had checked the other day and I think the SE tickets were sold out for Saturday.
     
  25. shawn12011

    shawn12011 Member+

    Jun 15, 2001
    Reisterstown, MD
    Club:
    DC United
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    These lines from Goff's article really bother me. He did not know..................

     
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