I love Dante and am glad he’s with the team but he was horrible behind the mic. It’s great to see a former athlete be able to make a career when his playing days are done. He’s such an intelligent guy and I feel like he’s in the right spot. Also, the dude is in incredible shape. He looks like he could suit up and play.
I suppose the point could be made that Dr. Pete stopped being an employee when he bought the team, right? In my book, an owner of a business isn't an employee. It would be like saying Lamar was a Crew employee in 1996 or that John McConnell was a CBJ employee. And as far as Greg Bartram, I know he does a lot of USA Today/Getty stuff. So maybe it's a situation where the team buys the photos from Getty. He's definitely involved, but is he an employee? As a sidenote, I see Frankie got a job change (if I knew, I forgot) and it's great to see such a long list of names/titles here: https://www.columbuscrewsc.com/club/staff I was also tipped off that maybe 3-4 event staff and other part-timers remain from 1996. Either way, Dwight was one of the true originals from 1995.
There are sadder--the guys I listened to in my youth as broadcasters for my Phillies, Hall of Famers Richie Ashburn and Harry Kalas died "on the job"--Richie the night after a game vs the Mets and Harry in the booth in Washington before a game vs the Nats. I'd actually listened to that last game of Whitey's...
Nothing but the best of wishes for Dwight. Kind of parallels Bill Davidge's retirement from the Blue Jackets to be with family and health reasons. This season is going to be so different...
Dwight has been an amazing part of Crew history since the beginning, but it was definitely time for a change. All the best to Dwight as he deals with the health issues. Let's see if Haslam/Edwards find the right fit for the next chapter. Hopefully they use this as an opportunity to raise the bar for the tv broadcasts, including sending our tv crew to away matches, instead of a studio in Cleveland. How about Ale Moreno and Brian Dunseth?
Have some ambition in this department for me to respect. All I can ask. Thank you for your time with the club Dwight. Much respect.
Look out for a brand-new poster who sings of the good days with Dwight as our announcer and how the new guys and gals are not up to par.
Burgess was the best PBP guy in MLS, hands down. Color not so much, although babbling fool Neil Sika might have had a lot to do with that. "McBride.....YEEEEEESSSSSSS!" will live forever in my mind. Last summer the pregame regularly had another guy, from Cleveland IIRC. Cant remember the name. I wondered at the time if that was a sign.
Was it Chris Doran, by any chance? He used to do games for a while with the original Time Warner exclusive deal when they had three-hr broadcasts, then left and came back last year. One of my favorite Dwight calls, and I can still hear (most of) it like it was yesterday was from DC: "...And this is how it sounded on the broadcast... Meanwhile, ______ night is done and Miles Joseph makes his first Crew appearance. HEADER....AN OWN-GOAL AND THE CREW LEAD! It was flipped on about ten yards out by one of the black shirts, went over Mark Simpson and into the goal." I just can't remember the player who left the field during that substitution. Yeah, it was Dwight ending the broadcast from DC from the first time we won there. I still contend the decision to move Dwight and Neil to that simulcast was a terrible one...and we know who was behind it and why.
Took a look at the list and near the bottom, under "Levy Restaurants - Food & Beverage and Merchandise" they list Ashley Spittle as Premium Manager. Probably not the best last name when dealing with food.
I will miss hearing Dwight calling matches. Nothing but well wishes for him. As Chelsey alluded, he might post. He used to post on MatchNight. (And I agree with Quarkspace—sometimes it could be hard to tell if it was Dwight or Neil talking.) I think both Doran and Neil are best suited as color commentators. And I wouldn’t be too surprised if there were new p-b-p people on both on TV and on the radio. I think it’s most likely that Doran joins Neil and moves to the TV booth, and that there will be new people on the radio. Hopefully two. One person on the radio is just too dull (and no offense to Doran; you just need some back-and-forth and some commentary from a second person).
Best wishes to Dwight. Thanks for 24 years of devotion to the team. Why do they have to go to Cleveland? Why not just set up a green screen in the Fox 28 studio in Columbus? Seems like it would be simple enough.
I wouldn't mind seeing him in the pregame program, leveraging his distinct grasp of Crew history to provide a segment every once in a while tying current news into historical artifact. Get Sirk as a producer for those segments and there's gold in them hills.