After watching the Open Cup on FSW, I was amazed at how my attention and enthusiam for the game was heightened by Mr. Bretos. Gems like "green grass like the garden of Eden!" and the classic when McBride was hit in the no-no area "the old capital of Thailand!" Yes, ESPN programmers, MLS representatives, I emplore you, sign this man for ESPN games, sign him now. The world will be a better place for it. Michael
he still needs to work on calling players by their correct names... when he does foreign leagues i really have no clue whether or not he is getting the names right during the run of play...but when he is calling a match in which i know the players on the team he seems to constantly get players wrong. i dont know how many times he called brian west-jeff cunningham and vice-versa. but i do agree, he brings a great amount of excitement and his own originality to the booth.
I personally liked the stunning bit of news from him that Bob Bradley was going to coach DC United. Max Bretos is the single most overrated soccer announcer in the US. Period. [TK]That's it! That's the list![/TK]
Re: Re: Max Bretos for ESPN games! Good Tony reference there Dustin.. I wouldn't go as far to say that he is the most overrated in history.. I happen to think that he is quite entertaining.. That bit with McBride getting kicked in the jewels was drop dead hilarious... I do agree though that he needs to do his homework a little better.. The Bradley/United quote was terrible and also his mentioning that the next time the USA plays will be at the Confeds Cup, not knowing that we have a friendly next month against El Salvador (a mistake he repeatedly made during the Gold Cup last year in mentioning our "weak" buildup matches to the World Cup - he didn't even know we were scheduled to play Italy, Germany and Holland).. Allen Hopkins needs some work also.. His mentioning that Sunday's MLS Cup was the best of all-time is simply criminal.. As far as game quality, it was the worst of the lot.. As far as atmoshpere, nothing will compare to MLS Cup 97' with the bouncing stands and chants of "DC!!" for almost the entire match, not to mention the entire lower bowl of RFK (about 28,000 people) standing for the entire match... I can live with the misqoutes and failed player identifications.. They are an enjoyable duo to listen to though...
Considering he does something like five games per week in five different leagues plus host studio segments in two different sports, mistakes are inevitable. In a once-per-week format, the factual errors would drop.
He has never really impressed me. Tried to watch that awful World Cup show on FX Sports World and he just did not stand out at all.
I believe Andy Mead said before Bretos is a Boob, or something to that effect. I couldn't agree more.
i think bretos is pretty good and funny, but i still can't believe there were two people doing the game, cause i swear there is absolutely no difference in their voices, i thought bretos was talking to himself. anyone else think there is no difference????
Bretos ranks somewhere in my estimation of all-time MLS announcers between Brian Davis and Trey Bender. You do the math.
Dont think hes that great but it will be an improvement over the 2 morons we have now. He'll be a good fill in while we continue our search for the perfect announcer.
I'm not a big Bretos fan, so take this with a grain of salt, but... Honestly, I could never tell the other night when Bretos was speaking from when Hopkins was... To my aging ears, they sound pretty much alike...maybe Max has multiple personalities?
i have never been able to tell their voices apart...never know who's talking and what's the difference, every american soccer announcer on fsw has the same voice
Max loves the game, and that alone is worth it. He seemed to have a penchant for the French Le Championnat games last year. He seemed like he knew alot about those games. Though he gets some facts wrong sometimes, I would love to see him paired up with Tommy Smith sometime, because they truly love the game, and you can tell it when you listen.
Jack Edwards loves the game, too. All PBP announcers are greener on the other side of the fence. Anyone that wants Max for MLS, try tuning into FSW this week and watch him call the Gold Cup games. 3 hours in and my ears are bleeding. He does sound great doing leagues that I don't know all the players, but every time he's called something where I'm familiar with the players and other facts, he's really bothered me. Even I, off the top of my head, knew that Lalas didn't have 99 caps (it was 96). How do you get your cheat sheet facts wrong? Seriously. How does he prepare for games? It was also nice to hear from Max that Lalas has played himself back into the US National Team picture.
Andy, are you that that is Max on FSW right now? I am reasonably sure that it is Alan Hopkins with some girl. Correct me if I am wrong, as is the case many times, but I am waiting for Max to call the tape delayed River-Boca game next.
I generally defend Max and Allen, but the US Open Cup Final was probably the worst performance I’ve ever seen from either of them. It’s fairly obvious that they don’t prep for MLS/US games as they do for the various other competitions that they cover every week. Given how comparatively rarely they cover MLS/US games and how much else they cover weekly, a few player misidentifications are understandable. Annoying, but understandable. Contrast that situation with Andres Cantor when he did MLS games virtually every week on Univision and later Telemundo. He once called an entire Burn game referring to Sergi Daniv as Tom Soehn. Yes, they both wore the same jersey number for the Burn and perhaps there’s an arguable marginal resemblance, but the Soehn move to Chicago was very old news at the time. He also referred to Simon Elliot as Sean Elliot for something like three or four Galaxy games in a row - and there just ain’t much resemblance in that case. Max is much better with the Argentine games. He knows the players and the teams quite well. He also combines to good effect with Christian Bozzo. I actually prefer to watch the Argentine games on FSW with Max and Bozzo than have to deal with Araujo’s preposterously over-the-top histrionics on FSE. Allen does a decent factual job with the Brazilian games - he’s really into Brazilian soccer and it shows. I’m sure both of them could reduce the MLS/US player misidentifications if they covered those players more regularly.
As long as doesn't mention "climbing the ladder" he's alright by me. Max Bretos may not be the best commentator ever, but I'll take him any day over Ty Keough.
move him from L.A. to Connecticut, get him off the white powdery stuff, let his head clear, maybe he'll be a bit more coherent. of course, he might not be as zany, which is of course his main draw.
I would like to see Max in more MLS matches. He seems to be more into the games than some other announcers. And what the heck, we need some one anyway. Just try him out, see if he can learn more about the players, and go from there. You never know until you try.
Yes, Max does get some facts wrong...yes, he will make mistakes. Yet, his passion for the beautiful game and his broad knowledge of worldwide soccer (not depth per se), in addition to his colorful personality adds much to the game for me. His enthusiam, while striking, is not over the top embarrising (like Jack's gutteral GOOOAAAALLL at the WC when McBride scored against Portugal?Mexico?, or his "Friedel is from Mars"). Bottom line, he is not annoying to me like the dynamic duo we have now, plus he brings a broad European knowledge base to the game which I enjoy immensly. Michael