It was January in June on Saturday night at the Rose Bowl.
But I doubt if any of the 93,420 fans were wearing Buckeyes or Trojans football jerseys as Mexico rallied to beat the U.S. 4-2, winning the biennial Gold Cup championship match. High-definition coverage of the match included the Fox Sports Soccer Channel.
As savvy announcers JP Dellacamera and Kyle Martino noted, the event looked like a home match for Mexico as green-clad fans from Southern California packed the huge stadium in Pasadena, Calif.
Like many fans past middle age — OK, older fans — who have been weened on American team sports such as football, basketball and baseball, it’s taken me a while to embrace soccer as a television attraction. But the more I watch, the more I appreciate the smarts, teamwork, conditioning and agile footwork of the athletes.
The key to appreciating soccer on television is watching it live.
I learned a lot last fall when Dylan Saunders, my grandson, played for the East High Angels, a scrappy team that qualified for the state playoffs.
Granted, high school soccer isn’t on the level of Gold Cup play or Major League Soccer, where the Rapids are the defending champions.
But these in-shape teenagers showed what teamwork and competitive athletics are all about.
Unlike televised NFL and NBA coverage, TV (commercial) timeouts don’t exist in soccer matches.
My major drawback as a soccer viewer has been not knowing a lot about the players. While I’m aware of U.S national team stars such as Landon Donovan and Clint Dempsey, Mexico’s lineup at the Rose Bowl consisted of no-name guys (to me, not to the soccer world).
But now I’m keenly aware of Giovani Dos Santos, whose terrific body moves and footwork helped Mexico bounce back from a 2-0 deficit against the Americans.
With less than 14 minutes remaining, Dos Santos scored Mexico’s fourth goal. That essentially put a win out of reach for the U.S.
Fox’s instant-replay cameras focused on Dos Santos’ footwork, which would have made Gene Kelly and Fred Astaire envious.
The replay of Mexico’s fourth goal also provided an agonizing view of U.S. goalkeeper Tim Howard peering through the net after Dos Santos scored.
Nielsen ratings for Fox’s cable coverage of the Gold Cup tournament before Saturday’s final were up 82 percent from 2009 — an in- dication I’m not the only one becoming fond of televised soccer.
Hard-core soccer fans found more action Sunday night when Altitude televised the Rapids’ game against the Crew in Columbus, Ohio. Three radio outlets — Mile High Sports’ 1510 AM and 93.7 FM and ESPN Deportes’ 87.7 FM — also broadcast the match.
When mainstream broadcasting in the U.S. realizes soccer is a sport worth covering, soccer’s fan base should continue to grow.
MVP at CNN.
Boxing fans probably will remember Nick Charles as an announcer on series such as HBO’s “Boxing After Dark” and Fox Sports Net’s “Top Rank Boxing.”
But Charles, who died Friday in Santa Fe of bladder cancer, was a key figure in the early years of CNN.
Charles spent 11 years, beginning in 1980, as co-anchor of “Sports Night” with Fred Hickman. Charles and Hickman competed against ESPN’s high-profile “SportsCenter” duo of Keith Olbermann and Dan Patrick, occasionally beating “SportsCenter” in audience ratings.
Charles, who would have been 65 on Wednesday, was somewhat underrated as a CNN sportscaster because of his good looks and his extensive wardrobe.
Thus, a “pretty face” tag unfairly dogged him during much of his broadcasting career. But as those who worked with him have noted, Charles was a hardworking pro- fessional.
Blast from the past.
Dino Costa, once a flamboyant and controversial Denver sports radio personality, co-anchored coverage of the NBA draft on Sirius XM radio.
Costa added “Mad Dog” to his title. He hosts a nationwide weeknight (5-9 p.m.) talk show on Sirius.
Longtime Denver journalist Dusty Saunders writes about sports media each Monday in The Denver Post. Reach him at tvtime@comcast.net.
ESPN relishes this competition
Is eating hot dogs a sport?
ESPN continues to think so. ESPN again will televise the annual “Nathan’s Famed Hot Dog Eating Contest” at Coney Island in New York on July 4 at 10 a.m.
Lou Kusserow, a Denver resident, heads up the company that produces the mustard- splattered competition.
Renee Herlocker, a former Broncos cheerleader and a local radio personality, will work the event as a reporter.
Joey Chestnut, the contest’s four-time defending champion, consumed 54 hot dogs in just 10 minutes last year. Not surprisingly, his nickname is “Jaws.”
