WHAT?! Why?!?!

Well it is nice to see FCD management still has no clue what is important to the fans. Brad Sham not only one of the most knowledgable broadcasters a true fan of the sport and an absolute
FCD fan. Cost should never be an issue with him. He is worth twice what they pay him because so many people in the metroplex identify with his voice. Stupid and assine!!!

God this is horrible

Hah, I’m not upset about this decision at all… I love Brad Sham for Cowboys games but I didn’t think he added anything special to FCD games and usually just annoyed me with his constant inability to name the correct player and the inane chatter with Dave Dir.

Will Rhine and Jolley be worse? Maybe maybe not, but they will definitely be cheaper and if that frees up more money to spend on HD broadcasts, then awesome.

Bad PR move. Like him or not, Sham brought a lot of clout to the booth. In other words, it “looked good” that someone with his experience was calling the FCD matches.

Nothing against Rhine or Jolley. I have full confidence that Bobby will handle the job well. (Jolley is an unknown.)

But this just smells like another silly cost-cutting step from HSG.

i’m with you quills. Sham, is a fantastic broadcaster and voice for dallas sports. but if we can get these games in HD, I’m all for clearing some overhead. Perhaps this also means they’ll be flying bobby and Steve to away games. one can wish.

I am glad to see Sham go, but I am not convinced Rhine is the right guy for the play by play duties. Hopefully he will surprise us.

Get of Sham’s d*** – he’s not that knowledgable and often sounds like an idiot in the booth when it comes to talking soccer.

I don’t understand why people are upset, he really didn’t add much to the calling of the game. I think it’ll be fine with Bobby Rhine in there. I’m not a Bobby Rhine fan, but he was good last year

Agree he added clout to the booth, but until I hear otherwise I’ll take this as a step toward where FCD wants to be in the future.

I’m very pleased with this move. Sham drove us crazy during the games!! I’m glad Bobby will be in the booth and I think he’s showed alot of promise last season…

Brad Sham has trained many color commentators over the years. If you think Bobby has done well as a commentator, it is in large part because of Brad’s tutelage. Bobby has improved quite a bit from when he first started, no doubt due to his talent and hard work, but who was his coach?

Sham may not know the game as well as Bobby, but he is a skilled broadcaster. He understands the nuts and bolts of that end of the business, and we should not minimize his skills.

We’ll see how well Bobby and Steve Jolley perform. Hopefully they will develop into something great. Still, I think that losing Brad’s voice is not a “don’t care.”

i’m surprised nobody has mentioned how many games that Sham has missed over the course of the season due to Cowboys or other responsibilities. I’m sure that had to play at least a bit part in the decision to replace Sham. he leaves during Cowboys training camp and preseason, then throughout the stretch run of the MLS season

I’m a Sham fan myself, but wouldnt it be better for FCD to have a permanent broadcast team than having to come up with replacements during the final 5 months of the season (July-Nov)?

Brad Sham was a TERRIBLE soccer commentator. A very nice guy, a great voice for the Cowboys over the years, but he had about as much soccer knowledge as your Republican Grandmother from Iowa. (no disrespect meant toward your Republican Grandmother intended).

A good decision. Next up on the docket….actually SEND the announcers to the games.

Brad Sham and Dave Dir were such an awesome combo in the booth. Yeah, they barely ever talked about the game, but it was entertaining.

I personally think Bobby Rhine is a really bad broadcaster. He has a hard showing genuine excitement after goals and needs to work on using the right tone in the right places.

Really? Brad Sham didn’t know soccer? Despite having done soccer on television since the 1970s?

Wow.

This is great news.

I don’t care if he’s a legend. He was terrible with soccer. He spent half the game making up imaginary converstaions the players were having with each other. Just horrible.

I will support this decision only if Brad Sham’s replacement continues to call a yellow card a piece of “cheese.” Sham will be missed.

“Really? Brad Sham didn’t know soccer? Despite having done soccer on television since the 1970s? ”

Actually, yeah. It is kind of amazing how little he seems to know about the game considering how long he’s been calling games. Embarrassing really.

I think there will be more than a few times during broadcasts this season where the saying “don’t know what you got ’til it’s gone” will be very valid.

In fact, I am going to try and find my Cinderella CD and play it.

PS: On the bright side, this team will probably win quite a few Emergency Brakes of the Week awards!

Seriously, I think that people would’ve had a greater appreciation for Sham’s skills after hearing Dave Dir’s play-by-play efforts last season.

I like Dave and he’s the best color commentator in the league, but his play-by-play skills really made you appreciate Sham… or at least it made ME appreciate Sham.

I called FCD and asked for the real reason for the split. Apparently they are paving the way for Rhine to use his catch phrase “That’s hot coffee!!” in the booth full-time. Word on the street was that Sham wasn’t a fan.

Ignorance . . . at its finest

ElJefe,

Just because Dave Dir isn’t a good play-by-play does NOT mean Brad Sham was good. There are several instances every game where I would ask myself, “Does this guy even keep up with FCD?” To me, and it’s definitely not all Sham’s fault, the broadcasts just reeked of poor quality. Having a football-turned-soccer announcer was just a contributor.

I appreciate Sham’s willingness to stick with soccer as long as he did but I think this is going to end up being a better move for both parties in the end.

Just turn the f-ing sound down and watch the game like the soccer gods intended. Do you really need commentary during the run of play? Bobby Rhine’s a good guy and more or less a local after all his years here. I enjoyed his pre-game and halftime work last year…..but honestly, why worry about it either way.

I think everyone in here who says such ugly things about Sham are indeed the ugly people.

Just because you don’t enjoy the guy’s efforts doesn’t mean you should be so eveil towards him. Imagine how he must feel if he reads this. Shame on you all!

Anyway, he’s an American who has given heaps to our game and should therefore, by default at the very least, be thanked for his time and efforts and wished the best for the future. SHAME ON YOU ALL!

Pull your heads in and just be postive about the future and have a little more respect for others.

Well, we get soccer’s version of Freddy Prinz Jr. back. The calls will still be shoddy just like most in these parts. The best play by play I’ve ever heard in tx was from an Aztecs game last year.

Upset – you know what, you’re right. I should have mentioned it in my first post.

Thanks for your time, Mr. Sham. I hope you stay an FCD fan after this is over.

Sham could be improved upon as a soccer play by play guy. But we will all likely find out that Rhine is NOT the answer at play by play. I say keep Rhine as the color guy and, if you must replace Sham as play by play, get a real play by play guy. Or even Bob Sturm for pete’s sake. The skills to do good play by play are extremely underrated.

Just recall the play-by-play quality of the recent USA-Canada final match for the gold in hockey, a sport that is about 10 times faster paced and thus a lot more difficult than soccer to call as a sports play-by-play announcer. In addition to having P-B-P skills, it is nice to also have technical knowledge of the game…at least to some extent. Sham came off as a very nice, but completely unprepared announcer, who consistently fell into the “associate color commentator” role, and getting bogged down into long and meaningless conversations with his co-hort and abandoning all semblance of professional game commentary.

There were many times where I just turned the sound off, but I would prefer to have a professional provide audio guidance that adds to the viewing experience instead of detracting from it. We don’t need the world’s best here, just someone who is solid, pays f*cking attention, and has a reasonable head for the technical aspects of the game.

What historian said is 100% on target.

Sham could use some improvement at a soccer play-by-play guy.

And if FCD was telling us that Sham’s replacement was TBD, then I could understand it if people were applauding it. After all, FCD might be hiring somebody who was a bit better.

But they’re not. They’re using a guy they have already have on the payroll, and instead of recognizing this as yet another example of HSG’s doing things in half-assed manner to save a few bucks, people are saying (and these are direct quotes)…

“I don’t understand why people are upset, he really didn’t add much to the calling of the game. I think it’ll be fine with Bobby Rhine in there. I’m not a Bobby Rhine fan, but he was good last year”

“Agree he added clout to the booth, but until I hear otherwise I’ll take this as a step toward where FCD wants to be in the future.”

“I’m very pleased with this move. Sham drove us crazy during the games!! I’m glad Bobby will be in the booth and I think he’s showed alot of promise last season…”

Really? For all we know, Bobby Rhine’s play-by-play might be comparable to a guy doing 2A high school football games for a public access station in West Texas and people are applauding this?

I can get that Brad Sham isn’t everyone’s cup of tea, but don’t act like anyone else would be an improvement, because as we found out often last year with Dave Dir on play-by-play, that’s definitely not the case.

You took what I said out of context. I meant that this might be an interim move until they can get who they want on the air, especially if they are spending more on TV now by going to HD. Of course I could be wrong and Rhine could be their permanent PBP man, in which case I’ll have to hear him call a game.

Brad Sham is a classy guy with loads of experience.

Bobby is a nice guy, who is clumsy on screen and hard to listen to on the radio.

This is another clumsy move by a bumbling club. Hope it works out.

I am not saying BS was God’s gift to FCD…but replace him with a broadcaster for pete’s sake.

Didn’t see it mentioned on here, but Steve actually did broadcasts for Houston a couple years ago. So he isn’t new to this.

Brad Sham may be classy and have loads of experience, but it doesn’t show. He consistently has no knowledge of opposing teams/players and often cannot even identify FCD players.

Bobby is a natural in the booth and was an upgrade last year. HOpefully Steve can work well with him and I don’t see any reason why he wouldn’t be able to.

I just don’t understand those of you who actually believe Sham was good in the booth (for FCD games). Experience does not make up for ignorance.

Once again, for those that don’t read well, this is what I think some of us are saying:

1. Brad was not the greatest pxp guy.
2. Replacing him is not the end of the world.
3. Replace him, though, with a broadcaster with pxp experience.
4. Bobby is good at color, leave him there.

I think Bobby Rhine will be great. In the long run, he will be as good a soccer play by play guy as Brad Sham is in football. Brad did fine in soccer, but Rhine has the potential to be better because of his knowledge of the game. Go Bobby.

Lucky for all involved with this debate is that we will get to see the result. I wish Bobby the best not only because he is stepping into giant shoes, but because TV play by play is a terribly difficult trade. FCD is somewhat throwing him into the fire – but knowing Mr Rhine, a challenge he welcomes.

When will the USA develop a truly good (great being too much to ask) footie announcer? Brad is great with the cowboys, but HORRIBLE with FCD. he was doing baseball- endless anecdotes and chatter filling ing the “dead” (i.e. non-goal) times. He failed to follow the action, call out great tackles or passes, etc. Love the guy, gave FCD some street cred, but listening to him was hard. And his broadcast seemed geared to the unsophisticated (don’t get off-sides, number of subs, etc.) soccer viewer, of which we have learned, there are none.

People seem to like JP Dellacamera but he too gets basic info wrong quite a bit. I hate to genuflect (again) at the EPL altar but most of the Sky guys get it right- follow the game action and nothing else.

One of the problems is the trend in sports announcing in the U.S.A in general. Ever since Howard Cosell the trend has been to interject human drama (regardless of relevance) into any broadcast.

This peaked (I hope) on MNF 2 years ago with Mike Turico, Ron Jaworski, & Tony Kornheiser. They hardly ever talked about the game and brought in guest celebrities during the game. A lot of stuff like that. This past year they replace Kornheiser with John Gruden and on more than one occassion he brought the other two back to talking about Football.

I do watch a lot of games many sports with the sound off.

We’ll see

I did not mind Brad. Nor did I mind Ray. I miss the guys from the first few years. Shameless homers, yes, but what is wrong with that for a local broadcast?

GOOOOOLL DAAALL-LLASSS!

Here is my favorite, from memory, not verbatim, but very close. “I know you want to sit on top, to see the play develop, but sometime, you should close to see the size, speed and power of the players. Or you could sit with the Inferno and go nuts.”

No one was quite as much pro Dallas, of course, than Ed Puskarich, who was actually also the team scout on the one occasion I recall him doing the color. I could have done without the “Hot diggity dog!” though.

Thank you for the service, Brad. Best of luck, Bobby,

Boggity, boggity, boggity! Let’s play soccer, boys!

This caught me by surprise.

Brad was a very enthusiastic, intelligent commentator.

He has paid his dues in the soccer community…

I know they want Rhine, but why did Brad have to go?

Epic Fail.

Good call. It was like listening Bob Costas talk about the World Cup.. knowledgeable to a point.. but missing a connection to the game..

Lets give Bobby and Bobbys buddy a go before we light them up.

I listened to Jolley and he is TERRIBLE. Rhine was in over-speak-mode as color not know when to add in and when to shut up.

So let’s see what HSG has done to this team since they purchased it in 2004…fired Andy Swift; changed name – and not for the better; crapped on the colors and heritage of the Dallas Burn; new stadium – nice but so far away from the true fans; 4 coaches in 6 years; 0 championships; 0 MLS Cup finals; 1 US Cup championship finalist; no players fans can follow for an extended period before the trade or sell; missed playoffs 4 of the 7 seasons; and so now since there is nothing else left to keep the loyal fan…they drop a HOF broadcaster. And so the sad, sad story continues…sad sad day