A great youtube channel I found

[Benotti69]

I'm wondering if Phil and Paul are being intentionally dense so as to communicate more easily with the American audience.

that and the live$trong audience

 

[Nielsa]

I'm wondering if Phil and Paul are being intentionally dense so as to communicate more easily with the American audience.

Well if the first thing you say is "the entire TdF podium and Ivan Basso are here in Colorado but they are not interested in winning," that's not a great way to market your media product. So you make up a narrative where these GT winners are giving it 100% and still end up behind George Hincapie in GC. Dishonest, yes, but hey it's marketing.

I watch the NHL and the scripted narrative at some networks is so transparent it's sad. You have an interviewer asking a leading question to a player, to which the player answers "no". Then the panel continues their discussion as if the player answered "yes", even though his answer makes their discussion irrelevant. It's ridiculous at times.

 

[Angliru]

Wow, what an amerocentric post. I dont dislike Phil and Paul because of any of the stuff you said.

Its because he doesn't know anything about cycling. Not anymore anyway.

Also notice how all your examples are from one race.

How can he be the voice of cycling, if he doesn't give a **** about 90% of the cycling season?

One of his examples references races that we hadn't heard of on this side of the pond, which I'm assuming means races other than the Tour. OLN was the first network in the US to actually have a regular schedule of races during the cycling season, with the classics, week long stage races and the grand tours--all with Sherwin and Liggett as the voices. If you didn't have convenient computer access to the internet this was the best we could get here in the states.

I can't see why you have an issue with this perspective. They were the voice of cycling for those of us that had no other options and to correct you, they didn't just commentate on the Tour. I believe Sherwin rode Roubaix competitively during his racing career so he has first hand knowledge of the race, the life of a pro and of course the sport itself. As was mentioned it was only after the arrival of Armstrong as a Tour champion did their perspective become extremely narrowly focused and in all eventuality, extremely difficult to tolerate.

 

[Libertine Seguros]

I'm wondering if Phil and Paul are being intentionally dense so as to communicate more easily with the American audience.

All well and good, except the butchering of names isn't conducive to good communication - Martin Jangly, for example, would be hard for most people to work out was Tjallingii, while Jacob Fool's Gang is another favourite; though Matt Keenan going on about Ahmed Zurooka riding for Uskadel OoskaDEE was similarly irritating.

Many infuriating and seemingly endless spelling errors are the fault of P&P too - two that seem particularly impossible to get rid of are "Euskatel" and "Kreuzinger".

Liggett added his commentary to the highlight package of the women's Ronde in 2010 (won by "Grace for beak"); my biggest disappointment with that was that Eneritz Iturriagaecheverría didn't go on the attack and cause him to have a coronary.

 

[El Imbatido]

I'm wondering if Phil and Paul are being intentionally dense so as to communicate more easily with the American audience.

Actually yes they are.....this article explains it:

http://www.bicycletimesmag.com/content/interview-tdf-legends-phil-and-paul

eg.
Q: Do you feel you have to adjust your coverage and commentary to make it more understandable and appealing to the casual cyclist…or even people who don’t ride bicycles at all?

Phil Liggett: Yeah, absolutely. American television producers are the world’s worst—or the world’s best—at making sure we do just that, depending how you look at it. I get all sorts of rude comments about mentioning Lance Armstrong too much…even when he’s not riding the race. But the fact is that they [the producers] make me tell the viewers where Armstrong is.

 

[Angliru]

All well and good, except the butchering of names isn't conducive to good communication - Martin Jangly, for example, would be hard for most people to work out was Tjallingii, while Jacob Fool's Gang is another favourite; though Matt Keenan going on about Ahmed Zurooka riding for Uskadel OoskaDEE was similarly irritating.

Many infuriating and seemingly endless spelling errors are the fault of P&P too - two that seem particularly impossible to get rid of are "Euskatel" and "Kreuzinger".

Liggett added his commentary to the highlight package of the women's Ronde in 2010 (won by "Grace for beak"); my biggest disappointment with that was that Eneritz Iturriagaecheverría didn't go on the attack and cause him to have a coronary.

Since I can remember, Liggett has always, and I mean always pronounced Valverde's first name as if it's the same as Petacchi's. For the life of me I can't figure out why it's so hard for him to get it right unless he does it intentionally as a slight of some kind.

 

[cprior]

Actually yes they are.....this article explains it:

http://www.bicycletimesmag.com/content/interview-tdf-legends-phil-and-paul

Wow, thanks for th link!
Brutally honest, but well worth keeping in mind!

>Do you feel you have to adjust your coverage and commentary to make it more
> understandable and appealing to the casual cyclist…or even people who don’t ride bicycles at all?

So I say to all the kids, all the experts who know as much as I do, “Look, turn the sound off. You’ll enjoy just as much.

Some of you regulars should start an own thread about it, this keystone to cycling commentary (which is oh so frequently debated here) is way too much buried in this mistitled thread!

 

[gregrowlerson]

Perhaps Phil and Paul used to be more up to speed with things, but today they are not.

Perhaps. I can't say that categorically since I am far from a cycling expert.

I think that their fanboyism and occasional mistakes actually add to the entertainment of the coverage of the TDF. My dad and I always get a laugh when they go on about Big George, and a lot of the errors create good humour - reminiscent of Murray Walker commentating Formula One. Murray also had his favourites, such as Damon Hill. To me the fanboyism is a positive so long as it is for a love of their favourite rather than a hatred for the rival/s. I don't think that Phil and Murray ever wanted Jan or Michael to win, but at least they didn't come across as being anti those guys; just VERY pro to Lance and Damon

Making silly mistakes is all well and good, but encouraging total ignorance of the sport overall is not. As commentators it should be their job to not only entertain, but to provide the viewer with further knowledge of the sport - the viewer can then choose to do what they like with that extra info provided.

Most people who watching cycling at all only watch the TDF. Some then branch out into other races. There should at least be some encouragement by the media for fans to do so.

The mentioning of other races is also important as to the awareness of what is going on at the TDF. In 2008 I was quite astounded when Ricco stormed away on Super-Besse. I actually hadn't heard of him; very ignorant, yes, but it is up to the so called experts to at least provide some info on the guy who is threatening to turn the GC upside down. It is excusable that I (a casual fan) had no knowledge that this guy had just given Contador a very tough time in the mountains of the Giro (I didn't even know that Contador was racing, or that he'd recently been to the beach; in fact I don't believe that I even thought of cycling once in May 2008!), but it's no excuse that supposedly leading commentators have the same ignorance. Ricco's performance on Super-Besse didn't come out of the blue (as I had thought, being mostly just a TDF fan - I have branched out a little more since), and it is the commentators job to make the viewer aware of this.

I wonder how many viewers of the TDF knew that Cadel Evans had just come off an exhausting 5th place result in the Giro in 2010, or that Alberto Contador was coming off a magnificent victory there in 2011?

I am pretty sure that I didn't even know that Andreas Kloden was riding the Giro in 2008. Sure, I was overseas at the time, but that is inexcusable

 

[Maxiton]

These are absolutely fantastic channels, Jordan. Thanks for finding and posting.

 

[Parrulo]

i've asked myself that.imagine de andres/delgado or cassani/pancani instead of them,how many people will still watch cycling?

anyway i gotta say,i don't know how you survive with that versus crap,commercials,commercials,studio with bob roll and that guy prounouncin g very weird "c.untador",armstrong dropped,no one can see it because of commercials,frank schleck on the ground broken collarbone commercials.i could not watch for even an hour.
i say it because i downloaded last year the mountain stages from 2010 tour,my god the coverage was pure crap.i deleted immediately eveything.

i must say i love both those teams. its not a proper giro unless you hear the "PANCANI" scream at least once

and perico is a great cycling expert( like kelly)