At a reported cost of around $5.5 billion, SoFi Stadium in Inglewood, California, spared no expense.
However, it appears that they forgot to make a little extra room for all of the announcers.
If only they’d spent another $500 million or so, perhaps the Dallas Cowboys’ Spanish announcing team would have been able to call the Monday Night Football matchup against the Los Angeles Chargers from a broadcasting booth. Instead, they called the game from the press box right next to all of the reporters and writers on hand to cover the game.
Various reporters from inside the press box shared videos of Victor Villalba and Luis Perez doing their thing, featuring big plays and even bigger calls.
The Dallas Cowboys Spanish announce team did not get a booth of their own tonight so they are in the main press box at SoFi Stadium. This is what the Dak Prescott touchdown sounded like. pic.twitter.com/LBdWtXnXJg
— Arash Markazi (@ArashMarkazi) October 17, 2023
Cowboys Spanish Radio Network broadcasting INSIDE the pressbox tonight! pic.twitter.com/babEuYodpC
— Darren M. Haynes (@DarrenMHaynes) October 17, 2023
SoFi Stadium cost $5.5 billion to build, but there is not enough booth space for the Cowboys’ official Spanish-language radio broadcast network, which has to call tonight’s game vs. Chargers from press box. pic.twitter.com/tfSxLo8ph1
— Michael Gehlken (@GehlkenNFL) October 17, 2023
The Cowboys Spanish radio broadcast team is absolutely bringing the juice in the general press box area of SoFi Stadium… pic.twitter.com/E664faYuRn
— Pat Doney (@PatDoneyNBC5) October 17, 2023
While some have speculated that SoFi Stadium did not have room for the Spanish announcers, it’s currently unclear exactly what happened. Either way, it does seem pretty odd that a state-of-the-art stadium built to host Olympic events, College Football Playoff National Championship Games, Taylor Swift concerts, and Super Bowls wouldn’t have a spare broadcasting booth handy for a regular-season NFL game.
Normally, there’s a pretty clear and understood rule in NFL press boxes that there’s no cheering and that volumes should be kept to a minimum. But in this case, it’s pretty clear that neither of those requests would be possible to honor.
[Arash Markazi, Darren M. Haynes, Michael Gehlken, Pat Doney]
