On Sunday, ABC aired the MLS Eastern Conference Final between NYCFC and the Philadelphia Union. During the match, one of the main takeaways wasn’t the performance of either team, but instead of picture quality on the broadcast.
Take a look at this highlights package from NYCFC and get a look for yourself.
In case you didn’t want to go through that, here’s a screenshot from the hard cam.
Yeesh. What year is this again?
In case you’re curious, here’s a highlights video and a still from Fox’s broadcast of the MLS Western Conference Final on Saturday between the Portland Timbers and Real Salt Lake.
Night and day, folks (and I’m not talking about the start time).
Per the Philadelphia Inquirer, ESPN is “looking into” the picture quality issues.
An ESPN spokesperson said the company is aware of the problem with the main camera feed during the broadcast, and is looking into what caused it.
The complaints about the picture quality of this MLS match mirror the complaints earlier this year about various Pac-12 college football games. Last month, ESPN said they were upgrading the equipment that was causing those issues, but it appears these problems weren’t isolated to college football games on the west coast.
Some of the critiques of ESPN are way over the top, but the company deserves every bit of criticism when the production quality of live events takes a noticeable dip.
