Can RC suck off Tomac anymore?

He's close to being the WOAT when it comes to commentating - but Ralph will always have that covered. 

Yeah we watch the race & could care less if a whisling bird does the broadcast. Mx only had 1 good one Art Ekman.  Apparently the op has never been to Florida it’s  Florida it’s full of good old boys & rednecks. After hhg rig day we partied . Then went to the swamp in a John boat with a spot lt & shotgun. They hang a chicken off a tree limb on a hook. We show up and blow the shit out of the alligator with a 12 gauge. Haha throw drag thst sob in the boat & party some more .  Ricky,s doing great making it fun to watch .  I never heard he,s fixing to make that pass on the outside. So I don’t hear any hillbilly stuff.  I,d rather hear some excitement than a mono tone office lecture . 

That’s where I am.  A bit of comedy while racing is going on 

RC just straight up sucks. Such a great racer, but he's a square peg in the booth. He doesn't seem very good with people in general. 

Out walking with the missus yesterday and while having a chat she made up some word. I said “ok relax Ricky” and she just about doubled over laughing before telling me to shut my whore mouth.

Ricky is cool and his gaffes are entertaining.

You saved me the trouble. Anyone else, would have quit after so much criticism. 

With you residing in the big city of Green Bay (cheesehead central) i find it funny that you're talking about rednecks. Florida is also filled with people who have relocated from the north. Ask me how I know...

RC and the whole crew are great. I enjoy listening to them. I especially like it when RC says “whoaaaa” when something big happens. 
 

Opinions vary. 

Said Kenneth Feld, Chair and CEO of Feld Entertainment, Inc. 😅

I miss Larry Huffman saying things like "he's on him like a Hari Krishna at an airport". 

Have you guys tried crying about it? 

What a putrid thread title.

Does Vital need to hire more moderators?

So many anonymous shit talkers...REALITY is..ooh, hey, is that RC? Hey RC, is it cool if I get a pic? Always thought you were the best man. Thanks! See ya Ricky. 

He was chill on the pulp show, if not a little patronistic. 

He's an objectively bad commentator and it's gatekeeping or gaslighting or something to shame people for expressing this.

I'd have no problem telling him that while I greatly respect his work ethic and grit, he's unpleasant to listen to and detracts from the show. And that nobody appreciated him being an unfettered asshole to Daniel Blair to look cool in front of his posse. 

I think he has been quite fair with tomac. A few years ago, RC was fairly critical of his inconsistencies 

Tell it. Bunch of bitchy little girls in here these days.

Its all part of the show. Sometimes he is good, sometimes he says stoopid stuff, sometimes he cant get it together but i still prefer him to that zero personality JT

Emig overcame a speech impediment and easily surpassed RC in his commentating.

Blair is simply put, the right man for the job.

To compliment him ( Blair ) I think James is a good fit. Honestly I feel Jason Thomas is also a much better fit in the booth vs trackside. I think Weege would also bring the broadcast team to the top step.

Listening to RC every week make word salad and over react to a simple foot down off screen detracts from the viewing experience. I am a firm believer that he has a monetary interest in Feld entertainment, an interest that insures he will be in the booth for longer than I would like. 

 I also think its high time the announcers and Feld stop trying to pander to the new viewer. Face it, we all can do a better job explaining it to our new friends. Also, you would have to be pretty daft to not understand the format or excitement of the racing by simply watching.

"You would have to be pretty daft to not understand the format or excitement of the racing by simply watching"

It always pains me to explain to my non-moto friends why one of my favorites (Phil) isn't jumping the jumps. Father time is undefeated is my go-to response 😅

Only a homo like you write homo shit. Posted this so this thread can be moved to the dumbgeon.

I hear ya - I do think she has slowed down this year and is better than previous years though

The harder RC tries the worse it gets. He was keeping it simple in the beginning but now he tries too hard in my opinion.

Here's an analogy that may crystalize the problem. When trying to be smooth and fast, let's say entering a turn, should you look right in front of you or focus your eyes on where you want to be, like the exiting rut? Now ask, why is this important and what types of riders can most commonly be found looking directly ahead at everything they ride across? 

When you're worried about what could happen, you look straight ahead, your tense, your concerned about making a mistake. And this is precisely, I guarantee you, what happened with Ricky. I doubt it was Ralph, probably a couple of people whose names you won't know, who came in and consulted when Carmichael was seriously taking on this role for NBC, who pressed a "right way / wrong way" mentality into him, layered with a heavy corporate expectation to deliver according to their formula ('cause they think they're the experts). These consultants may not have even been NBC, they could have been from a firm that works with commentators across all sports and networks. 

Don't believe me? Check Carmichael's earliest invitations to the booth. He didn't make mistakes. He talked naturally. He talked like a 15 time champion calling it like he sees it. That is until these corporate autocrats showed up and ruined what came natural to him. 

Now going back to the metaphor, he doesn't look at the exit coming into a turn.  He's looking straight ahead of his fender. It's mentally the same thing. They got in his head and now he can't let go and be himself or simply say what comes to his mind. You ONLY make these mistakes when you're forcing yourself to live up to expectations. When worried about making a mistake. When you're tense.

If they would just let him be himself, remove the script, you'd see a whole other side of Carmichael in the booth.

Some of you who are connected, if you really research this, you'll land on a couple of names who came in and did this. Ralph will know, but if you see him and ask, he's unlikely to give them up but they exist, trust me.

I don't harp on the job RC does in the booth. But I definitely don't think he's very good. I really like him when he goes on podcasts though, when he's talking much more naturally 

This is going to sound bad but I mean it in a good way. The difference between Stewart in the booth and Carmichael is, Stewart does not try and talk above his education and just says it like he sees it. It comes across funny and informative. Carmichael on the other hand tries to talk above his education and it sounds like he is a bumbling idiot. Carmichael is super smart and knowledgeable about the sport and he knows what the riders are doing. He should change his style to match Stewarts so he can get the point out. Most of us are not much more educated than he is. I know that I am not. 

Disregarding your last two sentences I agree. "To your point" the harder RC tries to sound smart the dumber he sounds. Stay in the good line RC just like on the track

I was about to start a thread on exactly this. I've been critical of hum in the booth, but hearing him on Pulp again this week, he's just so much more relaxed and easy to listen to. His voice is completely different when he's not trying to be "on". I don't know if it's NBC pushing him to be quick and more polished in the booth, but he stumbles so much in the broadcast trying to push thoughts and words out quicker. On podcasts, he's great and I actually really enjoy listening to him.

I remember I think it was after Tomac went out last year, there wasn't much to call after that. It it almost felt like they gave up calling the race and were just having a conversation, and it felt like he improved 1000% when the pace of the conversation slowed down.

In every sport, we never get the best color analyst. We get a color analyst who was a professional in said sport. Hundreds if not thousands of regular joes who never made it to the pros would be amazing analysts who will never get a look because all the broadcasting companies want is former pros.

is nothing I wrote gettin through? its not Carmichael. its the suits! until someone smacks the suits around and puts them in their place, Ricky will continue to work according to their expectations. he needs to be freed of that, and then he will be great. remove the suits and let RC talk to us, the audience, the way he wants to: don’t tell us story lines, don’t pretend to know a backstory about a 15th - 10th place rider, don’t pander to an audience just tuning in with no previous knowledge of the sport. the solution is psychological but to achieve it, a couple of suits needs to be put in their place. I wish I had their names. 

We are the #1 sport at complaining about the commentary