As D.C. United and the Columbus Crew headed to overtime in their first-round MLS playoff match at Audi Field in November, ESPN sideline reporter Sebastian Salazar was at Banc of California Stadium in Los Angeles, preparing to cover LAFC’s showdown with Real Salt Lake. Salazar, a Bethesda native and lifelong United fan, was anxiously following the game going on in D.C. on his phone. About 30 seconds before Salazar did a live hit on the field in L.A., his heart sank as United midfielder Nick DeLeon’s attempt in the penalty kick tiebreaker sailed over the crossbar to clinch Columbus’s 3-2 shootout win.
“It was the most nervous I’ve been on television in a while,” Salazar said. “It was a strange feeling.”
On Sunday evening, Salazar’s undivided attention will be on the action at Audi Field, where he will serve as the on-site studio host for ESPN’s season-opening broadcast of D.C. United’s match against Atlanta United, the defending MLS Cup champion. It’s a special opportunity for the NBC Sports Washington alum, who has primarily served as a sideline reporter since he joined ESPN in 2016 and will continue in that role this season.
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That D.C. is the site of a nationally televised matchup on the league’s opening weekend would have been difficult to imagine two years ago, and no one understands that better than the 35-year-old Salazar.
“D.C United is in my blood,” said Salazar, who has been attending United games since the league’s inaugural season in 1996, has covered United professionally in some capacity since 2010 and even worked for the team briefly in 2012. “I’m not the guy who is ever going to say a bad word about RFK. I grew up in that place, and nobody appreciates that building more than I do, certainly from a soccer standpoint. ...
"That being said, as somebody who grew up always thinking about soccer’s place in this city and more specifically D.C. United’s place within this city, the team was on life support down the stretch at RFK. No matter how romantic and nostalgic we want to be about RFK, it was on life support — and not just the team but the fan base. I remember going there as a kid, and everybody in town knew what D.C. United was. Two, three years ago, nobody in town knew what D.C. United was, and it felt like I was a part of a fraternity that was dying off.”
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The once-proud franchise experienced a revival last year. After playing the majority of its matches on the road in the first half of the season, United finally opened Audi Field on July 14 with a 3-1 win over the Vancouver Whitecaps that coincided with English soccer star Wayne Rooney’s D.C. debut. United went 12-2-1 at home over the next three months to clinch a playoff spot before its season ended in heartbreaking fashion. Salazar said United Coach Ben Olsen told him the shootout loss to Columbus was one of the worst defeats of his career.
“There was lightning in a bottle, and then there was the opportunity for that lightning in a bottle to really explode, and that didn’t happen,” Salazar said. “I think everybody’s kind of curious if that spark will be there this year and if they’re able to do it for a full year and maybe cap it off with some type of hardware at the end of season. You got to finish it off. People got into it last year, but that was because the team was winning. In this city, unless you’re the [Redskins], if you don’t win, you don’t matter. At the end of the day, I don’t know if people will care about this team if they’re not contending for something significant."
Salazar is confident United will build off last year’s success, so much so that he picked the squad to capture its fifth MLS Cup title — and first since 2004 — in ESPN’s preseason preview.
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“D.C. United has question marks coming into this year, but they have the fewest obvious question marks of any of the contenders in the East,” Salazar said. “Then you look back at the end of last year at how good they were, they strengthened areas where they needed to get better. ... I think they could be there at the end and have home-field throughout the playoffs, and I think Audi Field could be a big advantage and difference maker in the postseason.”
Salazar played soccer at Walter Johnson High in Bethesda and Westminster College in western Pennsylvania, where he earned a degree in broadcast communications. He worked at what was then known as Comcast SportsNet Mid-Atlantic early in his career before moving to Texas in 2012 for the launch of CSN Houston. Salazar returned to CSN’s Bethesda studios in 2014 as an anchor and reporter before landing a dream job at ESPN two years later. In addition to MLS, Salazar has covered the U.S. men’s and women’s national teams and the Little League World Series for the network. Covering the Mexican national team at the World Cup in Russia last year was a personal and professional highlight for Salazar, who grew up watching Mexican soccer on Univision and whose mother is from Mexico.
The bilingual Salazar, who conducts live interviews with players in both English and Spanish, will be back on the sideline next weekend when Atlanta hosts FC Cincinnati on ESPN. On Sunday, he will host the network’s 30-minute pregame show and present halftime and postgame segments, while Jon Champion and Taylor Twellman will call the game. His parents, United season-ticket holders, will be in the stands. Salazar said his mom recently bought him a new suit that she hoped he would debut for the occasion, but with rain in the forecast and the temperature expected to be about 40 degrees, Salazar figures to be bundled up on the open-air set.
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“Everything is perfect except for the weather,” he said. “If that’s the price I have to pay to host a game, on ESPN, in Washington, D.C. — which is a sentence I never in a million years thought would come out of my mouth — then I’ll freeze a little bit. ... It’s a unique opportunity for me, and I’m very, very grateful for it.”
Read more on United:
Chris McCann made abrupt move to D.C. United. Now Atlanta is coming to visit him.
Wayne Rooney isn’t waiting for the season to put D.C. United on notice
D.C. United was quiet in the preseason. Too quiet?
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