| Andrés Cantor | |
|---|---|
| Born | Andrés Cantor December 22, 1962 Buenos Aires, Argentina |
| Occupation | Television Journalist, Television personality, Author, Sports anchor |
| Years active | 1979–present |
| Website | |
| www.fdpradio.com; Twitter:andrescantorgol | |
Andrés Cantor (born December 22, 1962 in Buenos Aires, Argentina) is a Spanish-language sportscaster in the United States. Cantor primarily provides Spanish-language commentary of soccer matches, though he covers other sports as well; he also has provided soccer commentary in English. As a result, he is well known among English-speakers in the United States.[1]
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Cantor and his family moved to the southern California area when he was a teen, where he attended San Marino High School and then graduated from the University of Southern California.[2] Andrés is of Jewish descent. His mother was born in Romania and migrated to Argentina at the age of 13, while his father was born in Argentina. His paternal grandparents were from Poland, and fled during the Nazi occupation.[3] His favorite team is Boca Juniors from Argentina.
Cantor is famous for his signature call of "¡GOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOLLLLLLLLL!", a call which for decades has been a popular (and almost universal) play-by-play announcement method of a soccer team's score throughout Latin America and one which, due to translation and cultural dissonance issues, was absent from the lexicon of UK-based soccer play-by-play commentators. Cantor was the first to introduce this climactic scoring call to a U.S. audience while working at Univision, making him popular with American audiences. He first used it at the 1990 FIFA World Cup, but it became especially popular during the 1994 World Cup, which was held in the United States. It became so popular, in fact, that Cantor made guest appearances on the Late Show with David Letterman during the '94 and '98 tournaments, and after the tournament was over. He was broadcasting from Paris for the Late Show during the 1998 World Cup. The call is now being sold as a ringtone on Telemundo's website.[4] He says that Diego Maradona's goal at the 1986 World Cup in which he ran from midfield past five England defenders to score brought tears to his eyes (Cantor was working at the game). That goal became known as the "Goal of the Century," and took place after the infamous "Hand of God" goal. The yell was also used in a popular Volkswagen commercial that aired in the U.S. around the time of the 1998 World Cup.
Another unique line of Cantor's can be heard whenever a game reaches half-time or is over. He delivers the line, "El árbitro dice que no hay tiempo para más" ("The referee says there is no more time").
Cantor is currently working for Telemundo, one of NBC Universal's networks. At the 2004 Summer Olympics, where Telemundo was the first-ever U.S. Spanish-language network to broadcast the Olympics, Cantor worked as both a studio anchor and the play-by-play announcer for baseball. He went to Telemundo from Univisión.[5] Telemundo's other anchor for the Games, Jessí Losada, worked with Cantor at Univisión before jumping ship himself. Also, Cantor's soccer partner of almost a decade in Univisión, Norberto Longo, the lead sports analyst for Univision, also moved to work with Cantor for Telemundo until his death on April 21, 2003, of a heart attack at the age of 61.[6] XM Satellite Radio, in partnership with Cantor launched a Spanish-language sports network.[7]
Andres Cantor is the owner and main play by play announcer of this syndicated sports radio network which owns the Spanish-language radio rights of the FIFA World Cups 2002/2006/2010/2014 as well as the Mexican National Team, Concacaf Gold Cup among other sports properties. Andres Cantor hosts a daily show, Futbol de Primera, which airs nationally in more than 100 affiliates.
Cantor's first English-language assignment was the 2000 Summer Olympics in Sydney, where he called both men's and women's soccer for NBC. At the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing, Cantor provided only Spanish-language commentary for the Telemundo network.
In 2008, Cantor appeared in the American live-action film Speed Racer as one of the Grand Prix Announcers.[8]
Cantor is the author of the book Goooal! a Celebration of Soccer.[9] Andres Cantor's appearance booking fee can range from $5,000 to $10,000.[10]
In 2010, Cantor was featured in the Mike McGlone series of GEICO commercials where he is introduced as an announcer who could make any sport exciting. Subsequently, the camera cuts to him animatedly announcing a Chess match.[11]
In 1994, Cantor won the Sports Personality of the year, given out by the American Sportscaster Association. (http://www.americansportscasters.com/dinner.html) In 1994, Cantor won a Regional Emmy for his play by play work of the US World Cup 1994. (http://eltiemponeworleans.com/?p=3783) In 2004, Cantor received the Hispanic Heritage Award. (http://hispanicheritage.org/press_news.php/?id=40) Also that year he won the Broadcasting & Cable/Multichannel News Lifetime Achievement Award in Hispanic Television.(www.hispanicmarketweekly.com/article.cms?id=6968 - Cached
In 2005, Andrés Cantor received an Honorary Emmy from the NATPE for his contributions to Hispanic television. (www.emmyonline.tv/releases/doc/leaders_in_spanish_television_release.doc