It has probably been a solid 14 or 15 years since I last spoke to Dax McCarty. Weirdly enough, it may have been after FC Dallas downed Real Salt Lake in the first match of their conference semifinal series en route to the club’s lone trip to a MLS Cup.
As FC Dallas fans will remember, McCarty was a big part of the club’s run to a MLS Cup that season. After that MLS Cup loss to the Colorado Rapids, that is where our stories diverged. McCarty was famously left off the club’s Expansion Draft protection list and was immediately selected by the Portland Timbers, who then immediately traded him to D.C. United. McCarty spent most of the 2011 season with the Black-and-Red before being traded to the New York Red Bulls. After a few seasons there, he went on to play for the Chicago Fire, Nashville SC and Atlanta United. He retired after one season with Atlanta.
Now, McCarty is part of the league's broadcast team where he is a studio analyst for MLS Season Pass. Today we got to catch up with McCarty, who was fresh off a US Open Cup match last night with a lower division side, Des Moines Menace, who beat Sporting Kansas City II 2-1.
We touch base on that USOC run, his first few weeks in the broadcast studio, a lot about this weekend's FCD-RSL game and one final thought on his time in Dallas.
Here we go:
