No one today was alive when the American and National Leagues merged in 1903, to form Major League Baseball.

A few very senior citizens are older than the National Hockey League (founded in 1917) and National Football League (1920). The National Basketball Association traces its roots to 1946, but there was little hoopla around its first game.

Major League Soccer is only 29 years old and has just entered its 30th season. Fans just entering middle age remember its first matches, its rocky early years, and its explosive growth since then. 

Dave Johnson does too. He’s had a unique seat. As D.C. United’s play-by-play announcer since its 1996 launch, he’s been both an eyewitness to the league’s ups and downs, and a chronicler of them.

“It feels like family,” the Washington-area native says of United’s players, coaches, front office and supporters. “To be part of that family is big. Other leagues have been around for 100 years. But we were there at the beginning. Without us — our family — none of this would have happened.”

Last year, D.C. United named Audi Field’s broadcast booth “The Dave Johnson Broadcast Booth.”

Johnson’s perspective predates MLS. A soccer aficionado since the North American Soccer League days, the Washington Diplomats helped him through difficult times. His mother’s last good day before she died of multiple sclerosis was their 1979 home opener. The next year he and his father had season tickets, and marveled at Johan Cruyff’s wizardry.

Johnson was one of those kids who pretended to be a sports announcer (with an audience of one: his supportive mother). He yearned for a career in soccer. But his timing was poor. When he graduated from college in 1986, soccer leagues were going out of business.

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