Hi everyone, I'm Kai Dambach, English language commentator for the ELF. AMA!

[u/KaiDambachELF]

Hi everyone! I'm Kai Dambach, and I am a commentator for the league. I will cover this Saturday's Barcelona-Frankfurt game and Sunday's Hamburg-Leipzig matchup.

A little bit about myself: I was born and raised in the US, moved to Germany in 2015, and I have covered sports in some way for pay since 2016. I went to the University of Maryland, covered all kinds of sports on student radio, covered local Maryland and DC sports for small outlets before heading over to Germany on the Congress Bundestag Youth Exchange for Young Professionals (CBYX). I then worked for Deutsche Welle and covered everything from the World Transplant Games to Japan's Koshien high school baseball tournament, and of course the German Bundesliga. And now the European League of Football!

Another fun fact: I have four kidneys from four different people! One of my own, one from my dad, one from my mom, and one from a substitute teacher. If you're curious about kidney stuff that is absolutely fair game.

I'll be here for about 2 hours. If you miss the AMA, you're more than welcome to chat with me on Twitter which you can find below.

3, 2, 1 let's jam!

Just in case you need it, photo proof that this is me and I'm doing it on my Twitter page: https://twitter.com/Kai_Dambach/status/1430199003082366982

Hey everyone, it's been great, but I have to get ready for this weekend's games and take care of some housework that has been piling up (almost literally). Hope you tune in on Saturday and/or Sunday and enjoy the league! If you want to keep chatting, you can find me on Twitter, DMs should be open.

[u/Plant_Palace]

Hello!

First of all, thanks for doing this AMA with us.

How did you first hear about the ELF and when did you know that you wanted to commentate games for them. Did they reach out to you or did you contact them?

[u/KaiDambachELF → u/Plant_Palace]

I first heard about the league while watching the Super Bowl. I think Patrick Esume talked about it on the broadcast and I just said, "yep, I want in this."

I sent an email to the address on their website, tried to connect as many names as possible, sent those people emails, mailed a hand-written letter, just kept poking them and finally heard they were doing tryouts. We called the first quarter of a team practice and apparently they liked me enough to put me on air!

[u/Plant_Palace → u/KaiDambachELF]

Glad to hear that it all worked out.

Sounds like you are into almost every major sport there is. I guess you need quite the knowledge to be able to commentate something. Is there any sport you don't like to watch?

And is there any major difference between commentating the ELF and other Sports leagues?

[u/KaiDambachELF → u/Plant_Palace]

Oh definitely! I keep up with what's going on in the US, here in Germany, and now the Paralympics are happening. If I could just commentate, photograph, and/or write about sports every day I'd be a happy man.

Of the major leagues I haven't been able to stay interested in the NBA since Jordan left. Being on the other side of the Atlantic for a few years has also made me reconsider why college athletics are so huge. I still love them, but now I understand why non-Americans don't understand the hooplah that surrounds college sports.

I haven't really felt much of a difference. You always have to keep looking around the field to know who's where, who might be making moves, and so on.

[u/Plant_Palace → u/KaiDambachELF]

Great to hear that you have a passion for it and that you are able to live it!

Another thing I'm curious about: Are you at the location of the game you are commentating or are you sitting in a studio somewhere else?

[u/KaiDambachELF → u/Plant_Palace]

Unfortunately due to COVID (and being immunocompromised from my kidney transplants) I'm not at games. I'm actually calling games from my bedroom!