Beckham Arrives In America Along With MLS
BECKS UPS THE ANTE FOR MAJOR LEAGUE SOCCER IN THE U.S.
The biggest news day in Major League Soccer history was today. Real Madrid midfielder David Beckham along with his wife, Posh Spice, are heading to Hollywood.
The signing of Becks is huge for so many levels other than someone of his stature venturing to play in the 11-year-old league. The league and its founder have finally let go of the stigma of the North American Soccer League's demise in 1983.
If you remember the NASL at all, you'll know that the great Pele once played for the New York Cosmos. An infinitely small number of Americans would be able to name another player and a handful of those could name another team in that league. Pele's signing and the subsequently three seasons detailed in last year's insigthful documentary, "Once in a Lifetime" (watch the trailer here), were the pinnacle of American soccer in this country. When Pele retired the league went kaput overnight.
The lessons of Pele's signing and the mad rush to match the publicity effectively swamped the NASL and this phenomenon has clouded the men who run and finance MLS from day one. The lessons were learned and safeguards like the single-entity model were implemented effectively making the league office in New York City the focal point for every franchise, namely the rigid and stingy salary cap that was subsequently challenged in court by the players union.
These safeguards may have coddled MLS in its vulnerable and nascent years when the biggest thing going was the golden afroed Carlos Valderrama and cool uniforms, but as time went on their terrified reluctance to open up their product to meaningful growth became almost clinical.
With the implementation of the so-called "Beckham Rule" and the signing of the Beckham, MLS commissioner Don Garber is taking the role of a proud father walking his lovely daughter down the aisle. From this day, MLS no longer needs to be coddled. It's grown up and the founding fathers must believe in the slow and consistently care its given the entity. There's no going back now. Chelsea midfielder Edgar Davids is rumored to be talking to FC Dallas and, of course, one of the New York Red Bulls two Beckham Rule roster spots is rumored to be the great Ronaldo.
MLS in 2007 is much different than any season in the history of NASL. One of the problems of the former league was the extreme dearth of American talent or any perceptible breeding ground for domestic talent. MLS, of course, has a deep well of yankee talent universally believed to have kick started the U.S. National Team's meteoric rise in the eyes of the soccer-playing world.
The owners of MLS are littered with millionaires and billionaires in Los Angeles, New York, D.C. and Denver as opposed to sole deep-pocketed owner in the old NASL, Warner Communications executive Steve Ross of the Cosmos, who not only signed Pele to amulti-million dollar contract, but Franz Beckenbauer, Giorgio Caniglia, Johan Cruyff and Carlos Alberto which furthered the financial gap between teams but also the competitive gap. It's the primary reason that the New York Cosmos seems like the only team in the NASL to our collective memory.
Aside from this day, the second most important announcement in this league's short history was the opening of Crew Stadium in Columbus, OH.
By far, the impetus to open up the purse strings lies in the realizations among soccer media, fans and advertisers is that the league is not going away, not with soccer-specific venues opening, planned or under construction all over MLS. The NASL never had the luxury of building their own soccer parks like every team in MLS except for New England and Houston.
In the short term, every soccer-playing 12-year-old will be donning the bright gold jersey of the L.A. Galaxy and the media attention for his first game will be a spectacle and Beckham and Landon Donovan might lead the Galaxy to the MLS Cup championship, but unlike Pele's arrival in the 1970s, this rise of MLS will continue on much the steady curve it has for the first 11 seasons, except now, more Americans will know about it and most of the world's dynamic players will eventually desire a move to America.
Labels: David Beckham, L.A. Galaxy, MLS, NASL, Pele, Real Madrid, Ronaldo
