This past summer, a couple of friends and I got tickets to see FC Barcelona play the New York Red Bulls at Giant’s Stadium. It seemed that the entire tri-state area had tickets to the game. It was not an intense devotion to Red Bulls that attracted these fans. We all wanted to see Ronaldinho dance around challenges, Messi blast through defenders, and Deco score goals. Giants’ Stadium roared when Barcelona possessed the ball, and at one point erupted in chants of Messi’s name. We were there for Barcelona, and quite frankly we could not care less how the Red Bulls faired.
The disappointing reality about American soccer is that few care about it. I cannot name a single player on the Red Bulls; yet, I easily can run off the starting squads of AC Milan, Manchester United, and the Italian and English international teams.
Last Thursday, MLS was given some false hope. The international soccer icon David Beckham confirmed he would leave Real Madrid and join the Los Angeles Galaxy of America’s MLS. The five-year contract awards Beckham $10 million a year plus an additional $200 million in endorsements. MLS and the LA Galaxy have placed incredibly high expectations on the footballer, marketing him as the savior of American soccer. These claims are foolishly optimistic. Beckham’s presence in the MLS will generate a temporary interest among Americans but it won’t be enough get the American public to care about the game in the long run.
The United States seems a fitting place for Beckham. At age 31, Beckham has lost his ability to fight for a starting spot on a team of Real Madrid’s caliber, where veterans constantly compete with one another and with new talent for a spot on the starting-eleven squad, but he’ll start with the Galaxy. Living in L.A. will allow him to work more closely with and develop his youth soccer academy, which even his most avid critics must admit is an admirable contribution to the game. And with Hollywood right in his backyard, he can do all the movies, commercials, and photo ops his heart desires.
MLS and the LA Galaxy have also cashed in relatively early on their recent signing. Since Thursday’s announcement, the Galaxy alone sold 5,000 season tickets, which is remarkable considering the average MLS team sold only 15,504 during the 2006 season.
The MLS claims that it does not plan to use Beckham simply as a cashcow. Unfortunately, that is just about the only affect Beckham will have once his career ends in five years. MLS’s current approach to revamping American soccer is as follows: by recruiting a couple of international soccer stars, Americans and the world will care about our league. The problem with this policy is two fold. First, it ties American interest in the game to a handful of non-American star players rather than to the teams those starts play for; to celebrity rather than the game itself. Once those players retire, the American public most likely will stop following those teams if they have not already done so. In Beckham’s case, while his jersey undoubtedly will sell out in minutes, it is highly unlikely that those sporting the names of his future teammates will experience any rise in sales. While ticket sales will skyrocket, we can be sure that fans will flock to LA’s Home Depot Center cheering not for the LA Galaxy, but for David Beckham.
Furthermore, Beckham’s signing does nothing to increase the league’s level of play. A couple of players, talented as they are, won’t make the other players in the league any better. The league will not win any respect until it gets better. The only viable option is to develop talent within the United States, which requires the establishment of intense and competitive youth development squads for MLS teams. If MLS can increase the overall talent in the league, the effect on its popularity would be tremendous. It would entice American stars to stay rather than to play in Europe. More importantly, it would give Americans a great league over which they could have some ownership. Americans could understand that the greatness of their league is attributed to the talent of their players, not those from England or Brazil. Only then will the game take on a new life in the United States and will fans, like myself, feel compelled to support their home squads.
