Beckham and L.A. Galaxy

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And I thought the New york Yankees had more money than Brains...

 

This is probably a little late, but I just read it and thought you guys may find it interesting. The following is taken from:

http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2007/writers/grant_wahl/01/17/beckham.qa/index.html

 

The Americans don't give a rat's ass about Beckham and ugly Spice, and his move to LA won't change a thing about it. Michael Jordan farting at the ninth hole, now that's news, Barry Bonds buying a new car, that's news, Brett Favre's holliday destination, that's news, David Beckham....who the hell is David Beckham ?

LA definitely didn't buy him for his capacities as a footballplayer, he's proven his worth for the past few years in Madrid, and it wasn't much, so i guess they bought him as an icon, hoping the merchandise will skyrocket, which is highly doubtfull because as i said earlier, nobody cares about Beckham in the US. It would have been more understandable if he would have moved to the J-League in Japan, because the Japanese are completely nuts about him, there even was a time all Japanese men had the same hairstyle as Beckham.

He's a genius though, for a mediocre footballplayer he's making the most of it.

 

I wonder if the Beckhams will convert to Scientology , since they are best mates with the Cruises?

 

in my opinion beckham moves to las vegas by making this... he is getting closer to the scenes every moment and of course he gets unbelievable amount of money by making this but *sigh* i wish i could do this too

 

Well, Beckham arrived on Friday, and that WAS a highly publicized event. However, here's the thing I don't really get. In his first public interview, Beckham claimed that soccer has the opportunity (with his help of course) to become as popular in America as it is everywhere else in the world.

That gave me a chuckle. While soccer has become steadily more popular in my lifetime, It's still a B-list sport here, and regardless of what Beck tries to do to change this, it won't happen. MAYBE soccer can become more popular than hockey, but that isn't saying much.

Here's the thing I don't get - everyone is saying that Beckham will be one of the best players in the league. While I know the level of competition is much higher in Europe than it is in the U.S., I find it hard to be believe that a 35-year old has been is going to be among the best we have. Even in his prime, while Beckham may have been considered the best player on his team, he was never considered the best player in the world - not even close really - and unless he's aging like a fine wine, I don't see that changing anytime soon.

 

He's not 35. Plus, he's still a good player with something to offer for top level teams. The thing is, he's a good player who relies on other good players around him. He can pick a 40 yard pass on a bloody pin-head, but he needs a player with the quality of movement, football brain, speed and nous to get into the position.

In other words... Wayne Rooney can get on the end of one of Beckham's pinpoint crosses, but can some American joker?

Anyway, this signing is nothing to do with how good he plays.

Although yes, he'll be the best player in that league by a country mile. The European leagues are so far ahead of the rest of the world it's not even funny.

 

Barmy is absolutely right. Beckham will be one of the best players in the MLS, but not in the way that the American audiences might want. He's not going to dazzle by dribbling his way through the whole field, or scoring endless goals. David Beckham has the freakish ability to kick a ball through the air with pinpoint accuracy - and as Barmy says, it is debatable whether the LA Galaxy strikers will be able to make the most of that.

But anyway, as Barmy says, based on some of the other guys who have gone to America and done well, you could take virtually any first team player in Europe and send them to America and they'd be one of the best players.

It's a bit like the no-name American basketballers who come and do well in the Australian National Basketball League.

 

Heh, I do hope he does well. Of course, as a footballer, he is in no way worth the money they spent for him - but hey, as the saying goes, he's not crazy who eats the pastry, but who gives it to him.

Anyway, it's true afaik that his style best shines in a team. No doubt the team would try to adapt their style to him, but I don't know how effective they would be. Still, I think he can make it work out somehow. There was a similar case, from what I have heard, in the 1960s here. We had a really great player, Asparukhov, who made a no-name forward the top scorer of the league with two sentences:

When I get the ball, you start running for their goal. I will take care of the rest.

 

Whoops! - not 35 - the "5" is right above the "2" on the number pad you know. The point was, the guy was never the best at his prime, and right now he's not at his personal best.

Even if he is the best player in the MLS, that's not going to draw Americans to soccer.

Two larger points here. One, Beckham is already becoming the typical American athlete, by giving his services to the highest bidder. He certainly isn't coming here for the competition, but for the quarter of a billion dollars - quite a lot of quid, I admit. If he was truly interested in cementing his legacy as one of the all-time greats, he never would have left ManU - much less Real Madrid, to come to some B-list league.

Second, the only reason Beckham is generating even remote interest is because of a problem with American pop culture (note I say pop culture and not sports culture). Americans are in love with being famous. While the typical American sports fan knows squat about soccer, the typical American - sports fan or not - knows that Beckham is famous.

The true test will come when he starts playing - which is supposedly going to be Saturday although I hear that he might have an injury that keeps him out of the game. Are people going to start tuning in to LA Galaxy games? I say no. As HB suggested, Beckham's talents don't translate into true excitement for the American sports fan. It's probably due to what I said earlier - that most American sports fan don't have a good understanding of soccer, and you need that in order to appreciate what Beckham does. Of course, even if he was scoring two or three goals a game, I doubt that Americans would start tuning in by the thousands.

 

Nah, he was never anywhere near the worlds best player. That pretty much changes yearly to be fair though, in football. As a rough thing though, the best players when he was in his prime was probably Zinedine Zidane, now the worlds best is one of Cristiano Ronaldo or Kaka. The worlds best players wouldn't go to the American league, especially no in their prime.

The signing isn't one for a footballing reason though. When you buy Beckham, you're buying a franchise more than you are a player. The man is a pure cash cow. People love him, he sells shirts and sells tickets. He pulls in the coin, that's why you buy David Beckham. There's certainly better midfielders than him in this world.

Well yeah, he's trying to break the pretty much untapped American football market. More money for him. I can't fault him. Anyone would be crazy to turn down the amount of money he is getting. I think he's the highest paid sports star in American history, isn't he? I know I wouldn't turn that down.

It's the same anywhere, David Beckham is a global brand. Thousands of kids in Asia (probably the biggest merchandise market now), Europe and elsewhere will be buying LA Galaxy shirts just so they can have 'Beckham - 23' written on the back.

He's not going to score many goals, never has done. I think he averages a goal every 7 or 8 games in his career. That's not too bad for a wide player, really, but there's much better. He's one for getting assists (I don't like that word...). But, again, they've not bought him for his footballing talent. They've bought him to claim the 'Beckham brand'.

 

Oh, I certainly can't fault him for taking the money. He's getting paid a heck of a lot more money than he was before. If someone offered you a job where you basically did the same thing you did now for significantly more money, of course you'd take it.

As far as "highest paid" that all depends on how you measure it.

If it counts endorsement - and I believe that Beckham's total deal includes quite a bit of endorsements - then the highest paid is without a doubt Tiger Woods, who earns nearly $100 million EVERY YEAR. Granted, only about 15% of that total comes from actually playing golf.

As far as total contract value, $250 million would rate as the second highest numerical value ever offered to an American sports star. The baseball star Alex Rodriguez - commonly referred to as "A-Rod" - is currently playing on a $252 million contract.

The one measure where Beckham might come in first is annual salary just for playing a sport for a year, as I understand his current contract lasts for 5 years. That makes him a $50 million per year man on average (I have no idea if it actually works out to $50 million per year, but I imagine a good chunk of the money was up front as a signing bonus). A-Rod's current contract was for 10 years, so that's an average pay of "only" $25.2 million. Then again, A-Rod will be getting another new contract at the end of this season, and people are talking in the $30 million to $35 million per year range.

 

This kind of reminds me of the Wayne Gretzky trade. When the Oilers traded (sold?) the Great One to the LA Kings, mahy people were really upset. But it came out later that he'd wanted to go there and he was very interested in raising the profile of the game in the U.S. I would argue that he succeeded in a small way, though many Canadians aren't happy about it.

Perhaps the signing of Becks will be the catalyst that makes the U.S. sit up and take notice of major league soccer. God knows Americans spend an ungodly amount of money on other professional sports, why not have some of that disposable income go to soccer promoters? If I had the knowledge, I'd like to take a run at a piece of that pie.

 

He is a good player, but he’s a team player, if his team sucks, he’ll not shine. But as Barmy said, they didn’t buy him for his football potential; it’s all about marketing…

If you wanna draw attention to the game itself you need players with high abilities levels like Cristiano Ronaldo, Kaka, Ronaldinho, these players can rely less on the team. But as was already pointed these players would not leave Europe to play in the US, at least not in their prime.

 

Can't wait until they play Chelsea. Hope Beckham is fit to play by then.

 

If Beckham manages to do what Pele failed, then to put it frank **** the MLS.

 

I watched that Chelsea game. What a farce. The whole build up was all about Victoria and Katie Holmes and Tom Cruise. That's not ESPN, that's E! Channel.

Why don't they just get a bunch of third-rate Brazilians to come and play for 10% of the price? They'd be dazzling. We have one playing for a team in New Zealand. Clearly, he must be completely hopeless by Brazilian standards but everyone here loves him because he can twinkle toe his way through a whole team and score spectacular goals.