SOCCER / GRAHAME L. JONES : Time, Opportunity Being Wasted by MLS
All things considered, it has been a good month for soccer in the United States, culminating Sunday with the national team’s victory in U.S. Cup ’95 and the announcement that Alexi Lalas will play Major League Soccer next year.
Signing the outspoken and often outrageous Lalas by MLS gives the league a second legitimate “personality” who will help it as much off the field as on--a factor vital to the fledgling organization’s long-term success.
But it will take a lot more than Lalas and flamboyant Mexican goalkeeper Jorge Campos to attract fans when the league kicks off March 31. Between now and then, the 10-team MLS has to sign at least another 18 instantly recognizable “characters.”
MLS never is going to sign the Dennis Bergkamps, Juergen Klinsmanns or Paul Gascoignes. They are well beyond the league’s price range. All three changed clubs this month, with their combined transfer fees topping $30 million.
Dutch star Bergkamp was snapped up by Arsenal of England from Inter Milan of Italy for $13 million. Klinsmann was “brought home” from Tottenham Hotspur of England by Bayern Munich of Germany, which gave him a $2 million signing bonus and is paying him $1.75 million a year. Gascoigne was traded by Lazio of Italy to Glasgow Rangers of Scotland for $12 million.
Those kinds of figures are strictly fantasy to MLS, which will have to content itself with signing international players who are either on their way down (Colombia’s Carlos Valderrama is a good example) or have yet to be discovered.
The likelihood is that the league will concentrate on the former at the expense of the latter. Like Japan’s J-League, it could fall into the trap of spending too much on slightly over-the-hill players, hoping that their names will attract the fans, and not enough on up-and-coming youngsters who have yet to prove themselves.
Yet it is precisely these younger players, aged 18 to 22, who could mesh most effectively with the young Americans who will make up the backbone of the league. Then, too, MLS has the ability to develop and subsequently sell such players at a decent profit, much like smaller clubs around the world have done for decades.
There is no evidence, however, that anyone from MLS is scouring the globe for such players, even though South America and, especially, Africa, are overflowing with talented young players who would jump at the chance to play in the new league.
Perhaps such a search is going on behind the scenes, but evidence is to the contrary. On Sunday, the flame-haired, goatee-sprouting Lalas became MLS’ 18th signee. Of those, only Campos is not American.
It might take MLS clubs--and their coaches--a season or two to realize that they are missing a good bet. If leading clubs in Europe regularly raid the rest of the world for promising players, why not the United States? One-quarter of the league’s players will be foreign. The majority of them should be tomorrow’s stars, not yesterday’s.
Of course, right now the MLS has no coaches to lobby for such an approach. Neither does it have any club names, or club colors or club anything-elses. It remains, frustratingly, Mythical League Soccer.
The promise is there. The signs are positive. But the shift from illusion to reality is painstakingly slow. Exactly what MLS is waiting for is unclear. Why have the 10 teams not been given names? Why do they not have logos? Why have they not started selling themselves to the public?
Fans, no matter how much they want the new league to succeed, cannot be expected to support something that exists only on paper. They have to be given something substantive to cheer for, to look forward to supporting.
The answer from MLS is always the same. The work is being done. When the time is right, all will be unveiled. Well, the time was right when the World Cup ended, but that opportunity was blown.
The time was right when baseball went on strike, but that opportunity was blown.
The time was right when hockey took a holiday, but that opportunity was blown.
The time is right again now, before the NFL, the NBA and the college football and basketball seasons get into gear and before baseball finally reaches the only meaningful part of its dreary season.
Next year will be too late. Next year, in addition to all the other competition it will face, MLS will be fighting for attention with the Olympic Games. It doesn’t take a genius to see where a new soccer league fits into this picture.
So, while it is wonderful that the American team won U.S. Cup ’95 over Colombia, Mexico and Nigeria, and while it is wonderful that Lalas will be playing for MLS next year, perhaps the league could use a taste of the trademark Lalas honesty and forthrightness:
Wake up now or die stillborn next March.
