MLS Preview

Editors note: Before I turn these two loose on you, I want to set a precedent. I want you to know that if there is a sport we don’t cover here at BWC, and you think we should be send your appeals. I don’t know anything about soccer, but I’m intrigued. My city has a team (Toronto FC) and I’m curious as to whether or not I should care. All I currently know about soccer is that the coaches for the teams at my school say ‘well done’ roughly 100 times a minute. So, because it is impossible to ignore that soccer is growing by leaps and bounds in North America, I decided to recruit some help in making sense of this. It’s like pre-school all over again, but with no naps, no snacks and no toys. And now if I push Catherine Nichols off the swings I don’t go to time-out but rather, prison. Enjoy.

Mike Boone

You are presumably a discerning person. You make choices that reflect your love of what you feel is worthwhile. Everyone appreciates your taste in culture, entertainment, food and company. You are, in short, excellent in all things. Save one. In all likelihood, you do not watch, follow, or otherwise acknowledge the existence of soccer. This is a black mark on your nearly flawless appreciation of all things quality.

However, today the beautiful game will be revealed to you. What was foreign will become familiar, and you will be better for it. Unless you are already a soccer fan, in which case you will discover that your knowledge and love of the game will only be enhanced. In short, this will be a tremendous experience for all involved. Shall we begin?

Major League Soccer (MLS) could rarely have been accused in the past of being a major league, but this season all that will change, due to the arrival of one David Beckham, continued expansion into new markets (Canada, eh?) and extensive TV coverage (every game will be televised). This is the time for the league to shine, because the table has been set for success outside of a niche fan base.

You have probably heard about the appearance of David Beckham on these shores. What you may not have heard is what the man can do with a ball at his feet. First off, when you watch Becks play for the Galaxy he will not score many goals. He may score none at all. This is fine, he is a player who will do a few things, and do them exceptionally well. He will make tremendous crosses and set up plays for everyone else, he will be a strong leader, and he will be a consummate professional.

This last skill will be most important for new teammate and American star Landon Donovan. Donovan has been the most recognizable player in America since age 17, but now he is not even the best midfielder on his own team. His disappearance in the World Cup raised questions about his leadership, and his performances in the international matches since may not have helped. Despite scoring five times in three matches, he has added evidence to the argument that he doesn’t lead against stiff competition, instead torching weaker opponents. His comfort level in MLS seems to have negatively affected his development.

The Galaxy hold hope that Donovan can learn from Beckham’s example, and become the player he has the potential to be. While his hairstyles and personal life are extravagant, Beckham is workman-like on the field. If you pay attention to the intricacies, you will love the way he impacts the flow of a match delicately, without scoring at all. Don’t let his recent exclusion from the England national squad fool you; he is one of the best in the world at what he does.

While Beckham and Donovan may provide a reason to watch Galaxy matches, the team itself was not outstanding last season, so you will need to find other teams to watch. First, discover an MLS squad located near you and support your local team. And should you find that there is no squad close by, here are two teams worth watching this season.

If you’re into good-looking, fast moving soccer, you will love the New England Revolution. The Revs are the Chicago Cubs of MLS, constantly threatening, but never truly living up to their potential. The Revs play an attractive style of soccer, passing, moving and generally trying to score, rather than trying to keep the other team from tallying. In the attack it is worth watching American striker Taylor Twellman, who scores buckets of goals. Twellman is a big, strong forward who has played with the U.S. men’s national team and is one of the finest offensive players in MLS. He and midfielder Shalrie Joseph will lead a Revs team that came up short last season, falling to Houston in the MLS Cup final. They have not made any huge changes from last year’s squad, but that decision may prove to be a poor one, since some of the teams in the Eastern Conference look much improved.

DC United and the New York Red Bulls, who have been New England’s main rivals for a number of years, both appear to be as good as ever. D.C. looked impressive in international competition, putting up a good fight before falling to Mexico’s Chivas de Guadalajara in the semi-finals of the CONCACAF Champions Cup.

Those of you in the West will find it harder to avoid Beckhamania than others, but unless you are a bandwagon jumper you’ll want to find your own team. If this is true, behold the Colorado Rapids. While they appear to be one more horribly-monikered squad in the MLS, the Rapids are a team on the rise. This off-season they took the big step of entering a partnership with Arsenal, an English Premier League powerhouse and constant contender that is also home to superstar Frenchman Thierry Henry. This relationship is designed to allow the clubs to work together on strategy, training and player development. Most of the information will be passing from North London to Colorado, since Arsenal’s manager, Arsene Wenger is one of the finest developers of young talent in the soccer universe, and this remains a weakness of the MLS. For the current crop of Rapids, check out midfielder Kyle Beckerman, an American who made his first appearance for the men’s national team in February. When paired in the middle with American Pablo Mastroeni, a U.S. team regular and sometime-captain, they will control the flow of the ball and dictate the pace of play. Both are tough two way players, comfortable both going forward with the attack and dropping back in defense.

It’s going to be a great MLS season, so find a team, watch some matches, and discover just what you’ve been missing; it will be well worth it.

Scott Appleman

What began as a negotiating chip in the US bid for the 1994 World Cup is on the verge of becoming something in the crowded landscape of American sports. Major League Soccer is evolving. The obvious evidence supporting that statement is David Beckham’s enormous contract and impending arrival from Spanish giants Real Madrid to play for Los Angeles toward the end of the summer. That is true, and it is not true.

The Beckham deal has everyone talking about MLS (you’ve talked about it, don’t deny it). His greatest benefit for the league may be his status as a human billboard, not his bending free kicks or challenge to new teammate Landon Donovan for top billing. Real Madrid leapfrogged Beckham’s old team, Manchester United, to become the richest club in the world, even though he won zero trophies in their white shirt. People who are not sports fans know about Beckham, and now, MLS, because his face, his wife, his tattoos, and his children’s names are all famous. But, to you who are intrigued, yet unconvinced of soccer in the US, there are deeper changes happening than the addition of the former England captain.

For one, the newest team addition to the league follows the recent trend of organizations taking their identities seriously, realizing that soccer clubs are soccer clubs and should not be given names that belong in the AFL or WNBA (Dallas Burn! Miami Fusion!). In recent years, MLS seems to have learned to take Americans seriously as soccer fans, using more names inspired by European soccer tradition (FC Dallas, Houston Dynamo, Real Salt Lake). Canadians are this year’s beneficiary of that practice, as Toronto FC, the league’s thirteenth club, will debut in their own, soccer-only stadium, displaying rookie American midfielder Maurice Edu, and free from a terribly jazzy, regretfully intangible nickname. And, despite not ditching nicknames, the Colorado Rapids and Los Angeles Galaxy will sport new looks this year. Colorado has already switched from a little-league logo to a respectable team shield and the colors of English clubs West Ham and Aston Villa, maroon and sky blue; LA will drop their decoder ring logo and unveil new uniforms when Beckham arrives in July. These off-field changes tell soccer fans MLS understands the culture of the world game, and allow non-soccer sports fans to take MLS seriously on its own terms, not as a copycat, little brother league, hoping to catch somebody’s, anybody’s, attention.

As important as it is for MLS to consider aesthetics and rhetoric in cultivating the culture of the game in the US, a faithful and interested fan-base (you!) will be cemented with on-field changes. Beckham’s arrival is evidence of a more extensive change in mindset. Before this year, each MLS team operated under a salary cap that kept the clubs financially stable and out of the spending trouble that killed the NASL, soccer’s last major foray into the States. Now, steady growth has allowed for a salary-cap-plus system. The Designated Player Rule has landed Beckham in LA, reunited former US captain Claudio Reyna with former national team coach Bruce Arena in New York, and scored a North American rivalry coup in allowing Chicago to pry Mexican star Cuauhtemoc Blanco away from Mexican power Club America. Signings like these shift the power of club soccer in the region from Mexico and the small Caribbean leagues to MLS–exactly as American sports fans would expect.

This is important. It will be difficult for Americans (and Canadians, we cannot forget the Canadians) to invest time in a league that continually loses face against leagues from other countries (which they had been doing in the CONCACAF Champions League until this year, when Houston and DC stopped losing early in the tournament to small, difficult-to-pronounce, Central American teams and made the semifinals). This season, the schedule is expanding beyond the regular season, MLS Cup, and US Open Cup: MLS will pit its top four teams against Mexico’s top four in the first SuperLiga tournament. This year’s MLS entrants–LA, Dallas, DC, and Houston–were chosen on tradition; next year teams will qualify by posting the best four records. MLS teams will do less sneaking along in the regular season, hoping to catch fire and barely make the playoffs, and see Top Four status as something to fight for because the SuperLiga winner will pocket $1 million at the end of August.

In addition to the continuing maturation of MLS, the league’s maturing young Americans warrant attention. Landon Donovan, the figurehead of American soccer, both on the national team and for Los Angeles, won two MLS titles early in his career with San Jose (now Houston). US wings DaMarcus Beasley and Clint Dempsey developed in Chicago and New England, respectively, before moving to Europe. There are several young players on the national team scene who are now establishing themselves with their clubs.

Seasoned swashbuckler Blanco will play attack with Chicago’s young wing Justin Mapp. Chivas USA (if you don’t know that chivas means “goats” in Spanish, you should) will again run out speedy defender Jonathan Bornstein, the 2006 ROY. Young phenom Freddy Adu will run the show from Ronaldinho’s position for his new team, Real Salt Lake. Toronto’s Edu, Houston’s creative defensive midfielder Ricardo Clark, New York’s teenage striker Jozy Altidore, and towering Dallas target man Kenny Cooper are possible future Stars-and-Stripes expected to be regular difference makers in MLS this summer.

The heart of success in MLS will be the bringing in of veteran international stars to play alongside budding Americans (and, yes, Canadians), and this season, the league is heading in that direction. Couple that movement with the burgeoning understanding of soccer culture and tradition by both the league and sports fans, and the 2007 season signals a second era for MLS, the growing up of a little brother.