it's hard to become a fan of a team when the best players on the team strive to leave the team and go elsewhere. for the casual fan, it makes attaching yourself to the team very difficult and what you're left with is fans of the game, not the team. there's nothing MLS can do to prevent players from wanting to go to the bigger stages, i'm just highlighting a problem that they have when trying to grow the league.
you know next spring when the season kicks off, the majority of kansas city who jumped on the bandwagon sometime in the past couple months will be wondering wtf happened to "their" team.
This evolved into an interesting conversation that I wish I had the ability to participate in as it happened so all my thoughts will go here.
Part of this issue is that people think MLS has to be or even approach the success of the Big 4 in the short term to be viewed as a successful league and that is a basic fallacy that needs to be addressed before this conversation can be rationally had. The NBA is the youngest of those leagues and that league is 67 years old, even the NHL is nearly 100. Even looking at these established leagues in the scope of the television age, the MLS has progressed incredibly fast, the NBA had a contract that included tape delayed games in the 80's. The NHL is still struggling with a national media deal in America, their Canadian media deal is 3X that of their American deal.
The biggest mistake that the league can make, and I don't think they will, is to feel like they have to grow or make business decisions with the big 4 in mind. Keitzman interviewed Robb last week and he essentially asked him if the MLS would ever be able to offer a big money, long-term contract to a domestic player in his prime to keep him from going to Europe. His answer was a flat no, which was great to hear. Then dumbass Kietz proceeds to say that MLS will surpass the NHL and the NBA in the American sports pecking order, never mind the fact that the NBA is making more money, attracting bigger crowds, and getting more TV money than ever. So to 'clams point, no I don't think that player movement is an issue for four reasons.
-Soccer, all around the world, is built off of local/regional passion. Fans of clubs everywhere identify with their neighborhood club, not the players. The clubs that are now iconic globally, and there are less than 10 of them, didn't become that way by having the same players in the uniforms year in and year out, which leads me to point two.
-Even in Europe the players move around a lot. Players have freedom of movement a lot more than they do in major American sports. Drafts don't happen and long term contracts are rare and players seeing the end of these contracts is even more rare. The most iconic player in the sport the last 25 years played, primarily, for 4 clubs in 4 countries in his career. He isn't thought of lesser because of this fact.
-Losing players to Europe isn't some sort of black mark in the world of soccer. Elite players within European leagues move amongst other European leagues. We can become the number 1 league in world and we'll still lose players to other leagues around the world. American basketball players are bypassing sitting on the bench in the NBA to play in Spain because the money is right. If/When Eurobasket continues to grow, they are going to start attracting better players from the NBA too. The more established MLS becomes, the more comfortable European players will be coming over here. Becoming a soccer icon here is unique because you will be a star here and everywhere else. David Beckham made stupid money playing in Los Angeles that opportunity will present itself more and more to guys who fit the unique mold.
-Finally, players in all sports leave all of the time, I think this whole issue is one that seems like an issue because we're looking for issues where they may or may not exist. I am a Red Sox fan and we just lost at least 1/3 of the starting 9 after winning a world series. After winning the world series in '04 we lost 5 of the starting 9 and the most popular pitcher in the history of the franchise. It is 2013, there are no illusions about players staying with teams for extended periods of time. Not only do players have the ability to move but it is smart for the teams to not just sit on the status quo and make moves to continue to make the teams relevant. People who buy tickets, cheer for the team, they cheer for winning. People who cheer for players are more fans of the league that the teams.
Sorry so long guys
