David Beckham's deal with the Los Angeles Galaxy is worth a staggering $250 million US over five years. (Pierre-Philippe Marcou/AFP/Getty Images).
Soccer: John F. Molinaro
Coming to America: David Beckham
Last Updated Friday, Jan. 12, 2007
by John F. Molinaro
David Beckham and Los Angeles - it's a match made in heaven between one of the world's most famous celebrities and the city famous for creating them.
They don't write movie scripts any more compelling than this: "Mr. Beckham Goes to Hollywood."
On Thursday, the 31-year-old midfielder with the golden right foot revealed he will leave Real Madrid, the most famous club in the world, at the end of this season and will join the Los Angeles Galaxy of Major League Soccer, thus beginning his American sojourn.
The Galaxy will pay the former England national team captain the paltry sum of $250-million US over the next five years for his services.
A quarter of a billion dollars is an obscene amount of money to pay one person, of course, but to be fair, it's important to point out the Galaxy didn't buy David Beckham the soccer player. Instead, they bought David Beckham Inc., a multinational corporation worth hundreds of millions of dollars that is able to command the attention of the global media at a moment's notice.
Which is a good thing for the Galaxy and MLS, because, let's face it folks, David Beckham the soccer player is not what he once was.
To say he's washed up and over the hill would be a gross distortion. Even at 31, Beckham is still a good player who should have no problem carving out a successful career for himself in MLS.
But let's not kid ourselves either, because Los Angeles is getting a player who can no longer cut it at the highest level. If he could, he'd still be playing in Europe. Real Madrid tried to lock him up for another two years only because they realize, like MLS does, that Beckham is money in the bank when it comes to commercial opportunities.
On the soccer field, however, Beckham's best days are behind him. Just ask Fabio Capello, the Italian disciplinarian who was installed as Real Madrid's new coach at the start of this season.
A regular starter his entire career, Beckham has been forced to sit on the bench (he's started only seven of 25 league matches this season), a clear sign that Capello didn't rate the Englishman as a class player. That never stopped Beckham from seeing playing time in the past, but it's a different ball game in Madrid since Capello came to town.
Unlike his predecessors at Madrid who were more than happy to include Beckham in their startling 11 because it made good business sense, Capello was not swayed by the Englishman's overblown reputation and decided to bench him because it made soccer sense.
Though it would be a stretch to characterize Beckham's stint in Spain as a failure, it's hardly a coincidence that Real Madrid has not won single league title, Copa del Rey (the Spanish equivalent of the FA Cup) or a Champions League crown since Beckham joined the club in 2003, the first time in 50 years the team has gone three seasons without picking up a major trophy.
Beckham was brought to Spain by Florentino Perez, the former Real Madrid president who was more concerned with the club's economic bottom line than winning trophies. In Beckham, Perez saw a player that he could use as the centrepiece of his project to help Real Madrid eclipse Manchester United as the biggest and wealthiest team in the world.
Perez sold influential midfielder Claude Makelele to Chelsea in order to make room for Beckham, explaining that, "Makelele can't sell shirts, Beckham can."
And so he did. Real Madrid sold a lot of Beckham shirts, embarked on huge money-making tours of Asia and used its 50-per-cent control of the English star's image rights to become the biggest club in the world.
Beckham made Real Madrid piles of money, but he never won them a title.
But then, none of that really matters now, because Beckham's success with Los Angeles won't be measured by the number of MLS Cups he can add to the Galaxy's trophy case, but whether or not he can sell the game of soccer in the U.S.
Can Beckham lift MLS from the doldrums of anonymity and help it attain name recognition on par with pro football, baseball, basketball and NASCAR? Can he succeed where Pele failed before him?
Can David slay Goliath?
We'll soon find out.
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