TPP Op-Ed: MLS Should Sign Beckham before it's too late

David Beckham is having a miserable year. He has started only four games for Real Madrid, and has been dropped from the English National Team roster following a subpar World Cup. While initially rumored to be in contract negotiations with Madrid, the word coming out of the Bernabeu now is that Real would prefer to let the Beckham Experiment draw to a close.

This is Major League Soccer's chance.

Up untill now, MLS has eschewed shelling out for high-priced talent for fear of dooming the league to the fate of sports nostalgia to lie with the NASL, which folded under financial difficulties extending from a salary arms-race for players like Pele, Franz Beckenbauer, and George Best.

However, in 2007, this is due to change. MLS needs to buy Beckham NOW rather than wait a year or two because of the following reasons.

1) Stadiums: Next season, with new stadiums opening in Toronto and Colorado, for the first time ever, more than 1/2 of the teams in MLS will be playing in soccer-specific stadiums (7 out of 13). This keeps the revenue in MLS, and changes the business plan into one that MLS and the NASL never had before, enabling money to be spent.

2) Television: ESPN has just signed on for an 8-year deal that sees a network paying rights fees to broadcast MLS games for the first time ever, and matches will be played in primetime. ESPN wants big names and high drama to warrant their investment.

3) Becks himself: Beckham is only going to get older, and his skills are eventually going to diminish with time. The Becks three years from now may not even resemble the Becks we know now.

4) Affordable: Beckham is coming off his worst form of his career, so his asking price is low. Real Madrid is only asking for $9.4 million as a transfer fee (Less than 20% of his $46 million transfer fee from Manchester United to Real Madrid in 2003). This money, while substantial for MLS can easily be made up in increased ticket sales, Beckham jersey sales, and advertising. For reference, Freddy Adu caused three MLS games to top 30,000 fans in three of the league's weakest markets (New York, New England, Colorado) in 2004, and attendance registered a bump in all cities the Adu Roadshow visited that season. That's Freddy frickin Adu. Think the World's most famous soccer player might have a similar effect? In a few years, Beckham can either recapture his form playing in a Los Angeles Galaxy shirt in front of packed houses in the United States, or in a European shirt playing in front of packed houses in Europe.

5) Selling Beckham Back: Should Beckham recapture his form while playing in a Red Bulls or Galaxy shirt, Europe may come calling again, putting MLS in the enviable position of demanding a transfer fee for Beckham.

6) Other greats coming: Rumor also has it from credible sources that next season we could see Luis Figo in a New England shirt, and Ronaldo in an RBNY shirt. Becks would be a celebrity, and should get in while the getting's good.