"Two designated players?" or "The real problem with MLS"

I had planned to do an MLS season preview blog post last week, but my sources (the "Soccer America MLS preview") have been delayed. Rather than offer a poor, information-free preview of the season, I decided instead on this (a week late).

Just this past week MLS (that's Major League Soccer, the relatively big-time pro soccer league here in the US, for those of you who don't follow the sport much) announced a change to their salary cap rules. Previously, one player on a team could be "designated" for a salary cap exemption. Without going into the details, the point is that this exception allows teams to sign a player any amount of money and yet only count a fraction of that towards the notoriously stingy MLS salary cap. It's what allowed the LA Galaxy to sign superstar David Beckham three years ago, and also brought a few other "name" players to the league.

The change to allow 2 of these players to now be on the same team (plus a possible 3rd with some wonky details) is supposed to open up the league to more big-time players and raise the level of play across the country. This should address the biggest problem with MLS, which is that the level of play simply isn't as good as other leagues around the world.

Except for one thing..... the level of play in MLS is sub-par not because there aren't enough elite players, but because there aren't enough merely good players. Adding another few elite players (which is no guarantee, as anyone who has actually followed the designated player history could tell you) won't be enough. What really must happen to take MLS to a higher level is to open up the coffers in a smaller way, but to a larger group of players. This isn't going to happen, for reasons I'll discuss, but it better happen soon or MLS will start to lose the progress it's made since its inception in 1996.

First let me reinforce the main point. This league has some elite players. Sure, Beckham is hurt at the moment, but he still counts. He was logging major minutes for no less a team than AC Milan in Italy just this winter. You also have to count Landon Donovan. Many have scoffed at descriptions of Donovan as an "elite" player, but his recent loan (player movement in international soccer is curious for those only accustomed to US leagues... ask me about it and I'll explain in a blog sometime) stint at Everton proved that he could be a difference-maker in any league. Kasey Keller is an older goalkeeper, but one with a sterling history who could've stayed on in England had he wished. Shalrie Joseph has been almost a one-man-gang in New England for a couple of years now. Juan Pablo Angel had a disappointing and injury-marred 2009, but his record is that of a top-notch forward with success around the world. Freddie Ljungberg can still motor around the field and is making plays in Seattle. MLS has some elite players. There aren't nearly enough of them, but they are there.

However, there is a huge drop-off in quality below those guys (except at goalkeeper, the one position at which Americans always seem to excel) around the league. The player quality dips precariously from "blue-chip" stars to "junk bonds" without much in-between. Where are the "red-chip" starters that may not be quite as good as those elite players, but can still compete and play some good soccer? They've been removed from the league due to a myriad of circumstances. This dearth is why MLS teams look (on paper) to be comparable to top-level teams from around the world, but consistently come up short whenever they're actually paired up against them. Yes, Freddie Ljungberg and Kasey Keller were with the Seattle Sounders last summer when they matched up against English powerhouse Chelsea. But while Ljungberg and Keller compare fairly well against Michael Ballack and Peter Cech, Chelsea's TEAM was so far superior that they won by a couple of goals while playing in preseason mode. You see, where Seattle had to turn to rookie college product Steve Zakuani, Chelsea could play sometime English national-teamer Joe Cole. Where Seattle had to use Tyson Wahl in defense, Chelsea could call on then-English captain John Terry.

Now you may be saying to yourself that this isn't a fair comparison. Chelsea is one of the richest clubs in the world. Even in the top division of English soccer, they will almost always line up more stars than their opponents. That is true, but in the top division of English soccer Chelsea sometimes loses or ties. MLS teams NEVER beat "foreign" competition when it really counts. Sure, the MLS all-stars do fine in exhibitions, but that's the all-stars, not a real MLS team. Sunderland or Fulham don't match up man-for-man with Chelsea's stars either, but they're at least a threat because their lineup has decent players at all positions, not just bodies to support a couple of stars.

You see, soccer is a team sport. Yes, we celebrate the great individual players (as we should), and they certainly can make a big impact. But unlike basketball, where Wilt Chamberlain or Michael Jordan could single-handedly make their teams competitive, or baseball, where that one star pitcher always gives you a shot to win when he starts, soccer requires more bodies. It's much more like American football, where even the greatest players can only do so much if their teammates stink. Right now, Lionel Messi is widely considered to be the best player in soccer. He's tearing it up for Barcelona in Spain, and they're contending for titles. But Barcelona has a lot of good players alongside Messi. It's not just him. If you put Messi onto say... the Colorado Rapids, he would certainly improve them, but they still wouldn't be any match for most International teams. Again, it's like American football.

Take the St. Louis Rams from last year. They were pitiful, despite having a great running back in Steven Jackson. Now what would most improve the Rams? Adding Peyton Manning or adding 5 decent offensive linemen? The easy answer is the latter. Sure Peyton Manning would be better than the Rams had last year, and make the team a lot better. But he would soon find himself buried alongside Jackson because the offensive line was a sieve last year. In these team games, with lots of players on the field, you simply cannot compete unless you have a large group of at least mid-tier quality players.

One final way to look at this is with simple statistics. Skip this if you're bored already. Imagine rating every player on a team from 1 (why is he even playing?) to 10 (hall-of-famer in his prime). Now let's say your team is filled with weaker performers that you would grade at a 3. What would be the average talent of this team? Obviously it's 3. Now replace one of those players with a 10. That changes the average (for 11 players) to 3.6. Nice, but nothing special. (Compare that to replacing just one of 5 players, such as in basketball, which would raise the average talent from 3 to 4.4, a more significant jump. Just a couple of stars can carry a basketball team, not so a soccer team.) Now if you had the choice of swapping out one other player for another 10, or swapping out three other players for say... sixes, what would you choose? Well, swapping out for one more 10 brings the average to 4.3. But swapping out the 3 for sixes would raise the average to 4.6. It is better overall to add more mid-level players, especially once you factor in the odds of the one "10" getting hurt.

So why hasn't MLS done more to beef up the lower end of the roster? Why all the focus on just the stars? The answer is a combination of schedule, salary cap, and coaching cowardice.

The schedule in MLS is actually fairly demanding. It may not be quite as busy as many European schedules, but there are still a lot of games. Even the best players struggle to start EVERY match. Over the course of the season, players are bound to pick up bruises, sprains, muscle pulls and illnesses. Teams need depth to deal with the schedule. But if salary cap money has already been sunk into a small group of starters, there would be nothing left over for the backups. The result is that teams have stocked their rosters with cheap bodies. They have plenty of young legs on the roster because they're cheap, and they resist injury. If there's only enough money in the cap to buy either two youngsters or one proven veteran, virtually every MLS team will opt for the two youngsters because they need the bodies for the long schedule.

The salary cap is simply too low. There is a parabolic arc for player salaries in relation to their quality. You could get half-a-dozen decent veterans for the price of two "superstars", and an entire team of rookies and wanna-bes for the price of those decent veterans. Right now, the salary cap is such that teams can only afford to fill out the roster with the youngsters. There simply isn't enough space in the cap for the decent veterans. Either they're good enough to become "designated" players and get the exception, or they ply their trade elsewhere.

Finally, coaches in this league are cowardly (in general). It's a lot easier to grab a bunch of young athletic guys for peanuts and have them play a scrappy, defensive game, than it is to work with a group of veterans and develop a real plan of attack. At least with the scrappy youngsters coaches can excuse close losses with worthless phrases like "we're still growing as a team," or "we're giving a great effort." If they had to explain the same with veterans, their excuses become less believable.

So what can be done? Simple. MLS needs to raise the salary cap overall, not just provide another designated player exception. Why doesn't the league do so? Because they're cheap. Not every team will take advantage of the designated player rule, and those that do will likely target players that can sell t-shirts and tickets, not necessarily improve the soccer on the field. If the league raised the salary cap, that would add payroll to all 16 (18 next year) teams without necessarily generating more sales. Sure the soccer would improve, but the bottom line might not, and that's what's foremost on the owners' minds right now. But that's a short-sighted view.

There are a ton of soccer fans in this country. However, most of them can (and do) easily watch games from leagues around the world. It's difficult to convince those fans to start following MLS when the games often resemble a fast-paced game of kickball (or even worse sometimes, "kick-shins"). It's also hard to stomach the occasional game where a star is playing, but is simply hounded out of the game by a bunch of youngsters hacking away at him, and the remaining players aren't good enough to take advantage of the extra space. Until MLS games are consistently more entertaining and well-played, the league will not make many new fans.

So while the extra designated player slot may make a splash, and sell a few more jerseys, only the raising of the salary cap will make a long-term impression on the league's success. I still watch a lot of MLS, and usually enjoy the games, but it can certainly be frustrating to see when the league is clearly making a decision on the cheap. I hope teams actually use the extra designated player slot, and bring in some top players. I greatly fear, however, that the end result will be just that LA and New York grab another "name" veteran on the downhill of his career to move merchandise, while the games remain generally sloppy.

SAH