What DP signinig would create buzz for the casual & hard core fan

I did consider you post about Blance ( I don't think you mentioned Marquez, at least that I remember - if you did my apologies. Both Blanco and Marquez were players who were past their prime. Chicharito would have been a budding superstar. You ignored the fact that there are 19 million males of Mexican descent. All potential jersey buyers. So, yes I did consider your post - sorry, I didn't respond.

My point with Pujols is if the Royals could have missed him ( he was right in their backyard), MLS could easily have missed Chicharito. I am still looking into the fact about Pujols and the Royals. I have some e-mails out to some folks.

I went back and re-read the first three to four pages.

Cristiano Rinaldo - Seriously. You talk about my suggestions?
Clint Dempsey - after he is finished in Europe.
Tim Howard - after he is finished in Europe.
Didier Drogba - no way MLS tops 15 million dollars a year for 2 years he received.
Zidane - you want him at the age of 40? He is leaving being the Director of Football at Real Madrid to play in MLS.
Lampard - will be 35 next year. Isn't he another aging high dollar EURO star.

You made it sound like the first four pages were filled with sensible suggestions. Which they are, but just more of the same type of player.

 

It would be amazing if you could do that math.

 

Yes there are 19 million males of Mexican dissent and I bet not all of them like soccer. My point is that if Blanco and Marquez couldn't sell jerseys with the nostalgia surrounding them, how would Hernandez do it. Also you have to consider the fact that a lot of soccer fans don't buy player jerseys and just buy the plain club jerseys. Also you have to consider that he's not a huge player in the biggest market which is Asia. Beckham is a very popular player in the orient and that boosted a lot of his jersey sales.

All of those at the time were sensible suggestions outside of Ronaldo and Zidane. Drogba was a free transfer at the time. This isn't the Pele-esque soccer world anymore. There is new tournaments and prizes on the line that all discourage players to come over to America or any other league outside of Europe for that matter. So if you think America is overpaying for aging Euro stars think about when they over pay for unproven talent choking out American players. MLS is on the right track right now and its only going to get better.

 

Tim Cahill, anyone?

 

Just another overpaid Eurostar according to Schapes . Good pickup by NYRB though

 

In my opinion there wasn't as much buzz about Blanco/Marquez as there would have been with Hernandez. Just my opinion though, not trying to present that as any fact. Defintely see where you are coming from when you talk about Blanco/Marquez(don't want to be accused of not considering someone else's opinion and just ignoring their opinion - should never do that).

Just wanted to warn everyone I am changing the topic a little bit. Don't want to be accused of moving goal posts. I know everyone likes to discuss one topic at a time.

Ready?

Instead of utilizing DP's - would they be better off in not spending as much money on them such as Keane, Cahill, Henry (not going to include David Beckham because I know he sells a lot shirts to justify his existence when he is not injured or suspended (even though I guess he does sell shirts when he is injured or suspended))'
Frings, Nesta et al.

Would they be better off using that money to raise the pay of those players who make less than $50,000 in MLS currently? Hoping that a few of those kids make it and growing their (MLS) own stars. Now obviously you wouldn't raise the pay over $100,000. Just enough to give those players a sense this is their full time job.

I am just saying. As I said earlier a little off topic (defintely don't want to be accused of moving goal posts - that is bad and should not be condoned), but since the player pool to me (again, my opinion not fact) seems a little shallow. Just throwing it out there.

 

I think you don't understand how players become stars. If you succeed at a big club THEN you are a star not before. You said MLS should sign Chicharito before his breakout season in Mexico, at that point he only scored a few goals for Chivas and was just beginning to be on the radar for the NT. You think that kid would be a bigger star than Blanco (a Club America legend and NT legend) or Marquez (NT captain who won CL with Barca). He is famous NOW because of his accomplishments, not before.

 

I guess the jury is still out how much "buzz" Tim Cahill brings. Everton finished seventh last year - with Tim Howard on the roster some Americans probably paid attention to Everton (therefore seeing Cahill play in the process).

 

Not saying he would have sold more shirts his first season - as I said earlier if MLS could have signed him say mid breakout year for two years. So he joins MLS after his break out year (which you and others have said is impossible), he probably would have sold a decent amount of shirts. Would he have sold as many as David Beckham - probably not, but, (again in my opinion), I would have signed Chicharito than Beckham. Just my opinion - obviously FAR from FACT!

Who is the new shirt seller? I guess everybody has a number 23 shirt with BECKHAM on the back, right?

I am assumming Henry. Saw an article but it was two years old.

 

Minimum salaries are steadily rising in the MLS and it has to do with DPs coming into the league. When Beckham came into the league, (know you don't like him but more on him later) the minimum was a mere $15,000 and that was with an 18 man roster. Now you can be in roster slots 25-30 and minimum is $33,750. That is over 100% increase in salaries since 2007. This is because as the more interest you generate through signings, the more money is spent inside stadiums, for merchandise, and from sponsors. You can't just artificially inflate a person's salary and say he's worth this amount of money when there isn't that type of money to pay them. Its a slow build and within 20 years I bet salary minimum will increase substantially. (At least another 100% jump in minimum salary within the next 20 years)

Now onto Beckham, he's had a bad run of being injured some through his fault of his own IMO (AC Milan injury) but other than that its really just be a bad luck. As for his suspensions, this is typical Beckham throughout his career. He's the most carded England international with 17 (I believe). It's the nature of the beast with him but he has almost single handedly taken the league miles ahead of where they were pre 2007.

 

He doesn't create buzz but he's a scoring midfielder who is going to help out a midfield in NY who sorely needs him. He's a quality player and if people only know Cahill because of Tim Howard they probably are just a casual soccer fan

 

Bumping a guy's salary doesn't make him a better player. If you wanted more money for squad players I think the best approach would be to lower or eliminate the cap hit caused by DPs. I also think it would be great if MLS teams had some kind of mechanism to pay a current player a salary bumps off the cap. We've always had guys who came up through the superdraft who were being paid very low wages compared to their output (Holden at 50k and Ream at 65k come to mind). If you had an almost internal DP position to reward guys who played really well on a low contract, I think it would be a huge benefit and probably help convince more guys to come up through the Superdraft. I think this should be different than the current DP rule because the DP rule is the only way MLS teams can actually go out and pay transfers which will be the only way to sign quality young players.

 

I never said it would make them better players. But, would at least allow them to do a few things that they currently can't do. Maybe live in a little bit nicer place, maybe not have as many roommates - or any roommates at all.

The disparity in the locker room wouldn't be as great as it is.

 

Its really a different issue than the DP rule. The players union began to address this the last negotiations. Remember min. was at $12,900 before the last CBA I think min. is 33k now and goes up every year. It should be pushing 50k min. before the next CBA is up. The players union can again negotiate to push this number up higher after 2014. Overall I think we just need to be able to have teams have as many mechanisms as possible to pay players outside of the cap (DPs, Gen Adidas, Academy). The more players we can get paid individually by clubs, the more cap space clubs will be able to use on squad players.

 

So, a Geration Adidas player doesnt't count against the cap. Now I realize that I am moving the goal posts - so please don't be angry.

Could you do that with DP's? Your Designated Player sponsored by Budweiser - Mesut Ozil!

 

Young DPs have a smaller cap hit than senior DPs.

It's still not going to get the best young players in the world to come to the league.

 

Gen Adidas players are off the cap. Certainly clubs help line up sponsorship deals to help bring players over. I know Red Bull sponsors Henry/Marquez and they appear in marketing material for the energy drink. Herbalife signed Beckham and I know Blanco got deals with Best Buy and Safeway through the Fire. This probably all gets worked out through SUM. In fact there is something in the CBA about doing appearances and marketing work. I'm sure someone can link to it.

 

That is, for the record, the definition of a circular argument.

Also, shut up about "my opinion; not fact" thing. It comes off as the whining of a petulent child

No it isn't. Really, shut up if you firmly believe this. Chungachanga wasn't mentioning Munich, so there is clear evidence that the footballing world uses ManU as a general term to truncate Manchester United Football Club. We have no need for your pretense here.

 

Telling someone to shut up isn't very nice manners. Someone accused me of trying to pass something off as fact when it was really my opinion. Obviously everyone can't tell the difference. So, I am just trying to help for those that can't distinguish my opinion - so I don't get accused of trying to pass something off as fact. I guess you need to talk to your fellow posters.[/quote]

 

I was just thinking if you had a sponsor willing to pay most of the salary and it was enough to entice a player to come. Just throwing it out there.

 

[/quote]
Welcome to the Internet, you appear new here.

Also, learn to quote. Your inability to handle this very, very simple user interface brings into question your higher-level thinking processes and, essentially, renders whatever you consider a reasonable idea moot

 

Just because it is the Internet - doesn't give someone the right to be rude. If more people called out people who were rude - maybe, it would be a nicer place.

You may not like my ideas - but, I have been civil to everyone. I haven't called anyone any names.

In terms of the quoting feature. That is nuts. Whether I quote correctly has nothing to do with my ideas.

 

No, because I'm a human, I have the right to be rude. As an American, I'm afforded even more rights in that regard. Thick skin, my boy, it will serve you well.

No one has called you a name. But I'm sorry if I hurt your feelings. I didn't understand how emotionally fragile you were. My fullest apologies

Now, I mean this with no offense to you, personally. If you had someone tell you about this great new idea he had that was so revolutionary only he could ever think of it, and then that same person couldn't grasp the concept of putting "quote" and "/quote" inside brackets, how much weight would you give his arguments?

 

This has actually happened before. I believe sponsors helped pay Hong Myung-Bo's contract when he came over.

 

hey, if MLS is able to afford a player, he's not that great and therefore shouldn't be signed in the first place.
if MLS isn't able to afford him, MLS should get him.
nothing circular here, completely logical! (this discussion is full of awesome)