Anybody else see this in the Soccer America article by Mahoney (http://www.socceramerica.com/article.asp?Art_ID=562135326): "As to what it might cost for MLS to purchase Donovan's contract, Deputy Commissioner Ivan Gazidis refused to speculate when asked last weekend. As a frame of reference, last spring English club Blackburn made an informal inquiry to Bayer Leverkusen, which owns Donovan's contract through 2008, and was told a fee at that time would be 5 million pounds ($9 million)." Do you think $ 9,000,000.00 is reasonable for Donovan's value on the market? Low, High? I'd be interested in comparisons to other players who have recently been tranferred etc. I'm guessing that based on his international performance, $ 9 million is a bit low, but since he plays in MLS that hurts him a bit as no one knows what he will be like against top flight opposition. Nonetheless, that is still a pretty high number, surely the highest ever for an American...but then again I think everyone pretty much agrees Donovan is the best American soccer player ever, at least in modern times.
I think that is about the right value for Donovan, but I don't want MLS to pay that much for him...$9 million would be enough to pay the salary of 3 or 4 teams worth of players.