Ben clarifies that what he really supports is an idea that Richard Snowden wrote about back in December, which comes down to this: Replace the Designated Player rule (where teams can sign one player for an unlimited amount of money that doesn't count toward the salary cap after around $400k) with a rule that MLS teams will have a "soft" cap of $3 million per team, but can sign as many players as they want up to a certain amount, say, $10 million a year. The argument is that it would give teams more flexibility to play in the international transfer market than the current DP rule allows:
Given that many top players earn $7 million or more, MLS teams would be left with the choice described above: sign one player like Becks or Thierry Henry, or raid strong South American clubs and snag several high-quality non-megastars. The latter team might be a bit more likely to defeat a less well-stocked team on a given day, but given the relatively minor wage discrepancies, the less pricey team would never be easy meat.
This being the case, owners of lesser means would not need to fear that their teams would be left with little chance; as such, they would not be overly tempted to spend foolishly in an attempt to keep up with the wealthier Joneses. Clubs with more modest rosters would still be able to make the playoffs, and they would therefore continue to have a legitimate shot at the title every season.
While the idea seems reasonable on its face, I think it has some major problems and is unlikely to happen.
Up Front Costs
Snowden implies that the top level cap will only be used by MLS clubs to sign players on the international transfer market, but that's not the way he's proposed it. Under his terms, MLS clubs could spend up to $10 million on *any* players, including Americans. The result would effectively *quadruple* the current salary cap, and would result in massive wage inflation across the board as every team would be forced to spend more just to keep the players it has. The fact that the last $7 million would come out of an owner's pocket instead of the league's coffers does nothing to mask the massive increase in wages. Given the limited pool of American talent (and even more limited pool of Canadians), the league would not see a proportionate jump in the quality of play compared to the massive costs incurred.
And these aren't small numbers for MLS. Snowden picks $10 million a team because he raises the "soft" cap to $3 million (a 30% increase!) and then the hard is a little more than Beckham makes on the books. Keep in mind that only one team is paying that kind of money today, but with the justification that the uniqueness of the Beckham brand allows them to recoup a lot of it.
If the "hard" cap goes up to $10 million, we're talking a potential outlay increase of $114-$130 million per year for MLS! This in a league with a current cumulative salary cap of around $34 million, and about $9 million a year toward designated players above that (not counting the money getting paid to the league by Beckham). It wasn't that long ago when MLS shocked many by announcing it lost $250 million over its first five years. Snowden's "soft cap" proposal would run through that amount of money in two years, and despite the balance sheet looking much better these days, I doubt the league could survive that sort of body blow.
So what appears to be a fairly conservative idea on its face actually obliterates the cost structure of the league. The following claim by Duane:
This is not a call for a return to the NASL days of uncontrolled spending. Rather, it calls for teams to be allowed to benefit from their own success.
is patently untrue. When Ben talks about TFC's owners loving the current cost restrictions, these numbers are why.
With the owners dedicated to holding down the costs of a tiny labor pool that has few alternatives and no leverage, and already holding out the carrot of two more expansion teams coming online (which means 40 more jobs), I doubt you'll see anything of the sort seriously considered by the owners. We probably won't even see the salary cap go up much (I think it will go up, maybe half a million if that). And if you think the overwhelmingly American MLS Players Association is going to go along with the notion that the league can pay foreigners over three times what US players can be paid in their own league, I've got some sad news for you. It won't happen.
Player Development and League Stability
Not only don't the numbers work, but MLS was created to develop and provide a decent home for USA talent. Playing in the international transfer market is nice on a small scale, but the league's medium term goal has never been about challenging the best soccer leagues in the world for top-tier talent. The goal is to ultimately develop American players into that talent, and as reality would have it, make a few bucks selling the best of that talent to the "richest" teams in Europe. Let's not forget that overspending in the transfer market was one of the things that sunk the NASL, and is something MLS is specifically constructed to prevent. It's not just that Miami and Tampa Bay were contracted that makes people queasy, as Duane suggests in his article. It's the whole history of professional soccer in this country.
Furthermore, almost every other league in the world is suffering massive financial problems. England. Argentina. Italy. Eastern Europe. Brazil. It's not the minnows, and it's coming for La Liga and the Premier League, too. The fact that MLS has avoided *any* talk of monetary shortages in the current global environment is nothing short of miraculous. We need to think long and hard before we make the kind of massive changes advocated by Knight, Snowden, and Rollins.
It's also worth remembering that the DP rule was part Beckham and part "what do we do about the handful of American players making more than the league maximum?" In a very significant way the DP rule is a clarification meant to *prevent* players like that from mushrooming beyond a pre-determined maximum throughout the league. The most likely upward adjustment to the rule would be to allow two such players per team, but even that would be a radical change. And it's not like a lot of American players are getting turned into DPs right now.
Finally, the main proponent of the unfettered DP rule as it currently stands was Leiweke, specifically in regard to getting Beckham. After reading "The Beckham Experiment" I wonder if he's not nearly so optimistic about the vision he had for the rule. If anything, once Beckham and Blanco leave, and if the rule continues in the new collective bargaining agreement (my guess - it will) you won't see a lot of DP players making what those two make.
Parity and League Revenue Growth
Lastly, the big justification for such a change for our gang of three is that MLS team parity/mediocrity is bad for the league as a whole and needs to be changed. Snowden:
Second, we encounter yet another valid question: Would having a bit of competitive imbalance in MLS be such a bad thing? For years, many have complained about the excessive parity engendered by the league's single-entity structure, which has spread the wealth so thoroughly that MLS has been left with a full stable of comparably mediocre teams.
To be sure, having a handful of teams willing to splash more cash on much better talent (within reasonable limits, as noted above) would undermine the trend toward mediocrity. Modest players with potential would be better able to maximize that potential by facing superior opponents every week, and the prospect of beating the richer clubs would help fuel rivalries and make each game matter more, a perennial problem for MLS.
All of this in turn would boost MLS's chances of drawing and keeping more of the nation's core of soccer-savvy fans, possibly the most valuable outcome of all. These fans, attracted by MLS's much-improved standard of play, would likely show up through thick and thin and add a new element of passionate support, growing the league's fan base and putting MLS on track to evolve into one of the world's top circuits.
Like I said, the soft cap won't increase the quality of play anywhere near the order of magnitude of its costs. And I pointed out a couple of weeks ago that MLS already has a plan to lure more "soccer-savvy" (I think he means "euro-snob") fans to MLS and make boatloads of money off them in the meantime. Go read what I wrote. It's a plan that's slowly, surely growing the league, and unlike Snowden's proposal, leaves no chance that MLS will totally collapse.
The most galling, self-serving statement is from Ben Knight:
But I certainly don’t want years and years of my soccer future lashed to Garber’s iron lung so poor widdle FC Dallas doesn’t go bouncy-castle up.
Newsflash - you need FC Dallas to have a league. You even need HSG's deep pockets and commitment to the game, no matter how bitter Dustin gets.
And Duane:
The irony that it’s the American blogger desperately trying to protect the socialist system, while the Canadian blogger calls for a freer market, has somehow been lost on the majority of observers. God forbid a team, like, yes, Toronto, be allowed to benefit from the success it has had. No, it must be returned to the collective.
You know, this is the sort of thing that deserves Bill's ire - TFC knew the deal when they came in. For what it's worth, Duane uses some more conservative numbers in his version, but the per team costs of his proposal are still astronomical relative to the current cost structure and don't do much but inflate player salaries without any new revenue to speak of.
Regarding parity as a whole, I'd argue (and Bill already alluded) that in some ways there are already the haves and have nots. DC, LA, Houston and Chicago routinely are among the best in the league, while New York always has the most money. Sometimes Columbus and KC win honors. Dallas, Colorado, New York, New San Jose, Chivas and RSL almost never do. Seattle and Toronto are starting to see the money table tilt their way.
And look at who has designated players this year. Now look at the table. With the exception of money-pit New York, the correlation is already striking. One could make the argument that it's getting to the point where you need a DP to compete for the playoffs, even though that has the potential to cause massive roster issues like it did in LA and New York. And as far as I can see, a soft salary cap does *nothing* to alleviate those issues.
The relative parity in MLS is a good thing. Eleven teams are still in the running for the playoffs, and it's exciting. It is our substitute for relegation battles, and honestly, it's a pretty darn good one.
Conclusion
In short, I think the soft cap proposals are wildly optimistic about MLS revenue, unrealistic to implement, and the reasons for even considering them are not valid. This idea needs to go away permanently. If MLS wants to raise the salary cap, then it should and will raise it for all teams. But right now, there's only justification for a small increase.
Fake Sigi out.
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