After more than a year of rumors and speculation, Major League Soccer confirmed earlier this month that international soccer icon David Beckham intends to create a professional team in the Miami area. Slated to become the 22nd team in the U.S.’s top professional division, the as-yet-unnamed team joins Manchester City-owned New York City FC and current third-division side Orlando City SC as teams to be announced as new entrants to MLS in the last year. The Miami club won’t take to the pitch until at least 2016, giving people like me time to speculate on every little aspect of the project.
A little background, if you will. Our local area can trace its recent soccer history way back to the 1970s in the old North American Soccer League, which blew up in popularity when international stars like Pele, Franz Beckenbauer, Giorgio Chinaglia and others joined. One of the teams in the league was the Fort Lauderdale Strikers, a name which lives on today in the far newer North American Soccer League, which is the second tier of American soccer behind MLS.
The Strikers were quite popular, playing at historic Lockhart Stadium and featuring players like Manchester United great George Best, German legend Gerd Mueller and the current colorful voice of beIN Sports, Ray Hudson. But once some of the league’s stars started retiring, the league quickly lost its drawing power and was folded in 1984. MLS kicked off in 1995, just a year after the US hosted the World Cup, quickly boosting the popularity of the sport here in the States.
Florida got its own slice of the MLS pie in 1998 when the Miami Fusion took to the field. They, like the Strikers before them, played at Lockhart, perhaps a strange choice given that it’s in Fort Lauderdale. The teams labored for three seasons before having the best record in the league in 2001. However, an earlier-than-expected exit from the playoffs, combined with the league’s iffy financial state, led to the Fusion being folded shortly thereafter.
It was a shame, considering how good of a team they had at the time. Hudson was the eccentric manager who brought it all together, with MLS standouts like Nick Rimando, Kyle Beckerman and the recently retired Pablo Mastroeni all getting their starts with the Fusion. The attendance had jumped to an average of more than 11,000 per home game, though that still left Lockhart nearly half-empty. Soccer’s a business these days, and this was a business decision, a harsh one for a budding franchise, sure, but one that had to be made for MLS to survive.
As for Beckham, his long and illustrious career kicked off in 1993 with a decade of work at Manchester United, before moving to Spanish giants Real Madrid for four seasons. Then, seemingly out of nowhere, it was announced that he would join the Los Angeles Galaxy in 2007, becoming easily the biggest name to come to play in America since Pele. His contract was large, but the league ended up instituting a rule we now know as the Designated Player (DP) Rule so teams can afford up to three high-end contracts to circumvent the league’s salary cap. Most just took to calling it the “Beckham Rule.”
The most intriguing part of the contract was the ability to purchase an MLS expansion franchise, post-retirement, for just $25 million. For comparison’s sake, New York City FC required a $100 million expansion fee, while Orlando City shelled out $75 million. Beckham left MLS in late 2012, and even before his subsequent six-month spell at Paris Saint-Germain, the rumors started kicking up about his exercising this option. It all came to a head on Feb. 5 when Beckham made the announcement alongside MLS commissioner Don Garber and Miami-Dade County mayor Carlos Gimenez.
So what’s in store for this franchise? The first, most obvious problem is figuring out where they’re going to play.
The current favorite is PortMiami, where a good chunk of the island is seemingly there to be used. It’s close to the American Airlines Arena — home of the Miami Heat — which can be a good thing and a bad thing. Consider the fact that there’s only one road on or off the island, and one end of the road is right next to the AAA. Can you imagine the nightmare of the two teams having games on the same night? Especially in the spring months when MLS is just heating up during the NBA playoffs?
There are definitely other areas under consideration. Some spaces around Marlins Park that might be viable, given the parking structures there and the general openness, but that area might raise skepticism with city officials given the public-funding nightmare that surrounded the stadium’s creation. Plus, the MLS and Major League Baseball seasons almost completely overlap, so that’d create even more problems in an already difficult area to navigate.
It’s likely that the team will have to play a year or two in a temporary home while the stadium is built. Marlins Park is probably the favorite in this race given that they’ve already hosted soccer matches, including an international friendly between Venezuela and Nigeria in late 2012. The stadium fits snugly, with the mound effectively removed and all dirt covered, plus having a retractable roof would certainly be a first in professional soccer.
But having to do this process more than a dozen times a year might be a nuisance like that at Sun Life Stadium before the Marlins left there. Also, the seating arrangement isn’t conducive to soccer, where you’d prefer fans to be much closer to create a sense of togetherness between the fans and players. Alas, it’d only be temporary, so I guess you’d just have to swallow the pill. You might also consider Sun Life or even FIU’s football stadium, with its 20,000-fan capacity making it more “soccer-friendly.”
Then come the personnel. What kind of people will Beckham turn to in order to get the club off the ground? In terms of a manager, do you shoot for a big name or start “small”? NYCFC went with Real Salt Lake boss Jason Kreis, who won the MLS Cup in 2009 as the youngest manager to do so in league history. Kreis has already begun integrating himself in parent club Manchester City to familiarize himself with how the club works.
Miami’s franchise might consider a similar move for a younger MLS coach, like New York Red Bulls boss Mike Petke or DC United’s Ben Olsen. Both have multiple years of coaching experience in the league already, plus were long-time players in MLS. Olsen’s United won the U.S. Open Cup last season over Kreis’ Real Salt Lake, while Petke’s Red Bulls had the best regular-season record. Both would be worthy candidates, though you suspect Beckham might reach out to his numerous contacts both here and abroad, such as former Galaxy teammate Gregg Berhalter, recently hired as coach in Columbus after a spell coaching in Sweden.
There’s also the small matter of Miami’s current incumbent star athlete: LeBron James. He is actually somewhat into the soccer sphere already, holding a minority stake in English club Liverpool. While there’s no telling how “into the sport” he is, his name-brand recognition as a potential cog in the system would be a huge boost to the viability of the club before it even gets going. He plays just across the bridge from the proposed PortMiami location, after all.
In any case, there’s a lot still to hash out with the club, and there’s seemingly a lot of time to do it. I know I’m certainly looking forward to having top-class soccer in the area, and you should too, even if you’re not as big a soccer fan as I am. Here’s hoping that it works out better for Miami and MLS than it did for the Fusion.
