Beckham to join LA Galaxy

sprinkles

that includes a signing on fee and probably means they own his image rights. There could be all sorts of promotional deals included so I'd say it could be correct. Massive amount of cash for a 31yo

event

Aldini98 wrote:

One of the most over-rated players ever. Does playing in America mean he'll be a special teams player ? All he is good for is free kicks. Cant tackle, cant beat a player, jumps out of the way in the wall at a free kick and has no temperment at the best of times.

Is a model, not a footballer.

On the bright side, we probably wont have to look at as much of that ugly stick he calls his wife.

at his height, was one of the best footballers in england.

Never had pace. Never needed to beat a player as he was a crosser

simple fact, man united would not have won the treble without him. I know you can say that about most of their players, but its true.

he is probably the best passer of his generation (though scholes may be better), scored a lot of goals, set pieces or not. he set up a lot of goals and his commitment and determination on the pitch would make a show of other players.

he may be passed his best but was a fine player in his day.

gucci

so hes finally off to america to live the hollywood life in hollywood, i always thought he would end up there but thought he might have spent a season or two showing that he actually wants to play real football still with another club perhaps in italy. im not claiming he would be in a top italian team but im sure he could have done a deal somewhere that would have enhanced his bank balance before hitting to US in 2years, hes only 32 and obiously by 5year deal expects to play until he is 37.

what next a "space jam" style movie a lá michael jordon?

gucci

id say the figures are true enough,baseball players are on up to 250m a year and football ,sorry "soccer" wouldnt be as popular

godtabh

Its offical he is off to the US

Does this make him the heights paid player in the world?

Who would that be anyways?

_blank_

Aldini98 wrote:

that ugly stick he calls his wife.

I'd give her one.

And don't even say you wouldn't.

http://www.hollywood-celebrity-pictures.com/Celebrities/Victoria-Adams/Victoria-Adams-27.JPG

eirebhoy

gucci wrote:

id say the figures are true enough,baseball players are on up to 250m a year

Seriously? $5m a week. :eek:

super_furry

Fair play to Beckham. For a player of such limited ability, he's become probably the richest footballer in the world without ever being close to being one of the best. His agent is a genius.

gucci

crap i meant to say over 5 years, sorry

MisterAnarchy

super_furry wrote:

Fair play to Beckham. For a player of such limited ability, he's become probably the richest footballer in the world without ever being close to being one of the best. His agent is a genius.

He has easily been the richest footballer in the world for the last few years.
Last year he earned €25m from all deals inc sponsorships and wages.
LA are supposedly paying him $40m a year ,while the rest of the team earn a combined total of $2m .
Beckham will earn more than the whole league combined if those figures are correct ,which i seriously doubt they are.
Prob a load of unrealistic clause bonuses jack it up.

[Jackass]

I wish i was good looking and could play football

Mossy Monk

MisterAnarchy wrote:

That figure is laughable and pure nonsense

Sky Sports News say he will be getting a wage of £492,000 per week for 5 years

pure madness but if he can get then then best of luck to him

Fanny Cradock

I may well get blasted here, but he's a limited player - especially when you consider his age. I've nothing against the guy, but I can't possibly imagine how he could ever being to pay even part of that weekly wage back. Performance? Merchandising? Raising the profile of the game?

Scandalous figure to pay!

kinaldo

That's unbelievable. Good luck to him, and I hope 'soccer' becomes a lot more popular in America as a result.

mike65

So much for not needing the money.

Mike.

Andrew 83

Sky News said it will make him the highest paid sportsman in the world. End of his career as a serious player but not surprised at all!

Mossy Monk

so who will be showing Major League Soccer in the UK next season

seansouth wrote:

I'd give her one.

And don't even say you wouldn't.

http://www.hollywood-celebrity-pictures.com/Celebrities/Victoria-Adams/Victoria-Adams-27.JPG

not the most flattering picture of her but if she put on a few pounds

eirebhoy

Nobody could refuse the offer he got. He'll be a star in America and in 10-20 years time, if football is a lot bigger over there, he'll be to Americans what Pele or Maradona is to the rest of us.

MisterAnarchy

Andrew 83 wrote:

Sky News said it will make him the highest paid sportsman in the world. End of his career as a serious player but not surprised at all!

Sky News are a joke.Tabloid garbage.
Tiger Woods is the highest paid Sportman in the world by a long way.

Mushy

I can see one advantage of this...dont have to see Real Madrid matches every week now on sky. Although im quite sure they've been showing less and less lately, its nice to be confirmed on this matter. Yeah, I hope soccer becomes much bigger over there, although to compete with already established sports like baseball, american football will be very tough.

Thats a serious amount of money to be getting, wouldnt know what to do with it if it was me. Nice way to end your career though...more loaded than ever and in a nice enough place

mike65

Sky Sports Extra 8

Mike.

eirebhoy

MisterAnarchy wrote:

Sky News are a joke.Tabloid garbage.
Tiger Woods is the highest paid Sportman in the world by a long way.

Is it even possible for a golfer to earn $50m a year in prize money? If you're including sponsorship deals then fair enough.

Fanny Cradock

eirebhoy wrote:

He'll be a star in America and in 10-20 years time, if football is a lot bigger over there, he'll be to Americans what Pele or Maradona is to the rest of us.

Why do you say that?

First off, Pele played in America. Secondly, who is going to remember him in 10-20 years time? If he's going to be a star over there the time is now - not in a couple of decades. Good luck to him, but for the life of me I can't figure the financial sense (from the clubs perspective) behind the move.

Big Ears

Soccer isn't ever going to become anywhere near the big 3 sports over there(American Football , Baseball , Basketball ) even in 10-20 years it won't even come close . It is a very popular sport with young people over there but very few keep it on once they go the college and in peticular very few men do .
It is being promoted more and more over there so it's only bound to improve but I could never see soccer becoming anything more than one of the secondary sports(such as ice Hockey ) and even that might be more than it could achieve .

The game will never be mainstream over there .

Chucky the tree

I cant see how the club will be able to afford to pay those wages. There's alot bigger starts in America then him.

FatherTed

First off, those $250million/128million pounds figures are not official numbers.

Also, Beckham will be paid an annual salary of $3million for his play for LA and the rest is for image rights. What is unclear is whether is owns 100% his image rights or AEG (LA Galaxy owners). Either way, it is not difficult to come up with $50million per year based on all his endorsements.

MisterAnarchy

FatherTed wrote:

Either way, it is not difficult to come up with $50million per year based on all his endorsements.

Prob true,his off field income this year was $25m .
If LA Galaxy own all his image rights he will become a puppet and they will whore him out to maximise his sponsorship deals.
Perhaps David will act with his new best buddy Tom Cruise in a few films .:D
His stick insect wife can try to further her non existant career in some way; i.e hang on the arm of some designer/rapper/hollywood star/non entity and con everyone into thinking she is a megastar

astrofool

http://news.scotsman.com/topics.cfm?tid=298&id=477052005

thats from a year ago

Bateman

Apart from the obscene amount of money he is going to be paid, I find it sad that more and more of them (Scholes, Shearer, and a few Irish no-hopers come to mind) give up on international football, and representing their country, in order to make more money out of club football, which has already made them filthy rich.

He has another couple of years left in him at the top level. Go on, prove Ferguson wrong, prove Capello wrong, prove McLaren wrong. No, he just ****s off chasing the yankee dollar for a kickabout with no-hopers like Cobi Jones. He deserves to rot in obscurity but somehow I can't see it.

BaZmO*

seansouth wrote:

I'd give her one.

And don't even say you wouldn't.

http://www.hollywood-celebrity-pictures.com/Celebrities/Victoria-Adams/Victoria-Adams-27.JPG

That picture from about 10 million years ago. Sure look at the surname.

Mossy Monk

Bateman wrote:

He has another couple of years left in him at the top level. Go on, prove Ferguson wrong, prove Capello wrong, prove McLaren wrong. No, he just ****s off chasing the yankee dollar for a kickabout with no-hopers like Cobi Jones. He deserves to rot in obscurity but somehow I can't see it.

wow

Charlie

I don't think those are fair statements to make about Scholes and Shearer.

Both players gave their all for their country and in respect of Scholes he only left the internationla setup after being constantly being messed around by Sven.

I think Shearer had a right to make the choice he did. He had lost a lot of playing time to injuries and wanted to prolong his carear with the hometown side he would die for in order to win some silverware.

Scholes and Shearer in my view are two model professionals who only ever seemed to focus on the footie and not on wags , autiobiographies, hello covers....... (Ashley Cole, I'm looking at you)

Bateman

Mossy Monk wrote:

wow

?

Pighead

I think he's a bit shocked by the anger you express towards Mr Beckham.

Exit

Got this from another forum, but don't know the source, so don't know how true it is.

His yearly income from next season, when he leaves Spain for America, will be:

1. An annual salary of $10m

2. His existing sponsorship contracts with his four sponsors - Motorola, Pepsi, Gillette and Volkswagen - is estimated to be worth $25m

3. His merchandising shirt sales will bring in $10m

4. His share of the club profits: $10m

That adds up to $55m. Multiply it by five and you get well over $275m.

GuanYin

Merged

Exit

The BBC are saying that 1000 LA Galaxy season tickets have been sold in the last 4 hours.

This is big news in North America. It's one of the top headlines on the news today. At one stage, it was the lead story on CNN.

GuanYin

Exit wrote:

The BBC are saying that 1000 LA Galaxy season tickets have been sold in the last 4 hours.

This is big news in North America. It's one of the top headlines on the news today. At one stage, it was the lead story on CNN.

Err, no it isn't. It's an after-thought in the news after lots of Bush-bashing and democrat-loving stories including the stem-cell story.

Don't kid yourself - noone here cares.

de5p0i1er

My guess is she (Posh) wanted him to go to L.A. Now she can have her movie career and go shopping with all her movie star friends.

BKtje

Scholes, Shearer, and a few Irish no-hopers come to mind

While i'm sure there are footballers who would happily do this, the two you have chosen are just downright wrong imo.

I dont understand why people are surprised that he went for the huge amount of money. I would suggest that a high proportion of people here would do the same if they got offered 6 times their current salary to switch to a different company where he basically does the same thing. On top of that if the person you love wants to move out of Europe it would only make the decesion easier. For your average joe it really would be a no brainer, why would it be such a hard decesion for beckham(and by the speed he made it, i dont think it was)?

Exit

psi wrote:

Err, no it isn't. It's an after-thought in the news after lots of Bush-bashing and democrat-loving stories including the stem-cell story.

Don't kid yourself - noone here cares.

Well, I was kinda talking about the Canadian news channels.

iregk

I have to say I don't understand the annamosity towards him over the money. If someone offered me 6 times my salary I'd rip their hand off to take the offer!!! That said I do agree with some of it.

My problem with him is the bull he is coming out with. Just be honest David your going for the money and the fame nothing more. All this I want a new footballing challange. Give me a break. This is from someone who reported late to preseason training two years back as he and the rake went on a "raise our profile" tour of the states. Honestly, what on earth has that got to do with football. Beckham has long since ceased being a footballer and is now nothing more than a walking billboard. This move suits all parties involved.

Ronan|Raven

Exactly, he got offered a hell of a lot of money and took it. Fair play to him.

event

Bateman wrote:

Apart from the obscene amount of money he is going to be paid, I find it sad that more and more of them (Scholes, Shearer, and a few Irish no-hopers come to mind) give up on international football, and representing their country, in order to make more money out of club football, which has already made them filthy rich.

He has another couple of years left in him at the top level. Go on, prove Ferguson wrong, prove Capello wrong, prove McLaren wrong. No, he just ****s off chasing the yankee dollar for a kickabout with no-hopers like Cobi Jones. He deserves to rot in obscurity but somehow I can't see it.

can you explain why he deserves to rot in obscurity?

Jimboo_Jones

Exactly, someone offerd him a super huge amount of money to play football, he has accepted that offer and some people are making him out to be the devil.

Look hes not hurt anyone or anything 0_o

patmac

Yawn read some of this couldn't be bothered reading the rest, all over Sky Sports, all over the newspapers, does a story about a has-been footballer with his has-been popstar wife moving to the states for an obscene amount of money deserve such coverage? This is more a symptom of the celebrity obsessed culture that we live in today than anything else. Beckham was a good footballer with a brilliant marketing PR machine behind him, fair fecks to him.

BaZmO*

patmac wrote:

does a story about a has-been footballer with his has-been

A has-been footballer that still gets 5 pages on a thread in a football forum.

iregk

I don't think bateman really understands football that well. Players dont give up on international football to make more money for their clubs, its to preserve their physical well being. These players you mention were 30 or the wrong side of it and playing league, fa cup, league cup & european football all takes it toll. They need longer to recover after games than when they were 26 and their bodies cannot take the physical strain of the number of games they used to be able to play. The option, drop the extras of international football, your not only cutting out qualifiers but summer tournaments and friendlies. This gives your body much needed rest and will prolong your career and aid you to keep playing a sport you love that ordinarily you wouldn't have been able to do.

Teddy is 40, Maldini is 38. Do you honestly think they would have kept going that long had they been playing international as well?

patmac

BaZmO* wrote:

A has-been footballer that still gets 5 pages on a thread in a football forum.[/QUOTE
My point exactly

redspider

My thoughts on the Beckham move to the US are as follows.

MLS are trying to invigorate the league there and want to try to do what was attempted with Pele/Beckenbaur et al in the 1970's.

The size of the money deal is misleading. According to this:

1. An annual salary of $10m
2. His existing sponsorship contracts with his four sponsors - Motorola, Pepsi, Gillette and Volkswagen - is estimated to be worth $25m
3. His merchandising shirt sales will bring in $10m
4. His share of the club profits: $10m
That adds up to $55m. Multiply it by five and you get well over $275m.

Thats a salary of usd 10m a year or ukp 5m a year when comparing like with like. That's a lot of money for the US league, and will be helped by direct MLS payments and extra income they hope to bring in. I wouldnt be surpirsed that even his salary is dependent on match ticket sales.

The large 250m total being bandied about is already a way of generating interest in the sport over there as the PR machine must begin immediately. Beckham is one of the highest sporting earners in the world as it was. What people seem to forget is that he makes more not from his Real Madrid salary but from his other deals with sponsorship, etc. He would probably make just as much money if he started playing tiddlywinks now. You could say that he is a part-time footballer and part-time 'star/celebrity', and he does more of the latter. That's what irked Ferguson those years ago as well as his diminishing effectiveness on the field. Should this thread be in the entertainment section ?!?!?

A point to note is that LA Galaxy have just had their worst season to date. They average about 20,000 a game and thats over the last decade more or less, and they are one of the bigger clubs. However, the league has a salary cap system in place with I understand is a limit of about 2m pa for the whole SQUAD. This is clearly a seismic change for the league over there, but not as seismic as the 250m dollars headline would seem to indicate.

In terms of the footballing aspects, Beckham could certainly do a job for many teams both in England and Spain and elsewhere. I would play him out on the right wing and use his crossing ability, which he clearly still has, and have players that can head and finish in the box. He also needs a running full back to provide support and overlap. Okay, maybe I am stating the obvious. He is not completely spent as a footballing player.

I think its easy to pour cold water on his footballing talents. They are very specialised. However, how one player will make such a difference on the field for a whole league is anyones guess. The promotion of the sport in the 1970's brought over a swathe of players. In recent years the league is composed of none of these types and Beckham is currently alone in that regard. Many of the current players may want to take Beckham down a peg or two, although no doubt all owners of the franchises will want him to do well, so ...... he may be afforded an easy ride. Closer to Haarlem Globetrotters than 100% competitive. Note that some of this happened in the 1970's as well as the star players were 'allowed' to showboat. Its all part of the entertainment package and the razzmatazz.

This could of course all go pear shaped, the interest may start okay but may then wain. Or other 'stars' may follow and momentum may build. That is what the US organisation and franchises/businesses want. However, the US Public has been tried with 'sacca' before, in fact twice - the 1970's, partial success, and around world cup 1994, with much less success. Whether it will work now is anyone's guess.

The challenge is tough. Soccer is popular with kids and in schools, but US Football is then seen as the man's game and gets the interest in high school. It doesnt completely dissappear off the radar but at University level its probably not that much more popular than Rugby and less so than Lacrosse.

Just my 250m euro cents worth of opinion ;-)

redspider