How a new Designated Player rule will shape Major League Soccer

Is a big-market, small-market divide ahead?

I wrote a piece for ESPN Soccernet that went up on Monday regarding Major League Soccer’s Designated Player rule. The so-called Beckham Rule was the league’s high-stakes experiment that permitted teams to pay extravagantly for one marquee highlight-maker, with only a portion of his compensation impacting the salary cap. It was assigned a three-year study period that has come and gone, and the league’s board of governors (mostly a fancy way of saying “owners”) is reassessing the rule.

Officially, it expires this week, but the ongoing Collective Bargaining talks will preempt any immediate action.

But here’s something you won’t see in the Soccernet piece: I talked to Real Salt Lake GM Garth Lagerwey about all this Sunday, and I’m on board with one of his really smart takes on the situation.

Lagerwey talked about how something bigger is riding on the impending choice of whether to add a second DP per club. In a way the league could be shifting, perhaps seismically, it's entire personality. How MLS operates and its overall perception could be impacted.

See, if clubs are afforded the right to a second DP (and perhaps even a third via trade), then we’ll start to see a big market-small market divide developing in MLS.

The well-bankrolled L.A. Galaxys and Red Bull New Yorks, etc., can afford the lavish salaries that DPs will command. Sources tell me ownership in L.A., Seattle, New York and D.C. United are driving the charge to add a second DP asset per club.

The bullish big spenders can afford to take the risk, paying grande on the front end and betting that they’ll spin gold on the back end. Meanwhile, the smaller and the spendthrift will be left to purchase economically. It won’t exactly be a situation like we see in Major League Baseball, where the Yankees and Red Sox and one or two others out-spend everyone, or an EPL-type deal where the Big Four habitually dominate via the checkbook, but it will move the MLS train down the tracks in that direction.

“I do think they are making a decision, do you want to have true parity, a la the NFL, or do you want to go into a big market-small market situation?” Lagerwey said.

Good question. We’ll see the answer begin to develop soon.