Senior Editor Will Kuhns met with MLS Commissioner at the leagueGs SuperDraft in Florida on Feb. 10. INTERVIEW BY WILL KUHNS SOCCER AMERICA: Can you talk about the league’s philosophy as far as player movement, whether it be those entering the draft, foreign player signings or Americans going to and from Europe? DON GARBER: The recipe keeps changing. I get great joy when Chris Gbandi comes back. I get excited when Landon Donovan comes back. It will always hurt me when Cory Gibbs leaves or when Alex Yi doesn’t sign. I take those things very personally, probably more personally than I should because my objective is to have the best possible players in our league today. So unlike their college coach, who might believe it’s best for Gbandi to go play in Europe, I want what’s best for Major League Soccer because I think that’s what’s best for soccer in this country. That doesn’t mean we sell more tickets for each young college player who joins our league, but I believe, because of everything I’ve heard from Bruce Arena, everything I’ve heard from our coaches and everything I’ve heard from all the soccer people in this country: Young American players get better when they have competitive soccer day-in and day-out, when they’re training with the first team every day. With the exception of a handful of players — you can count them on one or two hands — the majority of young players go to Europe because financially it makes more sense for them. We’re not able to pay them, ultimately, what PSV Eindhoven or 1860 Munich can pay them to experiment with them because we’re not experimenting. We’re giving these kids an opportunity to be stars in their local community. So ultimately, I think our challenge is to continue to sign the best young American players and continue to bring in the right international players we can afford and to do it very strategically. SA: There seems to be a somewhat contradictory nature to the contracts that young players coming into the league sign. On one hand, they’re committed to a minimum of four years here, but on the other hand, that’s not guaranteed. So it’s like MLS is saying to the young player, ‘We don’t want you jumping ship on us … but at the same time, we’re not going to give you any insurance if we don’t want you.’ DG: It’s business. It’s no different than not having guaranteed contracts in the NFL. We have to manage the bottom end of our rosters very economically because, for the most part, the bottom end is not driving revenue. The bottom end is an investment that both parties are making. We’re both taking some risks, we’re both making a commitment, but at the end of the day, it’s a mutual investment. So far Project-40 has worked out very well. So far Ben Olsen and DaMarcus Beasley and Bobby Convey and Santino Quaranta have been great investments on both sides, and if they become more valuable to our business, then we re-sign them and pay them enough to keep them here in this country. The flexibility of the contract is the only thing that allows us to continue to invest money because one out of five will be the one that will be a star in your league. But if you think about it, what Project-40 player has become a true star in this league? Ben? SA: Yeah, Ben. DG: Maybe just Ben. Think of how much money we’ve invested in young players over the past five years. SA: I just know that a lot of players complain about the fact that they’re tied in for four years. I guess it’s from the standpoint of finding a better offer in Europe after a year or two and also from the standpoint of having a couple of really good seasons and still being stuck at the minimum. DG: But that doesn’t happen. What happens if they have a couple of good seasons — and Convey’s a good example — is that we sign them for more money. So the reality is that we’re going to take Clint Mathis and Josh Wolff and re-sign them before they get to that point where they play out their option year or ultimately they’ll decide that they’re being underpaid and will look for a transfer.

Economics 101

SA: Why was the salary cap, or salary budget, essentially squeezed by contraction? It may have stayed the same, but because there are 40 fewer jobs, what the league spends on players has decreased. DG: Economics. It’s pure economics. Contraction was a strategic move based on our economic position and our budgets are a function of our economics. As you know, we’ve added the discovery players, we’re thinking long and hard about adding discovery teams, but what we needed to do this year was take a step back and ensure that we could look out five years and ultimately know that in 2006 we’re going to have a viable business. We will be able to pay players what they need, deliver the right product for our fans and we’ll be competitive. SA: And you don’t feel that the players salaries are taking any bigger a chunk of that economic decision than any other part of MLS? DG: No. Right now we are as lean as we possibly can be. We are bare to the bones in terms of efficiency. Still the majority of our budget goes to pay players. We have an administration that is now 20 percent less then what it was a year ago. Our teams are now operating as efficiently as they can. I’ve heard on the Internet that people think the reason we’re in this position is because we’re spending money on other stuff, but it’s just not true. Trust me, the guy who was managing 250 people internationally after being a part of the NFL for almost 20 years — we are real efficient. And we’re efficient with our player salaries too. We’re paying what we need to pay in order to have the best possible product that we can afford. The same goes for our staff, our marketing, our production and how many games we do. SA: These issues I’m bringing up are ones I’ve heard more often since contraction, which obviously put everybody in a defensive posture. DG: Listen, I’ll be candid with you. Players don’t think they’re paid enough. They never will. Do you think you’re paid enough? SA: Of course not. (Smiling) DG: No employee ever thinks that they’re paid enough. So I don’t think we have the lock on disgruntled employees. Every employee is disgruntled. (Laughs). Again, what we do is we take a step back and say, ‘How can we have the best possible product, attract our fans, attract our players, have a position in each of our communities and still have a business that makes economic sense?’ We know we’re going to be taking a loss. But when you think about it, how do you have that loss low enough to be attractive to new investors? How do you have it low enough to know that Ken Horowitz won’t have to leave? … There’s so much that goes into those types of decisions. The average fan, your readers, are upset that we don’t pay players more or expand the rosters to 20 or asks why we don’t go after more Luis Hernandez-type players. Well, I will tell you that we have our finger on the pulse. We pretty much know what the formula is and now we just have to figure out if we can afford it.

To sell or not to sell

SA: So when you say that you know what the formula is, that means it doesn’t include big-money, ‘Luis Hernandez’ signings. DG: No, because they don’t pay out. They’re economically not feasible. They’re bad business decisions. We know that now. That being said, we need Carlos Ruiz in L.A., for example. SA: Then why doesn’t the league sell more players to bring in revenue? DG: Well, our teams struggle with having a salary budget. It’s based somewhat on parity and it forces teams, as their players get more expensive, to reconfigure so that you still have an opportunity to win. Add on to that concept that the league can snatch a player away from you because he can go and get signed in Europe … and you need to find a balance between the constant re-circulation of talent from top to bottom. Selling those players that you just feel it’s the right thing to do or an economic deal that you just can’t turn down has to balance with the need for that person to be a part of your marketing story. Selling Brian McBride would only make sense if it’s perfect for his development, perfect for the league financially and perfect for the Columbus Crew. And we looked long and hard when he had an offer last year. We don’t pro-actively go out and market our players. I don’t believe that we should be taking our most valuable asset, building them up, having them become personalities in their communities and then pro-actively selling them. I think we should be pro-actively selling them on this league and the quality of it that they want to play here because it’s good for their career. Our goal should be to make the league so valuable to them that they don’t have to look elsewhere. That the best soccer is here, that they can make a living here. That’s ultimately my goal. But even with that, we’re going to sell some players. That void will be filled by the young kids whether they’re coming up or coming back, like Taylor Twellman. It’s almost like a filtering system. It is a living organism that’s going along a path. As some players are leaving, you have to make sure you have new players coming in to replace them.