Tuesday, July 24, 2007
Famous for being famous
Did you see the media feast that happened on Saturday evening? Major League Soccer had their day in the sun as David Beckham, probably the most recognized soccer player in the world, made his first appearance for the Los Angeles Galaxy.
For those who know soccer (or football, for those outside of the U.S.), Beckham is a very good player and probably has a couple more good years to be at the top of his game. But, what the Galaxy got with Beckham is much more than a good player; they got star power.
Beckham has played for two of the greatest soccer clubs in the world: Manchester United and Real Madrid. After winning just about every honor there was, Beckham left a 9 year career at Manchester to pursue a different challenge in Spain with Real Madrid. It was no secret at the time that in addition to getting a good player, Madrid was also getting an entrance into the Asian market. Manchester United was huge in that part of the world and the people there wore Beckham’s jersey as much as they copied his hairstyles. Soon after, Real Madrid jerseys (usually with Beckham’s name on the back) could be found everywhere in Hong Kong, Saigon, and Seoul.
The funny thing about the media frenzy with Beckham’s arrival in the United States is that his star power was, up till now, very limited here. Ok, so he’s probably one of the best looking males you’ve every seen. And yeah, his wife is a former Spice girl, and the couple are close friends with Katie Holmes and Tom Cruise. But as far as “things he has done”, his exposure has been very limited to American viewers.
So, why does Major League Soccer now have to deal with the paparazzi? The short answer is that Beckham is famous for being famous. His popularity has been building for the last 15 years all over the world and slowly trickled down into the United States. It then became an avalanche as his arrival got closer and closer and exploded into constant news footage of his walk through LAX, his unveiling in front of 5000 fans, and then his first game on Saturday.
The lesson: One need not be worthy of such treatment; one only needs to be famous.
