Next spring, when the US Soccer Hall of Fame welcomes its newest class, there will be pomp and circumstance. The hall, which sits in a corner of Toyota Stadium, home of Major League Soccer’s FC Dallas, will feature the enshrineds’ signature red jackets. There will be glad-handing and speeches from players and coaches, misty-eyed reflections on their upbringings and their careers.
Many involved will be American-born soccer legends, of course. Yet every once in a while, a player whose footprint extends well beyond the borders of the United States graces the stage. Such may be the case next year when the hall potentially welcomes English legend David Beckham into the fold.
Some readers abroad – and certainly plenty of readers here in the States – will wonder why an ostensibly American Hall of Fame would admit non-Americans, something it’s done since its inception. The answer lies in the nature of the American game itself. Even our earliest heroes – Joe Gaetjens and the like – were immigrants, with Gaetjens scoring his famed goal against England in the 1950 World Cup when he wasn’t even a US citizen (he never ended up becoming one).
Advance through the decades and big-name, American-born heroes do start to emerge, but they are still outpaced by those from abroad. The history of the North American Soccer League is replete with foreign-born members of the country’s hall of fame such as Pelé, Franz Beckenbauer and Carlos Alberto. Even the Major Indoor Soccer League got its due eventually: just last year, Steve Zungul, the “lord of all indoors”, was inducted.
Tatu, another foreign-born legend of the arena, seems likely to go in this year. All of which is to say, there’s precedent for this. If you made a sizable contribution to soccer in the United States, you’re eligible – period.
It’s the way it should be. By that standard, there’s no doubting Beckham’s credentials. Perhaps the most direct analog for his contributions is the career of Pelé, who arrived stateside in 1977 and transformed the landscape of the game in this country.
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