by Steve Wolf

Created on: July 10, 2007

In America, popularity is not based on performance as much as it is on marketing and branding. While it is true that Michael Jordan and Tiger Woods are two of the top athletes in history, their iconic status is actually a fabrication of the media. Both these athletes focused a large portion of their attention in creating an image rather than identifying with the common person. For example, Michael Jordan became bigger than the game of basketball to the point in which he could seemingly manipulate the rules as he saw fit and frequently got away with it (see numerous travels and push offs, like the one off Byron Russell). His name became so synonymous with the idea of athletic perfection that major flaws such as his gambling addiction became overlooked.

If you don't believe that marketing is truly what has made Michael Jordan and Tiger Woods what they have become, then take a look at the world of tennis. Pete Sampras and Roger Federer are arguably the two greatest tennis players ever, yet if you asked the man on the street who was the best tennis player of the last decade, you would likely get the response Andre Agassi more often. The reason? Sampras and Federer are unappealing to advertisers, whereas Agassi appeals to the public. If you go on results alone, Federer and Sampras both won more grand slams, yet Agassi has reached the iconic status through his commercial success and marriage to fellow tennis player Steffi Graf. Results are not what is remembered, but rather image.

Now onto the man himself David Beckham. Ask a knowledgable soccer fan his list of the top 20 greatest players in history, or even of the last decade, and very few will put David Beckham on his list. Yet, ask the common person off the street who is the greatest soccer player, especially in America, and the most common response will be David Beckham. In fact he is probably the only soccer player that most have even heard of. His good looks and marriage to Spice Girl Victoria have created an idealistic image of Beckham a la Michael Jordan or Tiger Woods.

The fact that his performance is limited to crosses and set pieces is ignored by most, mostly because most don't know any better about the intricacies of the game of soccer. The name of Beckham will draw in casual fans, and when they see him score on a brilliant free kick, they will assume that they are seeing the epitome of soccer performance when they are in fact seeing only a small fraction of it.

In the short term, Beckham's arrival will

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