Beckham Goes Out in Style as Galaxy Win MLS Cup Chock Full of History (And Our Prediction Comes True)

The Los Angeles Galaxy sent David Beckham out a winner, locking down a 3-1 victory over Houston in the MLS Cup final this past Saturday, and giving the Englishman—who had announced that this game would be his last in the league—his second U.S. domestic title in six seasons.

That was only the most high-profile chunk of history carved out at the Home Depot Center. Landon Donovan, who may be headed elsewhere as well, won a record-tying fifth MLS championship and became the league’s alltime leading scorer in all competitions when he scored the Cup-winning goal from the spot, giving him 146 career goals (regular season and playoffs).

The win delivered Los Angeles its fourth MLS Cup title, tied with D.C. United for the most ever.

There was also coach Bruce Arena’s fourth title—two more than any other coach in MLS history—and a second consecutive one for Irish international Robbie Keane, who who iced the game with a penalty in stoppage time, scoring his sixth goal of the playoffs, tied for second-most alltime in a single postseason.

Twenty-four year-old center back and budding U.S. national team prospect Omar Gonzalez completed his return from a torn ACL (suffered in January) by winning the game MVP award.

Also historic, if only for its Halley’s Comet–like rarity, was our spot-on—3-1 LA—pregame prediction (scroll down for it).

To the highlights, which really should be run in sepia tones:

Still can’t believe Donovan missed that sitter in the first half.

Adding to the end-of-an-era, history-making aspect of the game was the talk afterward about this Galaxy team’s place in the MLS pantheon. Are they best team in the league’s 17 years?

They’ve been to three finals and won two. They’ve won two Supporters’ Shields (and narrowly missed a third), and they suit up the league’s best player all-time in Donovan, its most galvanizing in Beckham, and one of its deadliest strikers ever in Keane.

Still, for over all balance and accomplishment, we’d give the nod to the D.C. United teams from 1996 to ’99.

They appeared in four straight finals, won three, and featured Marco Etcheverry and Jaime Moreno in their primes, alongside U.S. national teamers Eddie Pope, Jeff Agoos, John Harkes, Roy Lassiter, Carlos Llamosa, Ben Olsen, and Richie Williams.

That D.C. dynasty also won the 1998 CONCACAF Champions Cup, a precursor to the CONCACAF Champions League, and, most impressively, the ’98 Copa Interamericana, a competition between the winners of the CONCACAF Champions Cup and the South American Copa Libertadores.

The Black-and-Red defeated Brazil’s Vasco da Gama to win that trophy, and it’s probably the most impressive competitive notch on MLS’s belt in 17 years as a league.

This Galaxy side is a good and historic one, but they’re a shade behind that D.C. club.

They do have one thing in common with them, though: coach Bruce Arena.

MLS Cup Promo, with Soundtrack by Sleigh Bells

MLS Cup is practically here, people: Tomorrow, 4:30 EST, on ESPN.

• Beckham’s last game on these shores.

• Possibly Donovan’s, too (but not really, right LD?).

• Brad Davis, his lethal left foot, and their chance to make up for missing last year’s final due to injury.

• Ireland’s all-time leading scorer Robbie Keane, who’s in deadly form right now.

• Up-and-coming U.S. center back Omar Gonzalez.

• Calen Carr’s Peter Cech-like helmet.

This game has a lot going for it.

Here’s the promo, with music by Brooklyn duo Sleigh Bells:

Speaking of Sleigh Bells, if you’re a straight male (and probably even if you’re not), their singer, Alexis Krauss, will give you a tingly feeling. See here:

Back to the game, we’re calling it 3-1 for LA. Enjoy the Cup and the weekend.

Beckham Is Still Quick on His Feet

At an MLS Cup press conference yesterday, LA Galaxy midfielder David Beckham was in the middle of summing up how things turned around for the Galaxy four years ago, when a reporter’s phone started buzzing on the dais in front of him.

Becks took it from there:

We need a follow-up from the owner of the phone. Was it accidental, or a wiseass friend of his who knew where he was at the time?

Beckham Announces MLS Cup 2012 Will Be His Last Game for Los Angeles

As you’re undoubtedly aware by now, LA Galaxy midfielder and global icon David Beckham has announced that next Saturday’s MLS Cup final at the Home Depot Center will be his last game with Los Angeles and in Major League Soccer.

He has not yet revealed what his next move will be, but he did say that he is not retiring from the game, and that he would like to take on “one last challenge” before hanging up his boots for good. The speculation as to where that challenge will be has begun in earnest.

So his MLS career will end on Dec 1, 2012, in the exact same place that it began on July 13, 2007. Nice symmetry there.

The rest of his time in MLS wasn’t quite so balanced, but on the whole he provided most of what he came to the league to provide. He got off to a rocky start, with injuries, apparent disinterest, more injuries, some hostilities with the public, and some squabbles with Landon Donovan in the midst of a struggling Galaxy side. But once Bruce Arena got the team in order, and results started to improve, the Beckham Era started to take on some shine.

The team made it to the 2009 MLS Cup final, losing on penalties to a rising Real Salt Lake side (Beckham made his penalty; Donovan missed his); they won the Supporters’ Shield the following season as the team with the best regular-season record, and they won the championship in 2011, clipping Houston 1-0 in the final, with Beckham and Donovan hooking up on the winning goal. And of course they’ve made it back to the 2012 MLS Cup final, where they’ll meet Houston again. That’s four conference finals, three championship games, and a shot at two titles in six seasons. Not bad at all.

(Click here for some more stats on the Beckham Era.)

He also did this:

And this, which was fun:

Success arrived off the field, too: Beckham boosted attendance wherever he went, his name sold gazillions of dollars in merchandise (that’s the official league figure), and he boosted the profile and credibility of MLS worldwide, opening the door for players like Tim Cahill and Thierry Henry to follow him here. That’s all to the long-term good of the league.

Over all, the Beckham Era was a pretty resounding success, early friction aside. And the timing of his decision was a perfect piece of PR/showmanship: It gives the league a great hook to market the MLS Cup with, as well as a potential exclamation point on the end of Beckham’s MLS career, if LA win the title again. As Houston coach Dominic Kinnear said, the league owes him a big thank-you.

He may be gone soon, but he won’t be soon forgotten.

And he won’t be gone long: Beckham said he intends to return as an MLS owner in the near future.

Houston, Los Angeles Advance, Set Up Rematch of 2011 MLS Cup Final

We’ve been buried with day-job stuff this week but we’re back now with a few words and pictures on this past Sunday’s eventful MLS Conference Final second legs, which set up a rematch of last year’s championship game between the Galaxy and the Dynamo.

In Sunday’s opener, Houston took a 3-1 first-leg lead into D.C., and got a pivotal goal just before halftime from Oscar Boniek Garcia* to all but kill off the series. Brad Davis set up Garcia with an incisive solo run down the right channel before stabbing it back to the Honduran with his favored left foot.

D.C. pulled one back late to make it 4-2 on aggregate, but this was Houston’s game, and series. They looked wholly professional, and will be a formidable opponent in the final.

Highlights:

In the nightcap, the Galaxy took a 3-0 first-leg lead into Seattle’s jam-packed CenturyLink Field, where the hosts would look to get off to a fast start against an LA team resting Landon Donovan (hamstring) and Juninho (Achilles).

The Sounders did just that, threatening early and often through Eddie Johnson and Fredy Montero. Johnson had a goal called back (incorrectly, replays showed) in the 11th minute, and then scored the opener in the 12th.

When Zach Scott powered in a near-post header in the 57th minute to make it 3-2 on aggregate, it was game on.

And then, well … click here for the highlights of what came next. (We’d embed the video, but it was an ESPN game and the WWL is a little stingy when it comes to posting stuff to the WWW.)

Click here to see the piece we wrote on the handball controversy for the MLS site.

Seattle’s 2-1 win was not enough to overturn their aggregate deficit, and LA advanced with a 4-2 total-goals victory. They’ll meet Houston on Saturday, Dec 1, at the Home Depot Center (ESPN, 4:30 p.m. ET) to try to win their second straight MLS Cup title and send David Beckham out in style (more on that shortly).

*Garcia’s parents gave him the middle name Boniek in honor of legendary Polish player Zbigniew Boniek (check his Juventus highlights here). We will never tire of how cool that is. The back of Garcia’s Dynamo jersey reads “Boniek.”

POTUS Turns LA Galaxy White House Visit Into Roast of David Beckham

The 2011 MLS Cup champion Los Angeles Galaxy visited the White House yesterday—squeezing in the cross-country round-trip ahead of their LA derby vs Chivas USA on Saturday night—and President Obama used the occasion to go Don Rickles on Beckham, telling the 37-year-old midfielder that most of his teammates “could be his kids,” and that, after battling several injuries during the title run last season, Beckham is the “rare man who can be that tough on the field and also have his own line of underwear.”

He also mixed in plenty of praise for the iconic Englishman, as well as the club, while demonstrating some solid knowledge of their 2011 season.

Here’s the clip:

Afterward, Beckham talked to the MLS website about this pinnacle of his U.S. sojourn, which started in 2007:

“It’s amazing. It’s a huge honor for every one of the players, the club, the franchise, to be invited here after the championship. And I think it’s an amazing tradition to have as well, for teams to be able to come here. Because you come out of meeting the President, and it’s a motivation—it motivates you to want to come back next year. I hope we do, because it’s a great day, a proud day for all of us.”

As with everything that enters the political sphere, though, there was some controversy: The Galaxy did not invite 10 former players to take part in the visit, including midfielder Chris Birchall (now with Columbus after a brief stint abroad), defender Frankie Hejduk (retired, and currently in the Columbus front office) and goalkeeper Donovan Ricketts (now with Montreal). Birchall, for one, was not pleased about being excluded.

The club did include goalkeeper Josh Saunders, who has been absent from the team since April 27 while he participates in the MLS substance-abuse treatment program.

Here’s Beckham and the MLS Cup Trophy on Jimmy Kimmel Live

He says the postgame party at the Staples Center went till 3:30 a.m. Monday morning. If that’s true, he bounced back pretty well for this Tuesday afternoon appearance.

Part 1

Part 2:

Beckham didn’t tip his hand about whether or not he’ll be back in LA next season. But speaking to the BBC recently, he did pretty much rule out a return to England.

The 36-year-old has offers from “a couple of big European clubs,” he says, and of course, the Galaxy has an offer on the table. (“He has the information he needs” from LA, coach Bruce Arena told ExtraTime Radio yesterday.)

So now it’s just a matter of him making up his mind.

But what about LA? What if they were to decide to move on? They could let Beckham go, along with the now retired Gregg Berhalter and possibly Jovan Kirovski and goalkeeper Donovan Ricketts, then use the freed-up cash to go get another marquee player.

Either way, the 2011 champs are in a solid position heading into 2012.

Behind the Scenes at MLS Cup 2011

This is pretty rad. The MLS video crew gives the full slo-mo glory treatment to LA’s historic championship win over Houston on Sunday night, complete with locker-room revelry involving No. 23.

Check it out:

For another look back at the game, the 2011 season, and some changes in store for 2012, see here.

Kandji Tore His ACL on MLS Cup–Winning Play

Turns out Macoumba Kandji wasn’t time-wasting after his nutmeg-and-toe-poke led to an own goal that won the MLS Cup for Colorado this past Sunday night.

Dallas players complained that the Rapids striker was taking too long to clear the field after the play—and understandably so: the clock was ticking, and their title dreams were slipping away.

But if the fact that Kandji left the game, leaving his team to play with 10 men the rest of the way (they had used all their subs), wasn’t evidence enough of an injury, test results yesterday confirmed a devastating one: The lanky Senegalese attacker suffered a torn anterior cruciate ligament when Dallas defender Ugo Ihemelu landed on his left knee at the end of the sequence.

Though Kandji told ESPN Los Angeles’s Scott French that it was the “best way ever!” to get injured, he’ll be out of action until next July or August.

Colorado Lifts MLS Cup 2010

Of the eight entrants in the MLS playoffs, they were probably the seventh-most likely to win the whole thing. They edged their first-round opponent on penalties, squeaked past the second round with a 1-0 victory, and entered last night’s final as the underdog.

And when they went down a goal at halftime, they were looking at an 0-for-50 record during the past several years when trailing at the break.

Yet here the Colorado Rapids are—after Mac Kandji’s extra-time toe-poke led to a Dallas own goal—MLS champions for the 2010 season, following a wild 2-1 win at Toronto’s chilly BMO Field.

For more on last night’s game, click here and read our column at MLS.

In related news, we have a winner in the First Annual Backpost MLS Playoff Pool, and his name is … envelope please…. Old 27!

A Denverite, Old 27 was one of two entrants to pick the Rapids to go all the way—the other was Jon, from the British Bulldog pub (“Your Colorado Rapids Bar”), also located in that fair Rocky Mountain city.

One point separated the two, and it came from Old 27’s selection of LA over Seattle in the first round, while Jon had Sounders FC winning that one.

So congrats, Old 27. A copy of Soccernomics is headed your way soon.

Thanks to all for playing, and reading.