Crew SC-NYCFC: A Tale of Two Approaches

Columbus Crew SC makes its first-ever foray into Yankee Stadium for the second and final edition of Crew SC-NYCFC Saturday afternoon. The match-up pits two teams with diametrically opposed methodologies when it comes to spending on players.

The Black and Gold play in a relatively small media market in Columbus, OH which is ranked 32nd nationally. In fact, the only city with a Major League Soccer franchise ranked lower is Salt Lake City, UT. Contrast that with the glamour and glitz of New York, NY, obviously the most populous city in the nation and not only the top market nationally but arguably the media capital of the world.

It should come as no surprise, then, that NYCFC and Crew SC utilize differing approaches in assembling talent.

The boys in blue are essentially a satellite club of English Premier League giants Manchester City. With the backing of parent company City Football Group, there has never been any reticence to utilize Major League Soccer’s designated player rule to full effect. Their three DPs, forward David Villa as well as midfielders Frank Lampard and Andrea Pirlo, are pulling in nearly $14 million in salary combined.

Contrast that with Crew SC. The only player on the current roster making DP money is their number ten in Argentine playmaker Federico Higuaín. His 2015 salary comes in at a mere $1.175 million which is roughly 8 percent of what the three amigos above are making.

If we broaden the look to both teams’ total payrolls as a whole, you get just another indication of the gulf in spending. Not including the salaries of new signings Harrison Afful and Gaston Sauro (you know MLS and how slow salary details get disclosed), Crew SC’s total guaranteed compensation to players this year comes to around $4.93 million while NYCFC that total is $17.86 million. Both Lampard’s ($6 million) and Villa’s ($5.61 million) salary alone exceed the entirety of what the 20 players on the roster who comprise this data are making in Columbus.

The results on the field so far, at least if we’re comparing and contrasting these two sides, don’t exactly prove a correlation between spending and success.

Heading into the match on Saturday (4 PM ET, YES Network, TWCSC-OH), both teams have ten games remaining on the schedule. The Black and Gold currently sit third in the Eastern Conference with 38 points. Their opponents this weekend are currently ten points behind with 28. That’s tied with the Montreal Impact and Orlando City SC. However, they’re at a significant disadvantage with Montreal who have four games in hand and a seven goal advantage in goals conceded which is the first tiebreaker after points.

Clearly the front office in Columbus, of which head coach Gregg Berhalter belongs to in his role as sporting director, is getting a lot more bang for their buck on the field than the suits at CFG. Is throwing absurd amounts of money at past their prime players a flawed approach? Does it have a track record since the advent of the designated player rule in 2007 of winning games and ultimately championships? Can this dichotomy between free spending and a more austere approach be analyzed in other sports as it relates to results on the field and compared to the same situation in MLS?

I’m going to use Major League Baseball as an example. After all, the New York Yankees share the same stadium as NYCFC and have always been known for bringing in players who command big-time money. Since 2000, the Yanks have had the highest payroll in MLB every year except the previous two when they were overtaken by the Los Angeles Dodgers. In that time, they have won the World Series just twice. Even the Dodgers, who had a payroll of over $235 million in 2014 were eliminated in the first round of the National League playoffs by the St. Louis Cardinals who spent $124 million less on players.

Shifting our focus to MLS, of the eight champions of the league since 2007 (again, the year the designated player rule came into effect), only on three occasions have a big spender emerged as the top dog and it was the same team all three times: the Los Angeles Galaxy. The other five champions didn’t have a single player on their roster who made more than $400,000 as the following chart should indicate. It lists the highest paid player on each team that would eventually win MLS Cup that year.

Obviously the Galaxy have proven and might continue to prove at the end of this year that the spend-to-win model does have relevance when all the right pieces get put in place. Their 2015 spending spree, having brought in Steven Gerrard and Giovani Dos Santos, is certainly reaping dividends in regular season play. Since Gerrard began playing for the team on July 17th against San Jose (Dos Santos debuted August 9th vs. Seattle), Los Angeles are 5-1 and have essentially doubled up their opponents goal wise, outscoring them 18-9.

Another reason this approach has worked in Carson while it has sputtered in the Bronx could come down to the kind of coaching required when you have big-name players on the team. Look, Jason Kreis has a proven track record in this league, having won MLS Cup in 2009 with RSL. However, I question his ability to manage big personalities the likes of which exist in the NYCFC locker room. For the most part, he didn’t need to do that in Salt Lake City.

Bruce Arena has this quality in addition to his tactical acumen and ability to make shrewd halftime adjustments. The latter was certainly on display last Sunday when the Galaxy fired off four second-half goals en route to a 5-1 definition of NYCFC at StubHub Center.

Ultimately, as the league continues to grow and the quality of play improves, it will become necessary for teams to write ever increasing checks to remain a contender. Nevertheless, managing sports franchises can in many ways be like stock market investing where finding and discovering undervalued assets can make you a fortune.

For Columbus Crew SC, the modus operandi associated with the latter already won them a championship. Going forward, it should continue to be their status quo for evaluating potential acquisitions in the future.

Note: MLS salary data obtained from MLS Players Union website.

Main Photo by Victor Decolongon/Getty Images