Rory Smith Complimented MLS...But You Missed The Point

Leave it to the American soccer twittersphere to highlight our country's predisposition to being reactionary, not to mention exposing our inferiority complex. Rory Smith from the Telegraph wrote a sly article, essentially saying that Landon Donovan and David Beckham are starting to force many to reevaluate their long held anti-MLS stereotypes.

Good right? Well, when he included the line "MLS, world football’s deformed sibling" he doomed himself to an immediate, misinformed and predictably childish backlash...at least on Twitter....though I'm sure BigSoccer is moments from blowing up their servers.

After all, what's the point of reading the article when you can pull five words from it and immediately ascertain the entire point, meaning and message of the author's work. In fact, if you managed to keep your patriotic fury in check long enough to get to the next paragraph, you would find the point of his whole article: "It would be ridiculous to define a league’s quality through just two players, but that both have swapped new world for old almost seamlessly suggests we may need to reassess our views of MLS."

Calm the &*$%^ down people. Smith was trying to make a point about the development of Major League Soccer by referencing back to the most commonly used stereotypes against the league. He wasn't bashing MLS or walking around with his nose in the air, haughtily dismissing the American domestic league. He was complimenting MLS. Not only that we was praising Landon Donovan, your freaking beloved talisman on the US National Team.

"That he (Donovan) prepared for his Premier League venture in the MLS suggests the latter cannot be as bad a proving ground as is believed. Americans tend to do well in England, anyway – John Harkes, Claudio Reyna, Carlos Bocanegra, Clint Dempsey et al – but to many it was the case of Donovan, the big fish in the small pond, that proved MLS’s weakness. He has exposed that myth."

Smith straight out says that Donovan is doing what Beckham could not do, forcing people in England and Europe to take another look at MLS and not view it as a footballer retirement home or a bastardized joke of league. Last I checked, that's a positive and complimentary statement. Despite what some might of wanted, this isn't another British guy taking cheap shots at American soccer, it's a British guy admitted that it's time to take another look at American soccer.

But you didn't read the article did you? You reacted to those five words right? Nicely done.