By now, Real Salt Lake's mantra that "The team is the star" has become synonymous with the club. This weekend, RSL will face a team that has found similar success with a similar approach to the foundation of the club when it meets Sporting Kansas City at Sporting Park on Saturday.
RSL captain Kyle Beckerman joined the Bill & OC Show on Thursday and talked about the identity within RSL's locker room that has grown to define the organization through a successful run of a league-best seven straight appearances in the MLS Cup playoffs "Every club has their own identity and the one we have here, I think it's really cool. I think it's easy for a neutral fan to get on board with what we've created here," Beckerman said. "It's pretty neat to see the evolution of Major League Soccer and how the clubs are gaining their identity."
Whereas some teams in MLS have sought to build through spending millions of dollars on big-name stars from around the world, others have built those stars from within their own ranks.
In LA, the Galaxy brought in David Beckham and Robbie Keane and won three MLS Cups in the last four seasons. In Seattle, Obafemi Martins and Clint Dempsey brought an Open Cup and the Supporters' Shield last year. New York had Tim Cahill and Thierry Henry in its Supporters' Shield-winning campaign in 2013 - the first championship in the club's big-spending history. Meanwhile, Toronto FC had the highly-touted trio of Jermain Defoe, Michael Bradley and Gilberto in 2014, but still couldn't crack the Eastern Conference playoffs for the first time in club history.
While those teams have had varying success with their spendy ways, others have won championships without spending millions on individual stars. Since Beckham came to the league in 2007 and MLS instituted the DP rule, only the LA Galaxy has won MLS Cup while spending big on Designated Players.
That includes Real Salt Lake in 2009 and Sporting Kansas City in 2013.
"I really enjoy what we have going here. What we've done so far here in Salt Lake, we've put down a strong foundation where we can bring our players, we can bring in Americans and we can bring in South Americans that aren't necessarily huge names but we can produce attractive soccer," Beckerman said. "That's a pretty nice foundation to have, where it's got to come from everybody. It's got to be a team thing. It's attractive. It's exciting and it's something that we can go up against the big name clubs like the Galaxy and the Seattle Sounders that want to get into the spending with the big-name European players. Right now, that's our foundation. We don't need that right now. We're laying the foundation for many years to come that Real Salt Lake can be a strong team."
To hear Beckerman's full interview, click here.
