News: Inside the confidential 2016 study that provided the blueprint for MLS’s modern era

I'm not talking about the contract the year it happened but instead the years afterwards. I haven't followed NFL for years so I won't pretend to know the details of contracts and caps. But just because a players is on a team that wins the championship, it doesn't make him the best in that position. But according to a brief look at wiki, he was pretty good being an alternate to the pro bowl. I also think players entering the NFL have limits as to what they make. So if I'm reading wiki correctly, the year after the season you mentioned Wilson was not highly paid. However two years after, he became the second highest paid player in the league. Meanwhile two year after Opera was named the best, more players defenders made more than the year before.

You repped a one line post, so it seemed like you agreed. If you didn't, why did you rep it? I'll rep your post as promised because it was a good effort.

 

You didn't rep Superdave's post fast enough.

 

I knew MLB, NFL had limits for newer players and acknowledged you would likely find examples here. However it has been much, much, longer since I watched baseball so the numbers were surprising.

 

Opara wasn't exactly a rookie nor on a rookie contract.

 

Going to sleep but good points.

 

Year Team Base Salary - Games Started
2010 SJE $80,000 - 10
2011 SJE $100,000 - 5
2012 SJE $100,000 - 7
2013 SKC $90,000 - 15
2014 SKC $97,500 - 2
2015 SKC $115,000 - 6
2016 SKC $125,000 - 16
2017 SKC $150,000 - 30
2018 SKC $325,000 - 31
2019 MU $350,000 - 29
2020+ MU multi-year TAM contract >$500k

 

Right...he was on a “you haven’t really done dick yet” contract.

 

I could be wrong but I'm pretty sure the foreign work restrictions are set by the US government and the USSF (which is in the pocket of MLS but they do have to keep the youth, women and players from getting too upset). But lets take a look at Bill's (and a heck of a lot of other posters) main theory that with a free market and more money, the domestic plow horses are likely to be replaced with more cost effective foreign players and that they would be wise to negotiate charter flights instead working to get rid of the leagues restrictive policies on their wages.
Here are the top top rated defenders in MLS in 2018 according to WhoScored with 1000 minutes (the top ranked player in the league was backup keeper John McCarthy with 1 really good game). If you don't like their ratings go complain to the blokes in London that created them. But unlike bigsoccer posters they are completely objective and are pretty well grounded in reality. If you don't like my arbitrary 1000 minute cutoff or bending the my own rules (technically Bacary Sagna didn't have the required minutes but he made a lot and was close so I added him) or want 2019. get the the data yourself as I need to be very bored in the off season to bother.

	Player	Age	Country	Total Compensation	Rank
	Graham Zusi	32	USA	782,102	19
	Mohammed El-Mounir	26	Libya	192,833	22
	Maxime Chanot	28	Luxembourg	408,000	38
	Walker Zimmerman	25	USA	235,000	39
	Michael Murillo	22	Panama	88,754	48
	Bacary Sagna	35	France	525,000	59
	Aaron Long	26	USA	73,125	61
	Kemar Lawrence	26	Jamaica	255,600	62
	Ike Opara	29	USA	342,917	66
	Tim Parker	25	USA	115,935	67
	Keegan Rosenberry	24	USA	120,763	72
	Edgar Castillo	32	USA	129,996	83
	Larrys Mabiala	31	DR Congo	793,333	84
	Rod Fanni	36	France	1,225,000	86
	Reggie Cannon	20	USA	67,500	98
	Matt Hedges	28	USA	525,004	99
	Auro	22	Brazil	272,504	101
	Steven Birnbaum	27	USA	525,004	104
	Leandro Pirez	26	Argentina	685,004	108
	Nick Lima	23	USA	100,200	109
	Chad Marshall	34	USA	341,250	113
	Anton Tinnerholm	27	Sweden	434,925	118
	Matt Besler	31	USA	783,250	119
	Lamine Sane	31	Senegal	855,000	122
	Alvas Powell	24	Jamaica	241,625	124

.

Now look at the top 25 paid defenders. Unlike Bill and a bunch of other BS posters I'm skeptical the players have to worry too much about being replaced cheaper foreign players unless the scouting improves a whole lot more.

	Player	Age	Country	Total Compensation	Rank
	Michael Mancienne	30	England	1,370,268	208
	Rod Fanni	36	France	1,225,000	86
	Jorgen Skjelvik	27	Norway	1,000,000	405
	Andreu Fontas	28	Spain	1,000,000	343
	Claude Dielna	30	France	909,861	238
	Jonathan Mensah	28	Ghana	868,996	125
	Lamine Sane	31	Senegal	855,000	122
	Gregory Van Der Wiel	30	Netherlands	835,000	317
	Reto Ziegler	32	Switzerland	800,000	278
	Larrys Mabiala	31	DR Congo	793,333	84
	Matt Besler	31	USA	783,250	119
	Graham Zusi	32	USA	782,102	19
	Marcelo Silva	29	Uruguay	726,625	225
	Ashley Cole	37	England	722,500	253
	Liam Ridgewell	34	England	700,000	265
	Rudy Camacho	27	France	699,153	383
	Leandro Pirez	26	Argentina	685,004	108
	Roman Torres	32	Panama	645,000	517
	Tommy Smith	28	New Zealand	640,000	270
	Jonathan Spector	32	USA	636,942	473
	Kim Kee-Hee	29	Korea Republic	632,004	199
	Michael Ciani	34	France	620,000	175
	Jorge Villafana	29	USA	617,500	153
	Kendall Waston	30	Costa Rica	604,167	178
	Johan Kappelhof	28	Netherlands	595,000	302

Of these only Zusi and Besler were not signed from outside the league. Flores/Villafana is instructive of how the league screws domestic players who helped build the league and don't make a scene like Eddie Johnson or Dwayne DeRosorrio. Unlike the examples from MLB and NFL that were provided where new players to the league are limited in the amount of compensation they get until spend a number of years in the league MLS works the complete opposite. Villafana made more in the one year he came back to MLS than the combined total of the previous 9 he spent within the league. Posters like @superdave can deceive themselves belittle the domestic players all they want one doesn't exactly have to be a statistical genius or have great ability to analyze talent to see the obvious.

BTW - Thanks for the posts on the salaries of MLB players. It is amazing who much they've increased since I stopped paying attention to that sport.

 

You
Aaron Long 26 USA 73,125

MLS PA
Aaron Long $800,000.04

 

A couple others:

Zimmerman - $600,000.00
Parker - $752,200.04

 

There does seem to be a problem with those American salaries, unless they've had huge increases in 2019 (that 2018 number is the one you used).


Parker, Long and Besler are all in the top 25 for GC and if you look at base salary Graham Zusi pops into the top 25, which makes sense as he probably hasn't had a sign on bonus for a while.

I agree American salaries are slightly suppressed but isn't that the same in any business, that people who work for a company for a long time tend to be paid less than the one that are hired from outside. Certainly that's my experience over a 35 year career.

 

When doing an analysis you need to pay attention to details.

Also not on the list are Ali Adnan at $1,278K, Aljaz Struna at $1,210K and Omar Gonzalez at $1,193K. The analysis was pay vs performance in 2018. Hell you would have thought that well known Brit;s like Ashley Cole and Liam Ridgewell the original list would have given you a pretty good clue about the year.

@Paul Berry since you took the time check the salary data and Ike Opara's minutes, but not comprehend it particularly well, how come you neglected to comment about Villafana's pay history? The hypothesis I presented is the league screws domestic players without leverage as much as possible. I know this doesn't quite match the imagined reality you share with so many others on bigsoccer. So what is your counter argument and what data do you have to support it? @superdave you seem to have a pretty strong contrary opinion, what is yours? The analysts from whoscored are decided to over rate American players performances to make American fans feel better? What about all the folks who took the time to look up data from MLB and NFL. Why no posts now?
While were asking questions I'm also curious as to how a bunch of left leaning folks folks at bigsoccer are so cool with a bunch of billionaires making returns at over 25% per year screwing domestic players or the limited number of Trump supporters are so cool with bringing in a bunch of inferior foreign players at comparatively widely inflated wages. The argument about saving the owners from themselves is tripe. The salary cap (or "Budget" for the pedants) protects the owners from themselves.

 

Wait...an employer trying to underpay employees without leverage? That’s unpossible!

Or capitalism. One or the other.

 

1. Players who have breakout seasons aren't rewarded in real-time, they are rewarded in their subsequent contracts, whether it's with their existing club/league, or another.

2. Not sure of your point about Villafana. I didn't randomly look for salary history.
Presumably he was made a better offer by Santos Laguna. He made his international debut in 2017 and returned to the Timbers on 4 times what he was making prior to his departure. Maybe he should have left earlier.

Villafana salary history.

2007 $12,900
2008 $17,700
2009 $34,000
2010 $40,000
2011 $60,000
2012 $66,000
2013 $69,300
2014 $72,765
2015 $130,000
2018 $600,000
2019 $600,000

3. I agree that the MLS business model suppresses salaries. You could also argue that mediocre players in some foreign leagues are grossly overpaid and this is why 24 English Championship teams are a collective $1.3 billion in debt.

For one thing, having a central structure MLS takes much of the power away from players' agents, which some would argue is a good thing.

In saying that, salaries have been rising rapidly.

A reserve or supplementary roster player today makes four times what Villafana made in his first season at Chivas and they are much more likely to still be 16 or 17 years-old rather than college grads with a ton of debt and families to support.

Leave the politics to another forum.

 

Making an argument that everyone else is simply overpaid would be a reasonable argument, although not one people seem to be making. However other established sports leagues (most american ones) are paying their players much, much more and are making quite a bit of money not including the increased asset value. There are also much cheaper waters to fish in than the English Championship.

 

Good morning all, it's been awhile. Thanks to the OP for this.

There is a lot of interesting information here, but it is a bit tricky to unpack. If I am reading it correctly, the table setting forth the 2015 projections adds the individual team numbers to the league number -- that league number does seem to include the league's share of the SUM money IMO -- to get a consolidated number. If that's correct, the 2015 projections indicate that MLS/SUM provided $260M of the league's projected $690M of revenue and the League/SUM accounted for $307M of the $868M of expenses. Of course, the biggest league expense is players (remember MLS is a single entity, so salaries are paid by the league). MLS paid $161M of the $266M in player costs. The rest of the wage bill was paid by the teams.

Okay, that's what the financials say (I think).

Rather than look at individual players, the better benchmarks IMO are:

-- Profitability. MLS clearly isn't profitable, or at least wasn't in 2015. The capital call to plug that red ink at the league level was $200K per club and even that left a $6M shortfall. Note expansion fees were not included in the revenue, however. But the consolidated loss is more concerning -- $141M. Yikes.

-- Percentage of Revenue Spent on Players. The 2017 Uefa benchmarking report notes on slide 71 that player wages account for about 61% of total revenue for clubs in the top Uefa leagues. That's down from 63% in 2015. Generally, the smaller the club, the more it spends on player wages on a percentage basis. By comparison, here "all in" MLS was spending about 38% of its revenue on players on a consolidated basis, or $266M of $691M in revenue. Compared to Uefa, that's low.

What you make of this is in the eye of the beholder. We have two benchmarks in some conflict here:

If MLS spent a comparable percentage of its consolidated income on wages (and benefits) as in Uefa, the player costs would be $530M, not $266M. That's a difference of $264M. The players and those who support them no doubt look at that and cry foul as evidence of wage suppression.

But if MLS had to operate in the black on a consolidated basis as Uefa benchmarks -- FFP, remember -- wages would go down $141M, from $266M to $125M. Again, a big number. Here the owners and those who support them can claim the league is spending more than it should now.

I am not sure the is a "right" answer here, but it appears both players and owners understand this is still an emerging enterprise growing very rapidly, which makes the financials a lot different from a more mature organization.

Sorry to run, but again thanks to the OP.

 

On one hand 2015 seems like the stone age pre-Atlanta and LAFC, but on the other hand, league attendance was actually below the 2015 level this year. So tough to say where the balance sheet has moved leaguewide.

One thing I did want to point out is that your comparison with the UEFA FFP regulations is missing a key aspect, that infrastructure, training facilities, and youth development are excluded from expenditures in those calculations. Surely in MLS that carve-out would eat up most if not all if not well more than all of the shortfall you outlined.

 

Presumably that was factored into the decision to shorten the season, increasing the number of poorly attended midweek games.

 

This is the thing that drives me nuts when people aren't recognizing this. Owners are obviously seeing huge increases in valuations of their franchises, but that didn't save a guy like Dave Checketts who didn't have the liquidity anymore to stay in the game, even with whatever SUM was giving him to make up for losses.

I've always been kind of suspicious that something similar has been going down in Chicago with the Bridgeview and Hauptman. I had multiple people on the Fire boards arguing with me that the team could turn a profit if they just drew better attendances, but that doesn't really square well with reality. To steal a @JasonMa calculation from another thread, the team's average attendance prior to last season was about 15.5k. Let's say you account for Chicago weather and the weeknight game factor and bring the average up to 18.5k, which would be just under 1k/game more than their all time highest attendance. Estimate $30/ticket x 3000 x 17 games = ~1.5M. + maybe 150-200k in extra parking and concessions. Hardly the type of change that'll get the team out of the red considering what it takes to spend on big name players the team wants to bring in, and you've got to subtract the marketing budget it took to get those extra butts in seats for a team that gets almost no media attention.

 

Pretty easy answer to that from a league perspective: sell!

The idea that a growing business that isn't profitable is somehow failing is a notion that would be foreign to any other industry.

Given MLS' desired growth trajectory, profits are a sign that something is going wrong, frankly.

 

You have to find a buyer who's liquid enough to either take the chronic losses himself, or in the case of Joe Mansueto bail out of the bad economic situation all at once to get things turned around. It was always kind of telling that AEG was never able to find a local owner for the team when it was trying to sell. (another thing about an individual tied to the stadium deal has been telling, but people get really mad when I bring it up).

 

It ain't 2006 anymore. Good MLS ownership groups are falling out of the bushes all over the place. Capital has seen the growth potential here.

Is MLS WeWork or is it Amazon? Both lost money for years and years and years. One had a sound business strategy, one didn't.

And then you layer on the additional question of: is the MLS/SUM growth model something the American soccer supporter should like? We're the customer after all.

But I digress: the god-given right to inevitable, perpetual profits is not a thing in business. NFL owners have made it so, and disturbingly made that idea kinda normative in everyday sports fan discussion, but they have done so on the back of business practices that are morally abhorrent and arguably illegal in several respects. And should be illegal in others.

 

True but WeWork is less than ten years old, so it's still a baby in startup terms.

If all sports leagues were popularity contests on they ownership groups and business strategies then most would collapse.

As I said...

 

It's funny. I've been around the league long enough to remember a lot of discussion about people and places where this supposedly didn't exist that now attend games regularly.