First off, there is no such thing as "The FIFA Calendar." A handful of MLS owners, and pundits believe aligning with the European Football Calendar would have huge benefits for the league. Secondly, USL is not a threat to MLS. The teams in USL cannot afford the talented young players in MLS academies today. After the next CBA, don't be surprised if the minimum salary for MLS players is at or above $100K. The new owners don't want to spend more on the current players. They want to spend more on bringing in better players. Which is why MLS has the alphabet soup of roster mechanisms ya'll bitch, whine, moan, and complain about. The next CBA will center on raising the floor of MLS rosters. It will be about raising the quality of the bottom third of the rosters, and possibly increasing roster size. The top and middle of rosters is fine, and can compete in CCC, Leagues Cup, etc. We saw it in the open cup this year. Teams played reserve heavy rosters in those games, and went undefeated. 5-10 years ago that wouldn't have happened. In order to be able to compete in CCC and the new CWC (if MLS teams qualify) the floor of MLS teams needs to be raised. This will make teams deeper, make their training sessions more competitive, which in turn helps to develop young players, etc, etc. When MLS teams are able to field their best lineups (18 players) they can compete with the best in Concacaf. The best MLS has to offer won't be able to compete with the Bayern Munich's, PSG's, Real Madrid's of the game, few club teams can. Correct me me if I'm wrong here, but didn't Botafogo go out and buy a couple of players from MLS? If MLS is as pathetic and horrible as some folks (like Tac) claim it to be, then why is the Copa Libertadores Champion shopping in the MLS aisle for players? Oh and paying not insignificant prices for those players to boot?
<sarcasm>Clearly the only answer is to spend as much as the top teams in Europe do, regardless of the whether or not the team has the revenue to support that expense. I mean, teams have owners, right? And by definition, owners are rich, so they should be able to spent infinitely to meet the standards these bloviators expect.</sarcasm>
Just noting that not all European leagues conform to that European Football calendar, either. It'll be fascinating to see what the next CBA ends up looking like. As has been noted many times, even this one will noticeably change (that is, increase) the existing salary budget structure by the time it expires in 2027, due to so much of the increase in salary budget being back-loaded in the deal. It does seem as though the owners want to ensure that the structure of the league allows teams to develop different salary budget strategies and not have to confirm to just one way of building a roster. You wan to spend big on a handful of players? Sure, but that may limit your ability to build a strong roster from top to bottom. You want to spread the wealth around and have strongest, deepest roster possible? Sure, but you won't be able to sign as many major impact players. To the extent I have a concern about the league's future it's that I'm not convinced that 100% of the owners will be willing to spend what the next CBA allows them to to remain competitive, and that the agreement's guaranteed minimum spend won't be high enough to ensure all teams spend enough to compete. I mean, the current CBA doesn't achieve that goal in, say, Montreal. In year one of the current CBA, the total budget spend (base budget + GAM + TAM) was under $9M. This season it's about $10M. In 2027, it'll be over $13M. The DP threshold was $612,500 the first three years of the CBA, is $743,750 this year, and will be at $883,438 in 2027. It's not hard to imagine a new CBA setting a salary budget that build on this and allows teams to spend $15M+ a year in the not too distant future, before any out-of-pocket DP salaries are even accounted for.
When transportation becomes cheap and fast (aka never) my "FIFA Dictator for a day" change would be to separate the Caribbean from CONCACAF, merge the remaining CONCACAF and CONMEBOL and merge the Caribbean with OFC.
Yet you understand what I'm saying with the calender. If they want to change their season, I doubt that can happen without MLSPA being involved. Players have contracts and how and when they get paid will be involved. If you are currently signed until 2027 with a club option for 28 & 29 but MLS flips, how will that happen? Does MLS play a shortened season? Do they stop playing for six months? It just won't happen without the MLSPA approval is my point. . The idea to win CWC isn't the goal but to actually get into it will be and that means winning CCC going forward. I doubt right now any MLS team will be represented in the CWC 2029. MLS just pocketed close to thirty million this cycle with the three teams playing. That's more than they would take in winning four CCC's in a row. Unless the US host again, there is only one way to qualify and if you want to be a league of choice, putting more emphasis on CCC should be the new goal for some MLS owners in the board room, no? I agree that the CONMEBOL teams shop here and that should be the next bench mark as Liga MX was the first and they are almost there in catching them. Getting a team out of group in CWC will be the new benchmark for CONCACAF in the future I believe.
Yes they did. Miami has also had to give up Campana and Yedlin in recent years, both extremely useful MLSers. I’m not sure if Taylor was a salary cap casualty or something else.
Ok, but you DO need some or all of those rules and regulations if the cap is in part about parity, WHICH IT IS. The NBA felt like in the 2010s there wasn’t enough churn at the top so they changed the salary rules and now nobody can repeat. They didn’t do it to keep costs down, they did it to increase parity.
Yeah, but it’s understating the case to say TM just dislikes the “structure.” He hates a hell of aLOT more thsn that.
Or allow Wellington Phoenix and Auckland FC to compete for the OFC championship. One of them would win it every year.
The Oceania Professional League should help work that. The A-League salary cap is US$1.956M plus one "marquee" player. The OPL shouldn't be that far behind if it happens.
On the subject of Auckland City, while the Bayern match was historically bad, it is worth remembering that this semi-pro side took the Libertadores champions to extra time in 2014, and beat Cruz Azul in the subsequent third place match.
Holy shit Auckland must have an insanely old roster then. (It’s not the same SIDE it’s the same CLUB. Schalke was in and around the CL regularly then. Man United was elite too. Etc.)
From what I gathered they signed a short term agreement with their former sponsor until the end of the season that just ended, and they're currently negotiating for a new long-term sponsor which hasn't been finalized yet.