Right. And if you take out PSG, the Ligue 1 average is much lower. So as I said, they're not talented enough for the top 4 leagues (& PSG) but make a lot more than they'd probably be offered in the second tier leagues, other than the Championship.
Bro, Miles makes more than the avg salary in 4 out of 5 of those leagues. There are tons of guys in those leagues making less. Tajon Buchanon makes $1.8m and that’s around the median La Liga salary. Joe Scally makes $400k less with BMG. Your understanding of payrolls is off. You said these are “Championship level” salaries as a way to distinguish them from top 5 league salaries but that is off. These are above median salaries in the non-EPL leagues, meaning half the guys make less. They’re above average for Ligue 1. There’s a bunch of overlap between all these league and the Champo anyway so you need some other qualifier if you want to force them into a panel with “Championship” in it.
I'm going to write this really slowly so that you may be able to follow. The higher paid MLS "lifers" Ferreira, Miles Robinson, Zimmerman etc probably aren't going to attract the attention a top 4 league team. Nothing to do with salary. Do you follow so far? They're also probably too expensive salary-wise for the SPL, Eredivisie, Primeira, Pro etc. The best paid players in those leagues tend to have dropped from a higher level. The only league that might pay a 7 figure salary to a player with no European experience is the Championship, where you already have a number of Yanks in their mid-20s making 7 figure salaries.
I don’t know if this is true. If they were willing to accept a lower salary and there wasn’t a transfer fee some of the top MLS guys would get top 4 league looks. Ferreira for instance had interest in Spain in recent years. But not from teams who could afford the transfer fee and who would probably pay him less. It’s the salary but also the value of these guys to their MLS teams is much more than the transfer fee they’d command on the open market.
I tend to think most of them would have had to leave when they were a lot younger, it doesn't make a lot of sense to invest so much in those guys when you can't benefit from the opportunity of them increasing their value dramatically which in part is a reflection of age and how much career runway is left to turn that signing into profit. Ferreira's the weird one because he was actually young, and would have moved if not for the invasion of Ukraine.
That's my whole point. They're not good enough for the top 4 leagues and they're too expensive for the secondary leagues, except maybe the Championship. And yes average is average, if they moved to these leagues they would be demanding above average salaries.
Foreign players get bought out of MLS frequently. That’s because the better players in MLS for the most part aren’t American. There’s also a difference between could a player latch onto a side in a top league vs is the player in demand, with upside and a profile that will raise the quality in the team and is worth the investment.
Yeah being in a top 4 league is itself a wide range in quality. Many of the bottom of the table teams in Germany, Spain, and Italy aren’t particularly notable but also don’t have close to the resources to be able to afford an MLS guy like a Ferreira even if he’d be good enough to play for them. This is less the case in the EPL because the bottom half teams half so much money but they are usually competing with top half of the table type teams in the other top 4 leagues for players as a result of their financial edge.
Well, your whole point is till wrong. They are good enough for the top 4. James Sands and John Tolkin more than held their own in the BL. Players who are proven successes and are domestics are paid more highly in those leagues. If Miles and Jesus moved to a top 4 league and they were paid what they were “worth” it would be less than they are getting now. However, it would still be within the range of what the players currently getting paid in those leagues get. Hence they would be paid “top 4 league” salaries.
What did Poch not see from not watching Tessmann that he hasn't called him up since March? TANNER TESSMANN'S FIRST-EVER EUROPEAN GOAL IS A BANGER FOR LYON FROM OUTSIDE THE BOX 🇺🇸🔥 pic.twitter.com/yvVSRbgHyy— CBS Sports Golazo ⚽️ (@CBSSportsGolazo) September 25, 2025 🗣️ Lyon head coach Paulo Fonseca on Tanner Tessmann:"His characteristics correspond to our game. Since I arrived, he started playing and he did it very well. This year, he has confirmed and progressed a lot. It's not just because he scores, he does very important things for our… pic.twitter.com/sYaKh7yuJ4— USMNT Otaku 🇺🇸 (@USMNTOtaku) September 25, 2025 🇫🇷 Game winner vs Angers.🇪🇺 Game winner vs FC Utrecht.🤫🇺🇸 pic.twitter.com/iM6KbussAD— USMNT Otaku 🇺🇸 (@USMNTOtaku) September 25, 2025
That's a good point. Sands is on loan. If he's a success he'll hopefully be offered more than he makes at NYC. Tolkin was on just under $1 million at Kiel according to Capology. Not sure if that's been affected by relegation. I still don't see a top 4 league buying Ferreira, Miles Robinson or Walker Zimmerman without an intermediate step.
It’s more like what you didn’t see, namely, I expect Poch has done more than watch a 10 second highlight clip.
They’re good enough to play but not good enough to get there with all the costs involved. Luca De La Torre was a regular starter in Spain for 2 seasons and is nothing special in MLS.
I think it's absurd for an Austin fan or an LAFC fan to call a Miami fan "plastic" ... or most of MLS. Like half the teams are under a decade old. And let's stop acting like people in every sport don't pick teams because they have a star player or for dumber reasons, like "I like their uniform." I think the whole criticism is cringe, frankly, especially since just about the only real criticism one might throw at anyone hasn't even happened yet -- it's just assumed. If someone stops being a fan after Messi leaves, feel free to call that person plastic or simply, a Messi fan. But that hasn't happened yet, and the charge will inevitably and dumbly be applied to someone who stuck around. I mean, FFS, Seattle used to draw 42-44k a game and now they draw 30k despite still being really good. I guess that close to a third of Seattle fans were just plastic right? Just let people root for who they want to in general. But also, all these teams are super young and super corporate, but that's what people got. It's far better to root for Miami than to be an American that pretends they have some long lost connection to some city in Europe they've never been to but they are Liverpool til they die or something.
There's tons of overlap in player quality between the league, but yes, there's also a huge number of barriers to the efficient market everyone assumes it is. Transfer costs, country rules, cultural adaptation, training, risk factors, etc. An EU passport is a huge differentiator once a player is established, for example. That opens up the market drastically. Little bit easier if you are a free academy level kid, but if you are in Italy or Spain and can have 3 non-EU guys ... you've got to be sooooo much better than you do with that EU passport.
Hey! I've been to Liverpool a bunch of times! Couldn't agree more though, this brand of tribal, self-righteous purity assessment is about as pathetic as it gets... and I say that acknowledging that it does sometimes well up in me, like the shame from some embarrassing past mistake. Right or wrong, fair or unfair, you summed it up pretty well:
I saw a police interview with some back country middle-aged hick who had shot dead a family member, recently. Noticeably the suspect a interviewed wearing an Inter Milan jersey. Proof that soccer has penetrated even the most sacred American traditions. 2iH1g8rhrKo 15:30 in. I removed the thumbnail as it depicts violence.
I'm not arguing that American MLS players aren't good enough to play in a top 4 league. It's just that they're not signing Yanks who are on 7 figure salaries in MLS. Sands is a notable exception but he is on loan.
let’s start with the fact that I grew up down there watching the Ft Lauderdale Strikers play in that stadium. Later I drove down from Orlando to watch Miami Fusion games and stand with La Sur and support the team. (Go ahead and look up how pathetic the attendance was back then for them). Now the plastic fans go to games to been seen and star gaze at who else has shown up for the event. They leave when Messi is subbed off, and chants are piped through the sound system to try and drowned out the away fans. I know that population intimately and they will not support a team that is not winning and packed with world recognized stars. Hell the Fusion had El Pibe on it when they folded.
Too bad Poch is stuck with such crap players Since Christian Pulisic made his Serie A debut, no player has been involved in more goals. He just passed Lautaro Martinez for the No. 1 spot 🇺🇸🔥(📸: @OneFootball) pic.twitter.com/k4LG2bSwEw— USMNT Only (@usmntonly) September 28, 2025 A lot of G+A between these five to start the season 🔥 pic.twitter.com/yZra1Wzjqz— CBS Sports Golazo ⚽️ (@CBSSportsGolazo) September 28, 2025 Both Liverpool and Napoli’s unbeaten runs were snapped this weekend. 👀 With a scoreline of 2-1 in both games. 💪 pic.twitter.com/zIA9ZtBvx7— USMNT Otaku 🇺🇸 (@USMNTOtaku) September 28, 2025 🚨🇺🇸 Christian Pulisic (27) run from his own half to assist Saelemaekers. 😳⚡️ pic.twitter.com/f5e5aaWeLs— EuroFoot (@eurofootcom) September 28, 2025
I asked Google AI what famous players has Poch coached? answer: Mauricio Pochettino has coached many famous players throughout his career, including global superstars like Lionel Messi, Neymar, and Kylian Mbappé at Paris Saint-Germain (PSG) and stars from his time at Tottenham such as Harry Kane and Mousa Dembélé. He also developed young talent like Dele Alli at Tottenham and managed experienced players like Thiago Silva at PSG.