If they are changing the calendar why would they have a sprint season AFTER the World Cup? If anything it should have been THIS spring prior to the World Cup. This weeks games should have been last week. Wednesday would have been a PERFECT night for MLS is back, as there was ZERO competition, and they had a World Cup Semifinal lead in. Then they could have had a full Saturday Slate of games, and then a Sunday Night Soccer Game at 8PM on Apple TV/Fox with a World Cup Final lead in....... That's a lost opportunity. Although I'd imagine FIFA would have had a say in the matter, as they want all of the attention on their showpiece event.
Also: @DUDEwipes is now the official back-of-jersey partner of Houston Dynamo FC. Space City, DUDE Wipes has our backs!https://t.co/LvuyCyX2x1 pic.twitter.com/DHMfSjZb75— Houston Dynamo FC (@HoustonDynamo) July 21, 2026
PTI (Wilbon and Frank Isola today) has one of their top stories on MLS's future today. First Wilbon said its a "great" ad campaign they're running right now. Frank is saying its still going to take time,, but the real question is "will the owners want to spend the money". Wilbon compliments the campaign again, but says he realizes they can't just create National TV money. He then asks if you could get Bellingham, Haaland, Yamal interested in playing here. Frank returns with "its going to take a long time". Frank then talks about the TV deals in the U.S, for Spain and England are primarily for people to watch just the top teams but here we want parity. In the end they both agreed that its still going to take a long time to get to that level, as much as they want it now.
We’re in our second day of World Cup withdrawal... pic.twitter.com/b3k589QL3p— PTI (@PTI) July 21, 2026 Here's the segement
Translations from: https://bsky.app/profile/aishiterutokyo.bsky.social/post/3mrafgkdfq223 Here's J-League once again showing MLS how to handle this opportunity.
derp, yeah, I lost track of what I was saying there. True, they swing a big bat in terms of negotiations. I don't think a game after the Final would be allowed, somewhere between FIFA and the blowback of the world audience being aghast at it. Saturday, however. . .
I think they should have started tonight with here is the plan going forward. With the flip of the season MLS will concentrate on our growing partnership with Liga MX by starting the first week of Leagues Cup July 10, 2027. Leagues Cup will for the first time have half the games in the opening round played in Mexico and that will be based on finish in the Supporters Shield standings and the combined standings for the Liga MX apertura & clausura. After the first round higher seated teams will get home games and in case the teams are tied in ranking each league will get home games that will flip each year with Liga MX teams getting the tiebreaker to start in 2027. . The new roster rules we would like to implement are ________ and at the end of this current season we will start negotiations with the MLSPA to finalize these changes. . MLS 2027/28 will open on July 17, 2027 in New York city with the opening of NYCFC opening their new stadium against their rivals New York Red Bull and the season will conclude on April 28, 2028 with decision day. The playoffs will start with a new format and that is__________. . You could have captured the World Cup buzz tonight and it wouldn't matter if it was good enough because it would give the perception of the league doing something big going forward.
Yeah, they absolutely need to be out there with what they plan to do. Each week they lose is lost momentum.
RSL hosted something like 90,000 people over the course of the Cup, for watch parties of the US and Mexico games, plus the final. 11,000+ was the estimate for the Mexico-Ecuador game. (Video features RSL's retired great Nick Rimando and current Utah Royal's player Kiana Palacios.)
My theory is that it's been obvious for a long time already what general direction the league wants to go in. I assume without knowing insider details that even the owners have reached a fairly reasonable consensus on how to move forward with what every CSO is telling them loudly: to simplify the roster rules and allow teams to spread the money around the roster how they see fit. MLS already gives teams the option to have 3 DPs, but I think tthey also know that in order to make a push for more TV money they need to build more complete teams that rely less on those DPs. Now here comes my point: I just don't think they will announce any increases in salary cap or changes to the salary structure until the CBA is signed. Because as soon as the league says "we're increasing salaries voluntarily" the union will be able to put all of its bargaining leverage into securing things like free agency and trade restrictions, etc. One of MLS's largest sources of leverage in CBA negotiations is being able to argue "we can't give you complete free agency, but look how much we're increasing salaries". If the league telegraphs that investing more in salaries is central to its commercial success, its position is signifanctly weaker against the union.
They haven’t deviated one penny from the salary budget, GAM, TAM, or salary guidelines contained in the current CBA. I agree, then, that there’s very little chance that MLS unilaterally increases those numbers now, when they’ve not done so since 2020. Leaving aside the huge questions about how the current CBA could even function under the way MLS intends to run things in 2027, the salary budget increases per team next year are already quite large. That’s how the renegotiated CBA was structured. Players saw either no or very modest increases in the first four years of the agreement. It’s only in years 5, and especially 6 and 7 that compensation numbers really ramp up.
The Premier League is launching "Coast to Coast," a new U.S. fan experience. It will feature free watch parties and activations for all 20 clubs during opening weekend of the 2026-27 season.MORE: https://t.co/fYiCh1eS2s pic.twitter.com/Cua5GcV8j0— Sports Business Journal (@SBJ) July 23, 2026 The Premier League is launching "Coast to Coast," a new U.S. fan experience. It will feature free watch parties and activations for all 20 clubs during opening weekend of the 2026-27 season.
The problem that MLS continues to have is that it doesn’t read as a serious league in a lot of ways. The two biggest player acquisitions coming out of the World Cup are, without debate, Griezmann and Lewandowski. If you’re new to the league, that’s probably what you’re watching. Griezmann scored a goal that had all the energy of a charity match, and in the Chicago match, the Miami goalkeeper was at fault for an own goal that you’d cringe at in a JV high school game. It’s just a hard product to sell to neutral newcomers when the quality is what it is.
Meanwhile if you watched your Union vs.NYRB, the game was loaded with young promising players that the league needs to market better.
Do you watch other leagues? Defensive mistakes and goalkeeper errors happen all the time. You're not even talking about the same match.
Other leagues don’t have the perception problem that MLS has, so goofy mistakes are more impactful on a new audience here. If Thibault Courtois whiffs on a cross, no one is going to think that La Liga is a joke. If Rocco Rios Novo lets a ball roll under his foot, a Barcelona fan who’s watching because Lewandowski is here now is going to view that mistake more critically. Do they come back for a second game, or do they write off MLS and just wait for the Spanish season to start in a month?
The only way the league could take advantage of the world cup was to actually loosen spending and roster rules. Of course they didn't, and so barring some change in course the league will drift back to where it was before. The problem is that MLS owners think fans are idiots who can't tell good soccer from bad. Just dangle a famous name no matter how old, create some "narratives" and "stories", and the league will catch on. No matter if half of the rest of the team are scrubs. Nobody cares about stories about mediocre players. I know I'm being a bit naive, but I think teams can be strong from roster spots 1-15, the play will be better, and if the play is better people will tune in.
When we’re talking about potential fans who actually watch soccer, the best bet at adding new fans for MLS is reaching people who actually understand and like soccer. Those folks know that some games are better than others and that even good players occasionally do something dumb. The fans who will write off an entire league because of the occasional dumb play aren’t going to watch MLS anyway. They won’t even watch La Liga or the Prem or the other top leagues generally. They’ll watch the top teams from the top leagues, probably mostly in the Champions League.
Many fans are. To wit: Now I'm not saying fans can't see a difference between Man U playing Arsenal and Charlotte playing Colorado. There are clear and obvious differences between the teams. But if you put Burnley playing Wolves on a pitch in the middle of the field with no logos on their kits and followed it up with LAFC playing Vancouver, the fans Grumpy is talking about above, the ones that dunk on MLS because of a simple own goal that you see in every league every season, largely wouldn't be able to see the differences between the (former) EPL teams and the MLS teams. And I'm also not saying all fans of the big 6/Spanish 2/PSG/etc. are like this. I'm specifically talking about those who have decided MLS is "beneath" them because its not one of those top 15ish teams without watching more than MLS bloopers. Those fans will never be convinced and aren't worth the league pursuing. If they come around it will be because enough actual soccer fans have come around and are watching MLS and its now "acceptable" to be a MLS fan.
On the other hand Atlanta vs. Charlotte felt as legit as a World Cup game to me with the momentum shifts, face paced counters, stunning saves, etc. Any league in the world will have meh games and thrillers on a match day.
They have different perception problems. Everyone knows what they are for Serie A, Ligue Un, and La Liga.
If you’re bailing on MLS because you see an error in the first game you watch in all likelihood odds of you sticking around weren’t very high to begin with.