MLS owners are trying to reinvent the wheel with complex rules pretending they need to crack some code on how difficult it is to build rosters. Meanwhile just down south we have a team like Monterrey do this: In the 24/25 season Monterrey bought; Lucas Ocampos for €7.25M Fidel Ambriz for €6.67M Nelson Deossa for €5.80M Santiago Mele for €3M Oliver Torres was a free transfer but he isn't going to leave La Liga to play in Liga MX for pennies. 25/26 season Uros Djurdjevic for €4.5M Luca Orellano for €3.82M Anthony Martial for free but again, like Oliver Torres, his salary must not be cheap. For this 26/27 so far Orbelin Pineda for €8M Diego Rossi for €7M Cuypers is pending I'm not counting Sergio Canales and Tecatito Corona which came before the 24/25 season and are/were top paid players in Monterrey. Also not counting players that were bought for less than €3M in that time frame. Sergio Canales left Monterrey this Summer for free. Players that have left that they bought since the 24/25 season are; Anthony Martial- came free and left free Nelson Deossa- sold for €11.70 to Real Betis Can MLS replicate this? Nope. Not with the current rules they can't. By MLS rules Diego Rossi, Orbelin Pineda, Uros Djurdjevic, Lucas Ocampos and Fidel Ambriz would be DPs. Maybe Ambriz would qualify as an U22-I at the time of purchase but depends a lot on his salary. That's just based on transfer fees. If we add salaries for players like Oliver Torres and Sergio Canales they might be DPs too even though they were free agents. Monterrey is able to keep its team and doesn't have to sell players unless a good offer comes like the one they got for Nelson Deossa. In MLS once you have 3 DPs you are stuck. You want to bring in another "DP" player? Get rid of one of your DPs so you can bring in another. Want to spend more? You have U22-I spots where you can spend millions but since they are kids don't expect them to perform like a "DP". Monterrey from the 24/25 season to date spent €46M in transfer fees (only counting transfer fees not player's salary) in 8 players. Atlanta United spent the same amount on 3 players (DPs). Monterrey is looking at adding 1 more expensive transfer fee this season so it will go past what Atlanta spent. Atlanta United can't spend big anymore unless it gets rid of one of its DPs. Does anyone see a problem with this? We have 2 teams spend the same in transfer fees in a 2 year calendar period but somehow in MLS there are many restrictions and designations from getting better quality rosters while spending the same as the league that always beats us in CCC. And MLS owners are still "figuring out a way how to construct better rosters" when the answer is very clear. Just follow what everyone else is doing. Keep the salary cap but teams need flexibility and less restrictions. MLS is already spending the same or more than Liga MX but we always say MLS has no depth. Well there it is as to why we don't. Any transfer fee over $5M in MLS would put any player in DP territory. Once you add his salary, depending how much he gets paid, will make him a DP.
Cuypers sold for $7.5M. Monterrey in one window bought 2 MLS DPs and another player that by MLS rules would be a DP based on the transfer fee alone. That's not countig the players they still have from the 2024 season that based on MLS rules would be DPs. This is why Liga MX is constantly beating MLS while MLS is trying to figure out how to "improve rosters" by adding more GAM and creating more designations.
In the last version of Football Manager I played, the English FA paid clubs for how many young home grown players it played, how many minutes. But it wasn’t enough to impact a budget. Maybe for a League 2 club, a very small effect. MLS could give allocation money each year based on how many minutes, for example, U 20 homegrown play. $25 dollars per minute on the cap is small enough to avoid unintended consequences, and might be big enough to encourage managers to get them minutes. Or maybe $1000 or something per appearance, to encourage putting a youngster on the last bench spot and then get him in there if it’s a 3 goal difference at 80:00. Yeah, I like that last one. $1K per appearance for U20 homegrowns of at least 5 (official) minutes. That’d be 8-10 minutes with added time. $2k for at least 20 minutes.
In the real world the English FA and Football League are separate organizations. Is US soccer going to provide the allocation money?
In the real world you fight for your spot. It's how you get better. It's what European leagues and MLS are doing and what an ex-player like Carleton is complaining about. But leagues like Liga MX (and I think Costa Rica is doing it too) put up a rule to force teams to give minutes to U20 players. Is it beneficial? A player like Mora was given minutes due to that rule and look how that turned out. There are more examples in Liga MX but none as good as Mora. Andres Lillini, Director of Youth Academy Teams for FMF, has said multiple times that the U20 rule is helping Mexico develop better domestic players. I'm not saying one approach is better than the other. I'm just on the side of the "you need to fight for your spot to get better" approach but it doesn't mean the other approach doesn't work. It does.
In 2025/26 players born in 2003 or later have to play 1,170 minutes for each Liga MX team. That's only 13 full matches. Philadelphia Union home-growns have played 3,157 minutes in the first half of 2026. I don't think Portland Timbers' home-grown player has any minutes in 2026 but their players born in 2003 or later have 2,125 minutes.
If I was King of MLS, there would be no rule for domestic and international players and for me it would benefit everyone. More reason to lend players down to USL where they can develop and more reason for players to fight for spots in the lineup. You would still have teams like the Union and Portland in my opinion. Plus it would raise the level of USL.
I was using Portland really as a bad example when it comes to home-growns, the polar opposite of the Union, but they still have plenty of young players. And MLS teams do loan players to USL. As far as foreign/domestic I think MLS is sort of on thin ice with the foreign player slots as it is, as once someone is working in the country legally you can't discriminate based on nationality. There are also dozens of young American players who play for other national teams, so having an initiative to encourage MLS to play young Americans might be illegal. I'm not a lawyer.
You would be right but because mandating playing time or domestic quotas is legally dangerous, MLS uses financial and roster-building incentives to encourage the development of young domestic talent without breaking the law. Like I said, I rather have zero incentive and just let teams build the way they want. The next CBA needs to be done on February 1, 2028 and this might be the first time the players hold the advantage over the owners. This is the first time owners are not in total agreement about spending, so the agreement for everyone will be interesting with so many ways this might go and needing to be done in the middle of the season.
Most MLS teams have no problem "if" that were a rule here. It isn't. I see teams like Inter Miami having issues reaching a certain number.
IIRC that requirement actually comes from USSF, not MLS directly. Or at least it did originally. Right, this is why they had to change the rule after the inaugural year from "American" to "anyone working legally without a visa". However it is legal to hire based on the requirement of needing a visa (or not).
The work around with a league that has a CBA with the players I would imagine is enough to keep out of court.
Huge thanks to the producers and Adam Leventhal at @TheAthleticFC pod. Interviews with Don Garber, Brad Sims, Garth Lagerwey and Mark Wilf in the pod and story.A deep dive into the future of MLS:https://t.co/ZXq4aDT3BWhttps://t.co/gkR4ySYwGk— Paul Tenorio (@PaulTenorio) July 21, 2026 Interviews with Don Garber, Brad Sims, Garth Lagerwey and Mark Wilf in the pod and story. A deep dive into the future of MLS:
Glad Lagerwey is doing okay. Also glad he left Atlanta United as SD. What Lagerwey said, where have we heard that before? Right here! (But also other social media places) Several posters have come and gone and some still remain and have said the same thing over the years yet MLS is still "trying to figure out how to improve rosters". Paul Tenorio said the same thing before and after the Lagerwey clip. Just simplify the rules, put a hard cap ceiling and floor and leave a DP spot (or 2 IMO) for a player like Messi. The other rules like HG, money from sales etc also need to change. It isn't difficult. Tenorio even mentioned something similar to what I posted of Liga MX (specifically Monterrey) in several post above and a reason as to why Liga MX always wins CCC. MLS is spending the same as Liga MX but doesn't have flexibility like Liga MX does.
I think the video is pretty disingenuous. They say what they want is to keep a few DPs and then otherwise just simplify the rules, but then they follow it up with: "if you have teams spending 50 million dollars, as MLS does right now, but 45 of that 50 million is focused on two or three players, that's the problem. Wouldn't you rather have a team spend 50 million dollars across its entire roster?" There is exactly one team spending $50m, and that's only because $28m goes to Messi (and $10m to Depaul to keep Messi happy). And they just spent the previous 5 minutes discussing why it's important that MLS has big names like Messi to attract TV audiences. The median spending team is the Houston Dynamo at $21 million. Let's try the quote again: "If you're spending $21 million dollars, but $5.5 million goes to their two highest paid players, wouldn't it be better if they could just spread the entire amount across the roster? And the answer is that it wouldn't make any difference. Here is what the third-highest-paid player makes on the top-15 spending teams. Miami $3.8m LAFC $1.8m Atlanta $3.7m LAG $2.9m Vancouver $1.4m SanDiego $1.9m Cincinnati $3.8m Nashville $2.3 Columbus $2.6 Chicago $1.6m (pre-lewandowski) NYRB $1.3 NYCFC $1.5 Charlotte $2.6 Toronto $1.7 Houston $1.9m The majority of MLS teams aren't pushing the roster limits now. The guy on the video is right, $2m/year is not that much for a decent player and yet many teams in MLS choose not to have three of them, even though they could. What's limiting the vast majority of MLS teams is not the rules, it's that they don't want to spend the money.
I think you have to assume that MLS 3.0 will come with a much bigger salary budget. So Houston Dynamo could sign say 8 players making $1.0 to $2.5 million and Mbappé. Ok, maybe not Houston.
It isn't just the salary though which he does mention. In MLS you have to factor in transfer fees too which if you add that to the players you mentioned they either become DPs or are Max TAM players depending on how much GAM a team has to be able to "buy down" part of his fees. Even if more teams wanted to pay close to $2M they can't when you take transfer fees into consideration. For this 2026 anyone making a salary above $1.8M is an automatic DP even if he was a free transfer. The $2M he used was an example. Same as the $50M he used. The point was to let teams build as they like within a set amount.
I hope so but I'm not so sure. Where is the money going to come from? It's not like revenue sources are going up significantly. How much more do you think Houston wants to spend of their own money? Another $5m/year? In some ways that doesn't sound like very much money (not my money), but based on how teams behave, I think it's a big ask. I'd love to see it, but I don't think it will move the needle much.
Combined revenue has more than doubled since 2019, according to the Forbes numbers. That's based on club soccer revenue. It ignores SUM and non-soccer related revenue such as stadium rentals, concerts etc.
I'm actually mostly fine with this. While I don't think the roster restrictions are the problem, I also don't think they're of much value. But the specific numbers really do matter. If I say I want a cap of $50M which you can spend anyway you like, the $50M is doing most of the work. What if I said that you get one off-the-books DP and then have a salary cap of $20M you can spend however you like. That would be a step up for the bottom-half teams and about what you get now for most of the top-half teams. As for transfer fees, what's your proposal? That they shouldn't count at all? I guess. You'd have to have a way of preventing shenanigans, and it would drive the league towards high-fee-low-salary players, but maybe that's OK. SO the ultimate clean rules: One off-the-books DP, the league gives you $10M, you can spend $10M of your own money, transfer fees and sales are nobody's business but your own.
That is good news. Though I would be worried about using 2019 as a base (and that's 6? extra teams), but still.
Ok to put it another way, in 2018 4 teams had revenue of $20 million or less. In 2025 Vancouver are on the relocation bubble with revenue of $40 million.
Transfer fees are already paid by the team. The money comes from what the teams make in revenue and/or an owner is willing to spend out of his own pocket (that's rare). There are ways to make money. Clubs around the world sell players constantly to buy other players.