MLS is built to be unpredictable.
With a soft salary cap and specific roster rules that ensure no team wildly outpaces another when it comes to the quality of their roster, parity is one of the original features of MLS. Even when teams open up the door and spend big money on Designated Players, they’re only allotted three of those slots.
In hopes of capturing fans in local markets, MLS has created a structure in which almost every team is theoretically in contention for something until the very last day of the regular season.
If you’re not pushing for the Supporters’ Shield, you’re pushing for home-field advantage in the playoffs. If you’re not pushing for home-field advantage in the playoffs, you’re pushing for a guaranteed playoff spot. If you’re not pushing for a guaranteed playoff spot, you’re pushing for a wildcard spot.
Keeping teams in the mix for a huge chunk of the season is designed to generate interest in the markets of MLS’s 29, soon to be 30, teams. It’s designed to sell tickets. And, maybe most relevant for the league’s long term future, it’s designed to keep MLS well clear of the largely predictable nature of many other soccer leagues around the world. There’s value in local interest, selling tickets, and in the unpredictability — that’s why the league has prioritized parity over almost everything since it first began play in 1996.
This year was no different. Parity was king in MLS in the 2024 regular season, too. But its crown was just a little smaller.
There were four truly excellent teams in the MLS regular season — Inter Miami, the Columbus Crew, LAFC, and the LA Galaxy. All four finished on or above 64 points across the 34-game campaign, with Inter Miami capturing the single-season points record with 74. On a per-game basis, each of those four clubs surpassed a 1.87 points per game pace this year.
That’s never happened before.
In the 28 regular seasons that preceded this one, only once had three MLS teams surpassed that 1.87 points per game pace in the same year (2022) and only six times had even two teams surpassed that 1.87 mark in the same year.
Even without Inter Miami loading up a handful of the greatest players of all time, the 2024 campaign still would’ve been one of the two most top-heavy MLS seasons ever.
There weren’t just more high-quality teams in the regular season this year. No, there were more players putting in top-tier performances, too.
In 2024, more players notched 20 or more goal contributions (combined goals and primary assists) than in any previous MLS season. 18 players met that threshold in the regular season, four more players than the 2017 season, the previous record-holding campaign with 14.
