Agents and managers of MLS clubs always know which day the Players Association releases salary data. This is the only time these two groups can find themselves in complete agreement. It’s a day they both dread.
In discussions with agents and technical staff this week, the central joke was that they needed to mentally prepare for 2 p.m. ET on Thursday, when the numbers will be released. Many jokingly called it the worst day of the year.
Players, agents and technical staff devour numbers, just like us. They debate the numbers, just like us. But for agents and general managers, these debates are followed by another step, as the publication of these figures prompts immediate demands for contract renegotiation.
A central defender finds a comparable player earning significantly more than them on another team and immediately calls his agent. This agent must relay the message to the front office and act on behalf of their client. Over the course of a few salary release cycles (or even just one, depending on how patient the player is), a change in representation can occur, resulting in agents feeling the same way general managers do.
For everyone, MLSPA Salary Dump Day is a fun day. In a league where transparency hasn’t always been a strong point, this is valuable insight into salary sheets from club to club.
It’s fun to discover new deals, new signings and any general information to glean. It’s fun to debate these numbers. It’s fun to play GM chair with friends.
That being said, just be careful not to get too carried away with guaranteed player salary spending as an overall data point for each club’s total spending. This is simply a salary expense on a roster and, with teams having the same constraints and parameters, this Really simply shows how much each team spends on salaries for its designated players.
The difference between the sixth highest spending team on salaries (FC Cincinnati, $18 million) and the lowest spending team in MLS in terms of salaries (St. Louis, $12 million) is not very big . If St. Louis signed a new expensive DP – say someone like Emil Forsberg, who is making $6 million in his first season with the New York Red Bulls – they would move from last to top eight.
The worst performing teams in terms of salary spending are also not necessarily bottom in terms of total first team discretionary spending. Real Salt Lake has the third lowest salary, but those numbers don’t take into account more than $15 million in transfer fees ($6 million for Chicho Arango, around $3.5 million for Andres Gomez , $2.5 million for Braian Ojeda, $2 million for Nelson). Palace).
Nashville finds itself in the top four, but it can afford to be a little more lavish and reward individual performances with new offerings. Hany Mukhtar was acquired before his expansion season for just under $3 million. He has been one of the best players in MLS during this period and his new contract is worth $5.2 million. Walker Zimmerman signed a new deal two years ago, making him a rare DP center back.
Both of these players have been with the club since their first game in 2020. That represents two DP spots with a total acquisition cost of less than $3 million, leaving more discretionary spending to put toward their salaries rather than selling and to purchase new DPs.
The more comprehensive table of discretionary spending includes transfer fees. Salary data is important and it’s great that the MLSPA releases it twice a year, but be careful about making grandiose conclusions without considering context. That said, here’s what we can take away from this version.
—Tom Bogert
It pays to be an MLS player these days
Ask any player from the first 10-15 years of MLS about their time in the league, and they will inevitably respond with a joke about how little they earned for their hard work.
Until David Beckham signed with the LA Galaxy in 2007 to usher in the designated player rule, playing in the league was not an opulent profession. The 2006 season saw only five players earn at least $500,000 guaranteed (or 1.6% of the league’s 320 players at the time). Only one player won the million dollars: Juan Francisco Palencia of Chivas USA, with guaranteed compensation of $1.36 million. Even Landon Donovan, the face of American soccer, then at his peak and with three MLS Cup titles to his name, took home $900,000.
Through a myriad of defining moments, the landscape has changed. In 2024, 302 players (or 34.6% of the league) will earn at least $500,000 and 115 players will earn at least $1 million. Rather than reserving seven-figure salaries for notable international recruits, established domestic players like Nashville’s Sean Davis, New England’s Henry Kessler and Dallas’ Paxton Pomykal all fit a player profile that justifies that salary outlay for their clubs.
When Beckham joined the Galaxy in 2007, he got a record guaranteed compensation of $6.5 million, or $9.55 million when adjusted for inflation. It’s a healthy total, sure, but still well below what Insigne collects in Toronto. Two years ago, Xherdan Shaqiri reached an MLS milestone by becoming the league’s first player to earn $8 million in a season; Today, he is the fourth highest-paid player in the league, rather than an aberration.
As such, the MLS All-Time Greatest Earners list has an undeniable recency bias. Messi and Insigne are skyrocketing up the rankings with eight-figure earnings, two of four players actively on MLS rosters to be among the top 16 earners since 2024.
In just two seasons, Messi has outperformed all but three players in MLS history so far. Of course, this does not take into account the non-salary incentives that helped attract it to the United States, including contributions from league partners Apple and Adidas. Toronto FC is well represented at the top of this wealth ranking, with the top three winners and four of the top seven (counting Sebastian Giovinco) spending at least the majority of their MLS careers with the Reds.
Oddly, two players ahead of Messi continue to appear in MLSPA salary releases despite being without a club. Jozy Altidore is listed as being under contract with MLS with a good guaranteed salary of $2.24; Altidore last played an MLS game on June 3, 2023 for New England and has played just over 1,500 minutes since the start of the 2021 season.
Bradley, Altidore’s longtime teammate at club and country, is also making $725,000 this season despite announcing his retirement from the game last fall. This total also allows him to remain at the top of the all-time rankings for one more season; Without the post-retirement salary, Insigne would have surpassed him as the highest-paid player in the league to date.
—Jeff Rueter
The biggest rises and falls of 2023
Inevitably, an offseason offers a team the best window to radically shake up its payroll. The length of player contracts, from January to December, leaves many teams facing difficult roster decisions, and players who feel shortchanged by their past salaries could enter a winter of discontent as they wait for a new one. pact.
Following Thursday’s official release, we now know that six teams saw their total salary spending change by at least 20% from last fall’s salary cut – four that increased and two that decreased.
Orlando finished 2023 with the lowest payroll in MLS, spending $9,642,918, more than $1 million less than the next on the list. That figure increased by just over $15 million this year, a whopping 56.2% year-over-year increase. It’s pretty easy to see how this happened: The Lions gave new striker Luis Muriel a healthy $4.3 million salary after leaving Atalanta this winter, while several second-place players from last year got significant increases; among these players are Facundo Torres (who got an 82.5% raise to $1.8 million) and Robin Jansson (50% to $946,667).
The New York Red Bulls (up 51%) surprised many by spending big on Emil Forsberg, with the Swede alone adding over $6 million to their payroll. FC Cincinnati has worked to strengthen its already strong defense and midfield, increasing its salary spending by just over 30% despite the loss of striker Brandon Vazquez. Nashville increased its salary spending by 25.9%, thanks in part to raises for Hany Mukhtar, Sean Davis and Walker Zimmerman, while the Chicago Fire added a second high-paid forward (Hugo Cuypers) to the roster.
Conversely, the two Los Angeles clubs reduced their salary expenses by more than 20% year over year. This is largely due to the departures of Javier Hernández to the LA Galaxy and Carlos Vela to Los Angeles FC, of course. LAFC is expected to increase its figure again following Arrival of Olivier Giroud this summer. The Galaxy opted for younger and (relatively) more thrifty replacements in Joseph Paintsil and Gabriel Pec, whose combined guaranteed compensation of $5.8 million is still well below the $7.4 million Chicharito earned alone in 2023.
It is still too early to find a definitive correlation between the evolution of salary expenses and success on the field, and the second biannual publication (after the summer window) will be more informative to this end. In total, 17 clubs saw their salary expenditure increase compared to 2023, while 12 decreased their expenditure year on year. After Wednesday’s games, 10 of 17 rising players are in playoff position (58.9%), while eight of 12 losers (75%) are above the playoff cutoff line.
As always in MLS: it’s not just how much you spend that matters, but how wisely you invest those funds.
— Rueter
(Photo: Christopher Hanewinckel-USA TODAY Sports)