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It is easy to forget the MLS season is in full swing. Games have been paywalled. National media coverage is next to nothing. Major League Soccer spent 25 years scratching and clawing for relevance from coast to coast and has squandered those efforts in the past two and a half years.
For American soccer fans like myself, who can recall the likes of Kenny Cooper toiling in the hot ass Dallas weather, Bobby Convery never quite living up to hype, the never-ending career of Shea Salinas and Tony Meola casually endangering children,.
This should be a moment of sadness and frustration. Yet, it’s not. The USL has gladly filled the gap that now exists in the American soccer market. It’s not that MLS fans don’t exist. However, the league has siloed itself to the fringes of US sporting discourse.
The deal with Apple TV may have been a cash windfall to clubs, but it has been suicidal to the league as a whole in terms of relevance. The only thing the MLS has done in the past three years was sign Lionel Messi. That may appeal to gloryhunters and kids but when Messi fades away, then what?
The hope was that the USA/Canada/Mexico co-hosted World Cup would then be the next boost. Don Garber and friends make some money, ride a few waves, and by the time the Apple TV deals end, MLS could reevaluate.
But as those running professional sports leagues are wont to do, MLS bosses did not bother to think about the unintended consequences of this decision. In this case, the unintended consequences were reversing the momentum the league had built up outside of the core fanbase.
The MLS is more irelevant today than it has been in years.
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