Major League Soccer Needs More Meaningful Games. Why Not Play Split Seasons?

Amid a spring of underwhelming TV numbers for Major League Soccer came some more promising news this week, depending how you view it.

According to Spanish-language journalist Jaime Ojeda, more than 1.4 million viewers in total watched the Concacaf Champions League final first leg between the Seattle Sounders and Pumas UNAM of Mexico’s Liga MX on Wednesday night.

Yes, more than 1.2 million of that watched in Spanish on UniMas or TUDN, with the remaining minority viewing in English on FS1. But even if a big Mexican club was the primary draw for most viwers, it was still a reminder that larger American audiences can find MLS-level games captivating when the stakes are high.

The same was also true in last fall’s MLS Cup Playoffs, when an average of nearly 1.9 million viewers watched a Thanksgiving Day match between Colorado and Portland, and more than 1.1 million viewed the MLS Cup final.

As we compare all these respectable numbers against the more tepid early-season MLS ratings, it’s also the outcome of the spring regular season games don’t matter all that much.

To give more games higher stakes, MLS should consider something radical: cutting its season in half.

For all the talk of whether MLS would ever adopt a European, fall-to-spring calendar, the split-season format used in Mexico and much of Central America would solve more problems for the league.

Here’s how:

More Games With More Urgency

Americans often view the National Football League as the perfect format to attract the casual fan.

Well, a spilt MLS season would essentially involve playing an NFL schedule twice.

Two 16-to-18 game regular seasons would be short enough that every match is meaningful, yet long enough that every team can recover from a couple bad performances.

Two 14-team postseasons would just bring more high stakes matches without changing a single-elimination format that has drawn generally positive reviews.

More Trophies For More Teams

With the league growing to as large as 32 teams in the not-too-distant future, introducing split seasons could bring more legitimate silverware aspirations to more clubs across the league.

Right now, there’s considerably less silverware per club available to MLS teams relative to European leagues that usually max out at 20 teams.

Crowning biannual playoff champions would bring that ratio back in closer alignment with European leagues.

Sanctity Of The Shield

The Supporters’ Shield could remain a once-a-year award given to the team that finishes atop the combined spring-and-fall regular season standings.

That could give the award even more clout than it currently possesses, and make it feel less like a consolation trophy when excellent teams like 2019 LAFC, 2020 Philadelphia Union or 2021 New England Revolution lose in the playoffs.

The U.S. Open Cup could also remain a one-a-year tournament, with the MLS-heavy portion occurring in the summer and fall. This is because fall season would probably be played over a longer window than the spring season, based on the U.S. climate and the timing of international summer tournaments.

Alignment With Mexico, World

Split seasons would aid MLS collaboration with Liga MX on initiatives like The Leagues Cup and the MLS All-Star game.

It could also potentially shorten MLS’ problematically long offseason if the Leagues Cup shifted to a winter event played before the spring seasons of MLS and Liga MX in warm-weather U.S. Climates.

Meanwhile, the All-Star Game could be a kickoff event for both countries’ domestic fall schedules, similar to England’s Charity Shield.