MLS Commissioner Don Garber - 2024 MLS All-Star Game Media Availability Quote Sheet
Wednesday, July 24, 2024
To download PDF of quote sheet, CLICK HERE
DON GARBER: It's been a great week. The Haslam family and the Crew have been incredible. They have hosted many of activities, community events, a concert, our Skills Competition, and a food-packing drive. This is what the All-Star celebration is all about. It's an opportunity for us to take a step back and take a midseason break. It's also an opportunity for us to take one of our most important assets, our best players, pit them against a very competitive team – the stars from LIGA MX – and bring that to a global audience with Apple.
I want to take a step back and talk about where we were 30 years ago. The World Cup came to the United States and FIFA asked U.S. Soccer for a commitment to build a division one men's soccer league. Here we are so many years later with the World Cup coming in a couple of years. MLS has grown from strength to strength, from our launch in 1996 to where we are today. I don't think that when I joined in 1999 that I thought we'd be sitting here with 30 teams, with 26 soccer-specific stadiums with two more coming online in the next couple of years, with what was a couple of hundred players and now nearly a thousand, and thousands of employees. I think it's important to think about the contributions that Major League Soccer has made to build a foundation here in this country that can lead the overall development of the sport. It takes a village.
We had a board meeting today. We always have a board meeting at our annual All-Star Game and our owners, which is now a very large group of people, came together and talked about the fact that we're not done yet. What else do we need to do to continue to build this soccer nation in both the United States and Canada? What should we be thinking about from a player investment perspective? What kinds of investments should we make in innovation and technology? How could we work more closely with Apple and bring our fans around the world Major league Soccer at its best?
As you know, Leagues Cup kicks off in a couple of days and that speaks to MLS innovation. Think about the fact that our league will shut down along with LIGA MX and play in an interleague tournament to celebrate what is so great about our sport in this region. Other major leagues have been thinking about in-season tournaments and I think it's a very innovative way to take a step back, offer your fans something unique and different. Obviously, we had great success last year and it's something that we're very excited about in the years to come.
It speaks very much to the partnership that we have with Mexico overall. You're going to see that really come to life both in Mexico and Canada with the World Cup in 2026. There are probably 12 LIGA MX owners here this All-Star week with us. They come to our board dinner, they attend our meetings, and they attend our All-Star Skills Challenge. They were very happy last night as they won the Skills Challenge. I could see there being more and more integration between our two countries.
Looking forward, we're very proud of the development of our league that started as a buying league and this year we'll have over $100 million in player transfers. That's a very important development for any professional soccer league. We want to be both a buyer and a seller. We want to incentivize our teams to be spending their resources in developing young players like Cavan Sullivan and see them come up through the youth ranks, come up through their academy, play for MLS NEXT Pro which continues to grow and expand, and then ultimately get first-team minutes. The player pathway is going to continue to be a major investment focus for MLS in the years to come.
We still have a great mix of international players and Homegrown players that come up from the bottom. You're going to continue to see this kind of development. [Olivier] Giroud will join our league with LAFC in August. Chucky Lozano was signed by our new team in San Diego that's coming up next year. This idea that being a global game with local roots is a big part of what we want our offering to be for our fans.
It's been a very busy summer and I think it's going to be a busier summer in 2025 and an even busier summer in 2026. We had many players playing in Copa America. We also had players on national teams that went all the way to the quarterfinals in the Euros. You're going to see more and more players from the nearly 80 different countries that Major League Soccer has on our rosters continuing to perform for their national teams.
We had our MLS NEXT All-Star Game yesterday. Right now, it's the largest youth soccer boys youth soccer league in the country. 750 teams, 16,000 players. This (MLS NEXT) came right out of COVID when the DA academy in the U.S. folded. MLS jumped in to invest through our teams and expand beyond our teams to put resources into growing the game at the youth level. I could see going forward having girls' divisions in MLS NEXT and figuring out ways that we can continue to expand by utilizing the resources of our clubs and the infrastructure that we have at all levels to be able to grow the game and hopefully help our country and help Canada perform better on the national team side.
There's been enormous momentum in the first half of our season. We're on track to have record-breaking attendance once again. We're at 8.3 million fans coming through our turnstiles. If we were to end the season today, it would be the fourth-highest attendance in the history of the league. We expect to exceed that and have up to 13 million fans, which is a number that we're very proud of. Our sponsorship revenue is up 10 percent. Our licensing revenue and merchandising revenue are up dramatically, 25 percent. Our social media and digital engagement are up over 200 percent. A very important stat for us – the combined social media followers for Major League Soccer and our clubs is over 100 million across all social media channels. That's something that, in this new world, with a young fan base and a very digital fan base, that's something that we're very excited about and very proud of.
You're going to see a lot of energy leading into San Diego. San Diego will be our 30th team. They'll be playing in Snapdragon Stadium. The team sold its jersey sponsor to DirecTV over the last couple of weeks. Chucky (Lozano) has signed with the club. It's going to be the end of expansion until we're ready to expand again. Right now, there isn't a specific plan to expand, but I know many of you might have seen the mayor of Indianapolis that was here over the last couple of days. If there's a good market for us to expand in, if that market makes sense, if we have the right owner and the right stadium plan, I think like any league, we will consider strongly expanding beyond the 30 teams that we have now.
Lastly, I wanted to wrap up by saying this has been a great journey for me. This is my 25th MLS All-Star Game. When I started this journey many years ago, I never thought that the league would be where it is today. It speaks to the resilience of the sport in our country. We went through many challenges in the early years. We managed through 9-11. We managed through financial crisis. We managed through Covid. Throughout it all, MLS has been able to build from strength to strength and that starts with fans who passionately care about our teams and view themselves as supporters who are deeply committed to their clubs, and players who are making Major League Soccer their league of choice.
It was a very competitive bidding process to get Lionel Messi to sign with Major League Soccer and play with Inter Miami. You're also seeing more and more young players, and Cavan is probably the best example of that, have a lot of options and sign to play in Major League Soccer. This remains a league on the rise, it remains a league of great opportunity, and it remains a league of choice for so many people that really love the game, whether it be an owner, a sponsor, a media partner, a fan, or anybody else that really wants to connect with soccer.
What is the end goal and benefit of continuously playing against LIGA MX both in a friendly setting and competitive setting?
DON GARBER: We believe that the sport needs to be connected regionally so that our confederation can be more powerful. We want to have the professional game be a driver of value regionally – no different than the Champions League is in Europe. We want the professional game to be a driver of fan interest here in this region. The Concacaf Champions Cup is a great project and I wish the Crew would have beaten Pachuca when they were down there earlier in the year. We're committed to that tournament.
We're looking to create more energy around the professional game and what better way to do that than against LIGA MX. I think that relationship will continue to grow. I think you'll see more programming coming out of that, particularly as we lead up to the World Cup in 2026. The (Leagues Cup) tournament was very successful. Sponsorship was significant. We had tons and tons of fans coming to those games. Obviously, it was a very competitive tournament with Miami winning in Messi's first year. I think you're going to see more and more activity between us and the Mexican league.
Have you determined the criteria for the at-large bid for the FIFA Club World Cup?
DON GARBER: Not yet. We've made suggestions to FIFA and right now if you look on their website it says ‘TBD’. It will be a host team, so it will be an MLS team and we have many options. Is it the MLS Cup winner? Is it the Supporters’ Shield winner? Do we have a game between the Supporters’ Shield and the MLS Cup winner? There's a wide variety of things that we're toying around with. I think the Club World Cup is going to be a great tournament and I'm pleased we have Seattle already qualified and we'll have another team qualify. We just haven't finalized it yet.
Did the league investigate why there were multiple strains of E. Coli found in food poisoned players prior to the CONCACAF Champions Cup final?
DON GARBER: I've heard that there were E. Coli outbreaks, but the league didn't conduct an investigation.
The U.S. Open Cup is now in the semifinals. I just wanted to see what the league's reflection was on how the tournament has gone this year. Have you had discussions with U.S. Soccer about what's going to happen for next year as well your thoughts on some of the fan discontent that have come from some supporters' groups across the league?
DON GARBER: I understand that it was an unpopular decision that we made, and we decided based on what we think is in the best interest of our players and our clubs. Frankly, when we think about the pyramid, when you have lower-division teams that are playing games of importance, when they're playing up, we wanted MLS NEXT Pro teams to have more games of importance and play up. We would have been more than happy to play those games against USL clubs. We have to make decisions as it relates to the health and safety of our players. We have to make decisions as it relates to our calendar. All of you are in this business. There is no bigger issue than the calendar. You probably just read about some litigation related to the calendar. It is the single biggest issue that leagues have and players associations have to manage through.
We have to make some decisions and make some priorities. We did research, and I don't know if every fan agreed with the decision we made going into 2024, and we have three teams that are going to be playing in the next round. We'll see how that works going forward in 2025. We are in regular discussions with U.S. Soccer. We are committed, if we can get this right, to have MLS teams participate. We need to do it in a way that is manageable, thoughtful, and strategic for our league as well as all the other participants.
After a dream-like scenario with Lionel Messi’s arrival, how will Leagues Cup build off its first-year success in 2024?
DON GARBER: Ticket sales are tracking ahead of where they were last year. It was a brand-new tournament, so we're expecting that it's going to be popular. Clearly, we had a boost of energy when Messi was signed and played his first games for Inter Miami as they went on to win Leagues Cup. The competition between our two leagues is getting intense. These are games of consequence with an opportunity to qualify for the Concacaf Champions Cup and if you win the Concacaf Champions Cup, you qualify for the FIFA Club World Cup. There will be many friendlies going on this summer, but these are not friendlies; this is a meaningful tournament.
If Indianapolis receives state approval for their proposed stadium plans, does that change MLS’s timeline on potential expansion into the city?
DON GARBER: There is no specific timing in place. Mayor Joseph Hogsett was at one of our MLS All-Star events, he came to New York and met with us in the league office, and the folks in Indiana are bullish about an MLS team Indianapolis. We've expanded by about 20 teams over the last 25 years, so we understand how to manage this process. We love the city and the support from the city and state leaders. We think there's interesting ownership dynamics, and we like the location that they're talking about for the stadium. We'll continue to work with them and see how it plays out with regards to the ownership group.
Are you able to provide any updates on potential expansion into Indianapolis or any names involved with potential ownership?
DON GARBER: Not yet.
Do you believe that how teams spend needs to change or how much teams spend in MLS needs to change to maximize the potential and the growth of this league?
DON GARBER: We spend a lot of time analyzing and talking through committees and our ownership about competitive balance. I think one of the great offerings that MLS has is its competitive balance; on any given day, any team could win. We've had eight different teams win MLS Cup over the last ten plus years. There's about a two-and-a-half times delta in spending between our high and our low, but we still have great competitive balance. We haven't seen any impact from money spent affecting the competitive balance in the league, and that is something that we care a lot about.
The eyes of the world are turning to the United States and this part of the world more and more, though. Our fans and consumers can see professional soccer both live and through various streaming and broadcast platforms, and we have to find a way to continue to be competitive. We're smart about how we think about our rosters and analyze our spending to be thoughtful and efficient. At the end of the day, from where we were to where we are, this league, against all odds, has built from strength to strength and has defied all the naysayers who said Major League Soccer would never be where it is today. Part of that is through thoughtful and strategic spending.
We want to better than Mexico, and we've been saying that for years. We're way more competitive against them than we were in the past, but we have to continue to win against our rivals to become the best teams and the best league in the Western Hemisphere. Some of that's going to be about spending, which requires us to have more revenue, and that requires us to look at our schedule differently and think about ways that we can generate more revenue.
How do the results of national teams with multiple MLS players impact the growth and reputation of the league?
DON GARBER: When I think about where we are now, we had more MLS players competing for other countries than for the U.S. Men’s National Team. With 14 MLS players on its roster, Canada made it to the semifinal of Copa America.
When we think about some of the success in Major League Soccer, particularly with young players, we’ve seen players come from South America, play in our league, and then go on to play for their national teams. We're giving them platforms to build their profile, and we're giving them the opportunity to play on teams that are well managed, have great training facilities, and are great at developing players. I think you're going to see more players that represent other national teams coming to our country and finding that they can have great careers in Major League Soccer.
With the first-year success of Leagues Cup, is it possible to think that MLS clubs will compete against South American teams to become the best in the Western Hemisphere?
DON GARBER: There are many things going on in the world of professional soccer that could change the way we think about things. Schedule congestion, travel, and player health and safety are big priorities for MLS. Playing a game in Monterrey, Mexico City or Pachuca is a lot different than playing it in Rio de Janeiro or Buenos Aires. It's an entirely different impact on our calendar, but I never thought that Copa America would come back to the United States. I think the world is going to look very different over the next 10 years in local, regional, and international professional football.
Do you believe Indianapolis is doing everything that's expected of it to be considered for an MLS expansion club?
So far, I think they're doing everything right. Tom Glick's a very experienced guy who has worked for the City Football Group, the Carolina Panthers, the NBA, Derby County, and he knows how to build a proper soccer team. This is a process that takes time, and these are teams that require a whole lot of constituents to come together, including ownership, city leaders, fans, and partners.
Does the interest in the U.S. market from foreign soccer properties impact the way the league is looking at things like roster construction and other elements of the business?
DON GARBER: We look at the enormous energy that international football has and its focus on the U.S. less from a competitive, on-field perspective and more from a commercial perspective. There will be 25 international soccer friendlies that will take place in the next three-and-a-half weeks here in our country, and I'm sure many of them will do well. We'll have Leagues Cup in the middle of all that, and all of this is coming off a Copa America tournament that had over a million tickets sold.
When I take a step back to think about where this sport was 20 or 25 years ago, FIFA couldn't sell the English-language World Cup rights in 2006 when the World Cup was in Germany. That's not that long ago.
Frankly, I think it is a credit to the professional leagues who have professionalized the game and not just Major League Soccer. The NWSL, which has got enormous momentum. The USL, which has dozens and dozens of teams at all sorts of different levels, and NISA that is playing at a low level but continuing to expand. We have professionalized soccer in our country and therefore everybody is looking at how they could ultimately take advantage of that.
Now we're here every day. We have to earn the connection with our fans and with our partners. We have to do that by having teams that they care about, brands that they care about, the types of players that they care about, and an in-stadium experience that you're not just going to get [anywhere else]. If you go to a game in just about any one of our stadiums, that's going to be one of the best experiences that you're going to have in sports. Go to a game in LA, go to a game in Cincinnati, go to a game in Miami, it's as good as anything that you're going to see anywhere in the world.
That's because of all the work that everybody's done to build the sport to where it is today. At some point, like anything else, too much can become too much and then the market figures it all out. Right now, it just seems like there's just so much activity going on and competition is good.
Just one more question, if I may. You allude to the Haslams having this event here just a few years after, you know, Save the Crew and this team potentially being on its out of town. Do you get a lot of satisfaction out of having the events here this week?
DON GARBER: I will tell you, this turnaround, which had trauma associated with it, is what really great moments make in the history of a business and in the history of people's careers. You have to rise to challenges and have the courage to face them and then make decisions so that you can get out on the other end, listen to what people have to say, pivot from what you were thinking, and end up where we are today.
I think it's one of the greatest accomplishments in Major League Soccer's history, spurred by the fans who said, we really care about this team. What we had wasn't working. What we needed was a transformational change. All that energy created the impetus for that change.
I talked about this at the first press conference. It (the club potentially moving) got the city to pay attention, thanks to the mayor, and got the governor to pay attention, thanks to Governor DeWine. It got Alex Fisher to pay attention. I met with Alex Fisher for 10 years prior to everybody coming together. We were able to find a new owner in the Haslams who were quasi-local, spending most of their time in Cleveland, but obviously, a lot of time here. We were able to get a stadium project that we were not able to get in the previous iteration of this team. I will tell you that our League looks at what's going on here with the Haslams and what's going on with the Crew and their on-field success, but also the popularity of their club and the showcase of a stadium.
I would go through trauma like that again because that which doesn't kill you makes you stronger. You must have the strength and courage to fight the fight. Here we are. I feel pretty good about where we are.
San Diego paid an expansion fee of 500 million. What will the next expansion fee be?
DON GARBER: It'll be more than 500 million.
You've mentioned some things with your remarks about the Open Cup about prioritizing raising revenue that goes into your talent when it comes to the Open Cup. Why was there such, in some form, resistance to letting teams make their own decision on the Open Cup as they see fit, as to who they wanted to play in it and is there still such resistance now?
DON GARBER: You know we make decisions in a very orderly fashion. I think that's positive. We have good governance in MLS and rather than the Commissioner deciding on my own or our technical staff or our business staff, we sit down in owner committees and talk about these things. We talk about the best path forward that will work for all of our clubs.
The decision we made then was based on [Concacaf] Champions Cup qualification and many other schedule dynamics. There were a handful of clubs that said, hey, you know, we would like to participate, but by then it was too late. So that's going to go into the hopper now.
We're going to figure out how do we present a plan to U.S. Soccer that will be orderly and will make sense. But again, you know, there were 1,400 people in the stands in Atlanta for the game that they played the other night. I love the legacy of it. Our founder's name is on the trophy. The tournament needs to get better and we're not quite sure collectively what we need to do to achieve that. For whatever reason, the tournament hasn't resonated enough to be able to drive the value that we hope it could drive at some point.
Our task is to figure out the right way to manage it over the period of time to determine whether or not the tournament can achieve its goals and whether it could make sense for Major League Soccer teams.
On expansion here in Indy. Can you go into more details about what MLS is looking for when thinking of expanding and what might set our city apart from some of the other potential cities?
DON GARBER:, What we look for is what we've looked for in every expansion process. You need a great stadium project. You need support from the community, both in the business and political communities. You need to have an ownership group that really believes in Major League Soccer and what it can do for a city. Those elements are the elements that are being worked on now. This is relatively new and it's early in the process, but we're encouraged and excited about the discussions that we've had..
Obviously big news with expansions and small markets are booming, but I cover a big market in Chicago and a team on field that has missed six out of seven playoffs and a stadium situation that's kind of tricky. In a city where we didn't have a Copa [América] game or a World Cup game, is that a concern for the League, that a market like Chicago is not reaping the benefits of the lead that other cities might and it's such a big market that we're not getting big international events and the team is kind of fluctuating?
DON GARBER: Well, on the latter part, the big international event question is one that you should ask the Mayor and the Sports Commission. That has a lot to do with whatever decisions they're making as it relates to their resources. That's something that I can't comment on. (Fire owner) Joe Mansueto loves the Chicago Fire, and he loves the League. He's very bullish about the League and really wants to continue to invest in building the Fire and finding a solution that will work for a great soccer city. This business isn't easy, and you follow our League. You know that it's hard to put together a winning team and it's hard to get all the elements right. Whether Soldier Field is the long-term solution for the Chicago Fire is still to be seen.
I will tell you that Chicago is a great soccer market. It is a great sports market and we're very, very committed to the city and Joe Mansueto.
Real Salt Lake went through its own trauma a few years ago and came out the other side with a new ownership group. We wonder what you think from your perspective of their performance thus far. As you see this relationship deepening with LIGA MX, do you foresee more big purchases like Chicho Arango or big sales like Fidel Barajas?
DON GARBER: [Real] Salt Lake I think is indicative of where MLS is, that if you have the right ownership group, the right stadium, a passionate fan base, a good brand and you're successful with players that people care about, you can be successful in Major League Soccer.
RSL is a great team. It has a great ownership group. They're laser focused. As you probably know, it's part of a multi club ownership group. They own, I think, seven or eight different soccer teams or football teams around the world. Chicho [Arango] is incredible and has had a great run. We couldn't be more excited about what's going on there.
The smaller markets in Major League Soccer have been disproportionately successful, and I think Salt Lake is an example of that. I think Columbus is an example of that. Cincinnati is an example. I think that's what you want. When sports leagues were founded, they had this idea that you have to protect the small markets from the big markets. You see that in many other major leagues.
That's not what we have in Major League Soccer. You just have to get it right. You have to connect all the dots between your players, your fans, your stadium, your community, and you have to really understand the game. If you do that and you put a winning team on the field, people will come out.
I think there's no end to the support that exists in our country for MLS clubs, NWSL clubs and the success that the USL is having. Professional soccer is on the rise in our country, and I think it's probably even just the beginning.
