Is It Too Late For MLS To Shift To FIFA Calendar?
Yet again, Major League Soccer seems to be flirting with the idea of adjusting its schedule.
While MLS’s March to October regular season schedule was once necessitated in part by member clubs sharing stadiums with NFL teams, that’s largely not the case anymore. Now, you could argue the league’s biggest barrier to aligning to FIFA’s typical August to April/May schedule is… its own tradition of being misaligned.
The schedule question never really goes away since MLS is one of the few prominent(ish) leagues not aligned with the rest of the soccer-playing world. But it’s coming into greater focus right now with the United States, Mexico and Canada co-hosting the 2026 World Cup next summer.
As a result, the event puts the MLS season on hold for more than a month, as players participate in that tournament instead — while most other leagues are off as it is.
MLS Commissioner Don Garber has said that the change now won’t occur before the World Cup. So that begs the question: If not before the World Cup, then what’s the point of doing it at all?
Shifting before the World Cup would be sensible business for the league because it would aid broadcast partner Apple (who now goes without games for the summer, save for its MLB Friday Night rights unless it adds F1 or more MLB inventory). It would also prevent a major interruption in the midst of the season, and finally align it to the international transfer window (currently set in summer, when its calendar is usually in full swing already, lending to lower participation among MLS clubs).
But after, there’s really very little point to doing so. Schedule disruptions are limited afterward (save for the Summer Olympics every four years). Pulling from local soccer interest critically means avoiding too much bumping up against youth schedules, which largely take place in the fall. And importantly, U.S. TV’s sports calendar may be too locked in at this point to really take on extra challenges.
Going back to when MLS was founded in 1995, there’s a chance you’re carving out a place in the fall/winter/spring TV calendar, even if a diminished one. But 30 years down the line, audience habits are baked in to expect the NFL and college football in fall and winter, March Madness happens, and then the NBA and NHL playoffs begin before interest in MLB action starts picking up in late spring/early summer.
Today, MLS is able to fill some gaps, acting as a baseball alternative through spring and summer. And for international soccer/football fans just looking for live contests in the offseason, Apple’s MLS coverage is a welcome treat.
Moving to the FIFA schedule also runs MLS directly into probably its biggest competitor for U.S. TV attention: The English Premier League.
The EPL doesn’t have clubs in the U.S., but that hasn’t stopped the richest league in the sport from earning fans stateside… but the season also largely runs opposite MLS. So the leagues can coexist in the eyes of soccer fans and TV audiences.
A 2024 survey by the Men in Blazers Media Network calls out that 33% of soccer fans in the U.S. said their favorite soccer club was in the Premier League, while another 31% said they played in mainland Europe. Just 40% said they followed MLS on a daily or weekly basis. And all of this is without direct TV competition relegating MLS to second — at best — tier status among those that have a stated interest in the sport.
Despite the lack of direct competition on TV right now, it was reported by The Guardian that last December’s MLS Cup Final (between teams in New York and Los Angeles, no less) had just 65K viewers. And recent figures from Apple and MLS state the league is averaging about 120K viewers per match this season. Not bad at all. But average viewership for the Premier League this past season was 510K per match, apparently.
How is MLS supposed to compete with numbers like that when they’re airing against one another, and NFL, NBA and NHL games, too?
Even as an existing season ticket holder for an MLS club (the Galaxy), I find it hard to believe the shift will work from a TV perspective, despite my own long- and short-term MLS optimism. And that’s before getting into the winter weather issues that could have clubs suing the league should they come to pass.
Whether fortunately or unfortunately, the time has probably passed for MLS to make a calendar shift. Assuming it doesn’t come to pass, though, the league can still capitalize on domestic growth in soccer interest and continue to carve out space during summer months with limited TV (and in-person) competition beyond MLB games.
