On May 18, 2023, Major League Soccer commissioner Don Garber officially awarded the city of San Diego, Calif., with the league’s 30th team. San Diego once had a soccer club in the United Soccer League Championship called the San Diego Loyal founded by 2009 MLS MVP Landon Donovan.
The Loyal have since disbanded because they could not find a long-term stadium. It got me wondering about the structure of certain soccer leagues, however. The top four soccer leagues in the United Kingdom and Spain are part of a pyramid and managed through a promotion/relegation system. How it works is that one league’s bottom feeders would be relegated to a country’s next-lowest-tier league. The top two teams from the three lower leagues as well as the playoff champion, conversely, would all be promoted to the next level.
What if that system came to the United States?
Comparing with the UK’s system, if MLS is the USA’s Premier League, then perhaps the USL Championship is in the same tier as the English Football League Championship. Three out of MLS’ 29 current teams came from the USL while another two earned the call from the now-defunct North American Soccer League. Each of the three divisions in the United Soccer League (USL Championship, USL League One and USL League Two) could have their own official competition level.
For starters, the league structure used in Europe may further increase viewership among the U.S. population. Inter Miami CF superstar Lionel Messi is already doing that by himself, as he has increased the league’s social media presence at an unprecedented rate. Approximately 10.9 million people watched an MLS match during the 2023 season, and Apple has confirmed that some matches attracted millions of viewers on Apple TV+. Those numbers could increase if there was more at stake because each match would be equally important and worth someone’s viewing interest.
The promotion/relegation system would also significantly raise the stakes. Every regular-season match would feel like a do-or-die playoff game. It would be less like a Lamar Hunt US Open Cup or CONCACAF Champions Cup battle, but more like an MLS Cup Playoff contest. Some soccer matches already feel like one because of their stadium’s standing-room sections or key rivalries, such as El Tráfico and the Hudson River Derby.
Major League Soccer has more playoff games than the Premier League and La Liga do. Since those leagues do not have a true playoff format, the league’s official champion for a particular season goes to the club that earns the most points. Competition for the Supporters’ Shield would significantly increase if MLS adapted that format.
The Supporters’ Shield is awarded to the league’s regular season champions each year before the playoffs, but under this format, the winners would be that season’s outright champions. Both DC United and the Los Angeles Galaxy would have the same number of league titles at four apiece if that had been incorporated throughout MLS’ four-decade tenure.
The only true playoff format in English and Spanish soccer is in the divisions below the Premier League and La Liga. Since 2016, the EFL Championship, EFL League One and EFL League Two have each had a two-round tournament where the winner of that playoff earns the final promotion spot. It only features the clubs that finished third through sixth in the league table because the top two teams are automatically promoted.
The USL’s is a little different as it involves the eight best teams from each conference and is a single-elimination tournament. If the EFL Championship or Segunda División’s formats were in place in the USL Championship, for example, perhaps the top teams from each conference could earn automatic promotion to MLS. The next seven best clubs from each conference would compete for the remaining spot.
There are a few caveats to bringing this system to the United States; the main one being how long the regular season might last as a result. Both La Liga and the Premier League have 20 clubs. Starting next season, when San Diego FC debuts, MLS will become the fifth professional sports league in the United States with at least 30 teams. Premier League and La Liga clubs play the other 19 squads in their league twice for 38 league matches. Major League Soccer clubs face the teams in their conference twice and only half of the ones in the other conference once for 34.
If MLS were to have each club play every other team in the league twice, they would be currently competing in 56 total league matches. Between the league’s regular season, a player’s obligations to their national team and international break periods alone, a campaign with that many games is just not manageable.
So maybe the solution is to do promotion and relegation by conference. I am not suggesting that the conferences become independent leagues titled MLS East and MLS West. Instead, perhaps each MLS conference’s last-place team gets relegated to the USL Championship while their regular-season conference champions earn a spot in the following MLS season. It could help maintain MLS’ 34-game scheduling style and leave some room to expand the regular season by four games and match it with Europe’s top-flight leagues.
The United States is one of three countries hosting the 48-team World Cup in 2026, a first for FIFA. MLS Next Pro president Charles Altchek has openly considered the idea of relegation and promotion as part of MLS’ efforts to expand their presence in lower divisions ahead of the World Cup. That includes turning reserve teams in MLS Next Pro into individualized sides that could go into any USL league.
The European style of promotion may work to further grow soccer’s popularity in the United States if it is implemented. With the right amount of strategy and planning, the promotion and relegation system could succeed in the United States Soccer Federation.