For one month, soccer owned the American sports conversation.
The 2026 World Cup filled massive stadiums across North America, produced enormous television audiences, and persuaded millions of casual viewers to build their schedules around matches. The two semifinals averaged a combined 25.6 million viewers across Fox and Telemundo, while the United States’ Round of 16 match drew about 30 million viewers. Those aren’t niche sport numbers. They’re the type of audiences normally associated with the biggest events on the American sports calendar.
Now comes the uncomfortable question for Major League Soccer: What exactly is it going to do with all that attention?
MLS has spent years waiting for this opportunity. It has soccer-specific stadiums, wealthy owners, recognizable international players, and increasingly valuable franchises. It also has a domestic audience that just spent weeks demonstrating that it will enthusiastically watch soccer when the product feels important, accessible, and culturally relevant.
The league can absolutely become more popular after the World Cup, but it won’t happen simply because Americans suddenly discovered the sport. Americans already like soccer. They watch the Premier League on Saturday mornings, Champions League during the week, Liga MX, international tournaments, and, every four years, the World Cup. MLS doesn’t have a soccer problem. It has an MLS problem.
MLS Has Spent Too Long Chasing Parity Instead of Becoming Must Watch Television
One of the league’s greatest strengths has also become one of its biggest weaknesses.
For years, MLS has prioritized parity above almost everything else. The salary cap, Designated Player rules, allocation money, roster mechanisms, and countless other regulations were designed to keep every club competitive. In many ways, they’ve worked. Nearly every fan enters a season believing his or her team has a chance.
The downside is that the league rarely produces dominant teams or star-studded rosters that casual fans feel compelled to watch.
Dynasties aren’t always bad for sports. Michael Jordan’s Bulls, the Patriots under Tom Brady, the Warriors with Stephen Curry, and even the Yankees during their peak years created villains that millions of people tuned in to either support or root against.
Sports thrive on emotion.
Sometimes that emotion is hate.
MLS has spent 30 years trying to eliminate too much of that tension in the name of competitive balance. It shouldn’t abandon parity altogether, but it should make it easier for ambitious owners to spend more, attract bigger stars, and build teams that become national attractions instead of simply local favorites.
Lionel Messi proved exactly how powerful one player can be. Inter Miami’s annual revenue exploded from roughly $56 million in 2022 to around $200 million just a few years later. Ticket prices skyrocketed. Merchandise sales surged. Television interest increased. Fans who had never watched an MLS match suddenly knew exactly when Inter Miami was playing.
That’s not an accident.
That’s star power.
Local Success Isn’t the Same as National Success
To MLS’s credit, the league has never been healthier.
More than 11.2 million fans attended regular season matches in 2025, the second highest total in league history. Average attendance climbed to nearly 22,000 per game, placing MLS among the world’s top soccer leagues in attendance. Many clubs regularly sell out their stadiums, and expansion franchises have consistently exceeded expectations.
Those are real accomplishments.
But attendance doesn’t automatically translate into national relevance.
A Timbers supporter watches Portland. A Sounders supporter watches Seattle. FC Cincinnati fans passionately support Cincinnati.
The NFL has something MLS still lacks.
Football fans don’t simply follow their own team. They’ll watch almost any NFL game because they care about the league itself.
MLS still feels fragmented. Casual fans rarely tune in unless their own club is playing or Lionel Messi is involved.
That’s the next hurdle.
Make MLS Impossible to Miss
The league deserves credit for simplifying its television strategy in 2026.
Instead of asking fans to purchase a separate MLS Season Pass subscription, every match is now included with a standard Apple TV subscription. That’s a major improvement and removes one barrier that frustrated casual viewers.
Even so, MLS still feels hidden.
The World Cup succeeded because nobody could escape it. Matches aired on major television networks. Highlights dominated social media. Sports talk shows debated lineups and controversial calls. Even people who couldn’t name five professional soccer clubs knew when the United States was playing.
MLS needs more of that visibility.
The league should aggressively expand free nationally televised matches, continue building marquee Sunday night broadcasts, and market rivalry games like major sporting events instead of simply another stop on a crowded regular season schedule.
If casual sports fans have to search for your product, many simply won’t.
Sell the Rivalries
Ask almost any soccer fan in the Pacific Northwest about Portland versus Seattle.
You’ll quickly discover one of the best rivalries in North American sports.
The atmosphere is electric. Supporters fill the stadium hours before kickoff. Giant tifos cover entire sections. Every tackle feels personal.
It’s incredible television.
Yet outside soccer circles, many sports fans barely know the rivalry exists.
That’s a marketing failure.
Sports leagues grow because fans become emotionally invested. Rivalries create that investment better than almost anything else.
MLS should be promoting Portland versus Seattle the same way the NFL promotes Packers versus Bears or college football promotes Michigan versus Ohio State.
The league already has outstanding rivalries.
It simply hasn’t marketed them aggressively enough.
Make Every Match Matter
Another issue is the structure of the season itself.
With 30 clubs, an unbalanced schedule, Leagues Cup interruptions, and an expanded playoff field, too many regular season matches feel interchangeable. When most teams remain in playoff contention deep into the season, individual games naturally lose urgency.
The regular season should matter more.
Reducing the number of playoff teams would immediately increase the importance of every point. Fans should feel the pressure of every match in July, not just the excitement of October.
Scarcity creates urgency.
Urgency creates television audiences.
The World Cup Opened the Door. MLS Has to Walk Through It.
This is the strongest position MLS has ever occupied.
The league has modern stadiums, committed ownership groups, thriving local fan bases, youth participation continues to grow across the United States, and soccer has never been more culturally relevant in America.
The infrastructure is no longer the issue.
The opportunity is.
The World Cup reminded millions of Americans how exciting soccer can be. But excitement fades quickly. Football season is approaching. The NFL will dominate headlines. College football will return. The NBA and NHL won’t be far behind.
MLS cannot assume those World Cup viewers will come back on their own.
It has to earn them.
That means investing in star players, simplifying the league’s rules, making marquee matches easier to find, promoting rivalries with far more intensity, and creating a regular season where every game carries real significance.
For decades, MLS has celebrated steady growth.
That isn’t enough anymore.
The World Cup opened a door that may not swing this wide again for another generation. If MLS capitalizes on this moment, it can finally establish itself alongside America’s major professional sports leagues.
If it doesn’t, we’ll be asking this same question again after the next World Cup.
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