When Major League Soccer commissioner Don Garber announced his departure, the league entered a pivotal transition. His two‑decade tenure transformed MLS from a modest 12‑team experiment into a 30‑team enterprise that now commands global attention.
Larry Berg, a partial owner of Los Angeles FC and longtime advocate for greater sporting ambition, is set to assume the top post on January 1, 2025. He inherits a league that has already built soccer‑specific venues, attracted marquee international stars and nurtured domestic talent, yet still wrestles with a perception problem among American sports fans.
Despite the World Cup final drawing the most‑watched non‑NFL broadcast since 1994, MLS remains eclipsed by the English Premier League, the UEFA Champions League and Mexico’s Liga MX in television ratings. The challenge for Berg is to make the product feel more authentic and competitively rigorous, moving beyond the novelty of expansion.
The upcoming shift to a fall‑to‑spring calendar, scheduled for the 2027‑28 season, will require a shortened sprint season in early 2025 as a bridge. Parallel to the schedule change, owners are near finalizing a new salary structure that promises simpler spending rules and greater autonomy for clubs.
A New Era for MLS
Berg’s vision aligns with the recent push by LAFC and other forward‑thinking franchises to relax financial constraints and pursue higher‑profile signings. Convincing the broader ownership group to adopt that mindset, however, will test his persuasive abilities and his capacity to translate ambition into concrete policy.
The success of MLS under Berg will hinge on his ability to rally owners around a shared sense of purpose, to modernize the league’s competitive framework and to embed the sport more deeply in the cultural fabric of the United States.