As is now tradition, my final piece of season preview coverage starts with a tip of the cap to the great Zach Lowe for the inspiration, courtesy of his Annual Tiers of the NBA opus.
What follows are not hard-and-fast Power Rankings, per se, but rather something a little looser in terms of talent level, cohesion, chemistry and all the et ceteras that make teams tick (or not).
These teams are mostly in the order I think they'll finish, but what really matters is the tier designation.
These are the teams I expect to win a trophy this year, be it Concacaf Champions Cup, Leagues Cup, MLS Cup, US Open Cup or the Supporters’ Shield. These guys have to add something to their cabinet or they’ll be disappointed.
Seventy-four points. The greatest player of all time and three of his besties. A deep and flexible roster. An improved backline. Young players growing into bigger roles. New players in town to do more than just plug holes.
This is the deepest-ever MLS team (at least on paper), with the most top-end talent. They have a guy who’s proven to be a match-winner in goal, can change shapes and formations, and have the ability to mix and match both the midfield and front line in ways that should keep them fresh even amid a jam-packed season.
My Worry: And yet I’m more than a little concerned this is just too damn high. Remember that 2023 St. Louis team we said was overperforming their underlying numbers to an unsustainable degree, and how they came crashing down the following season? Remember the 2022 Austin team that followed the same pattern in the ensuing two years?
Yeah, last year’s Herons overperformed their numbers by more. A lot more.
They won a lot of games, collected a lot of points, made a ton of highlights… and also played a lot of bad, gappy soccer. Everybody got run-outs against them. And look, preseason is preseason, and you’d be stupid to read too much into it, but those structural issues from last year? Well, they sure don’t look like they’re fixed.
A single defender, stranded to defend a 2v1 in the open field, eh? Glad to see last year’s tactical identity carried over under new head coach Javier Mascherano!
It should be unsustainable. And yet I’m still picking them to win the Supporters' Shield and MLS Cup anyway. I can’t bring myself to pick against Lionel Messi, no matter what the underlying numbers say.
But they are SCREAMING at me that this team is going to regress.
First-Choice XI
4-3-3: Callender; Alba, Martínez, Avilés, Luján; Bright, Busquets, Redondo; Allende, Suárez, Messi
If not for this year’s Miami team, this year’s Sounders side would be the deepest in MLS history (that holds true even after trading Josh Atencio, since they’re surely about to go out and bring in a U22 central midfielder to take up that spot, and also have an extra $1.3 million in GAM to throw at other potential holes).
Like Miami, they should be able to flex between a 4-2-3-1, a 3-4-2-1, a 4-4-2 and a 3-5-2. Like Miami, they’ve got young players growing into bigger roles, a match-winner in goal, and new arrivals who should do more than just plug some gaps. That decade-long commitment to building their academy system and pipeline to the first team has paid off in every conceivable way. So this team’s loaded.
My Worry: The question is whether they have big-game match-winners up top. Can Jesús Ferreira hit another level? Can Pedro de la Vega be that guy after an extremely promising preseason? Is Jordan Morris going to bang in 20+ goals?
All they need is one “yes” from that bunch, because you know they’ll have a top-three defense. And look, this team is so deep and balanced and devoid of weak links that they could win a trophy even if none of those three guys level up. But it’d be a hell of a lot easier if one of them did.
First-Choice XI
3-4-2-1: Frei; Nouhou, Ragen, Yeimar; Arriola, C. Roldan, Vargas, A. Roldan; Ferreira, de la Vega; Morris
Cincy don’t have the depth or flexibility of the two teams above them here, but they’ve shown to be an elite defensive team over the past few years, and their newly revamped attack – built around club-record signing Kévin Denkey and an MVP candidate in Evander, as well as holdover Luca Orellano – has the high-end pieces to hang four on anybody. Denkey and Evander are new, and Orellano held out for a few brief minutes this winter, so it might take a little bit of time at the start of the season. But honestly, these pieces fit pretty well, and Pat Noonan’s game model is intuitive. So I don’t expect an extended settling-in period; it’ll all probably work from the jump.
That elite defense held together last year even when 2023 Defender of the Year Matt Miazga suffered a midseason knee injury (PCL and meniscus) that ended his 2024, but just barely. Miazga is juuuust about back (they’ve slow-played his return this preseason) and with him should come something close to the league’s best overall group. That, in turn, will help Pavel Bucha and Obinna Nwobodo clean it up in central midfield, which in turn will help Evander and the attack. It’s a virtuous cycle with few discernable flaws.
My Worry: The one obvious one, though, is that lack of depth. Cincy have acquired and bid farewell to the late Marco Angulo and Malik Pinto in central midfield the past couple of years, and have barely played young Stiven Jimenez. Veteran Tah Brian Anunga is here now, but he’s just functional, not a game-changer. And for the best teams, even off the bench you need to have game-changers in the engine room.
Given that there’s probably at least one U22 Initiative central midfielder on the way (they have two U22 slots open), Noonan’s going to have to be a little more willing to play the kids than he has been the past couple of years. Doing that would keep the starters fresh for the stretch run and the Audi MLS Cup Playoffs, and perhaps give this team a different tactical club to play every once in a while.
First-Choice XI
3-4-1-2: Celentano; Hadebe, Miazga, Robinson; Engel, Bucha, Nwobodo, Yedlin; Evander; Denkey, Orellano
The Black & Gold mostly discarded their other tactical clubs this offseason – they were a very good 4-3-3 possession team!! – to go pure 5-2-3 transition. All of their moves have been targeted towards that.
And look, when they play that way they are really, really excellent. There’s a reason they’ve won three trophies since Steve Cherundolo arrived in 2022 and come close to so many more. Denis Bouanga is maybe the best open-field attacker in league history, so why not lean into a blueprint that gets him into the open field as often as possible? In a lot of ways, it’s the smartest thing to do.
The hope, then, is Olivier Giroud will settle in and be productive in his second season, David Martínez will expand upon his per-90 greatness, and the veterans in central midfield, defense, goal and at wingback will absorb, win the ball and get that front line (which will also probably include Turkish international winger Cengiz Ünder, who’s likely to be a starter) off to the races.
My Worry: Most teams will simply have no chance of stopping their Plan A. The question for LAFC is, what happens when they run up against a team that does?
First-Choice XI
5-2-3: Lloris; Hollingshead, Long, Tafari, Marlon, Palencia; Delgado, Tillman; Bouanga, Giroud, Ünder
These teams have the pieces – or in the Galaxy’s case, will have the pieces once they get healthy – and the foundation to go out there and win something. If they do so, nobody should be surprised by it. If they don’t manage to win, nobody should be too shocked.
But if they’re outright bad? Then yeah, that’d be shocking.
Everybody on the Galaxy has been clear this preseason that they’ll have to change how they play without Riqui Puig, who’s expected to be out until at least August as he recovers from a torn ACL. And look, that has obvious downsides – Puig’s one of the best passers of the ball in the entire world.
The silver lining, though, is it’ll be a little bit easier to mitigate the risk with a more structured 4-2-3-1 out there, with Marco Reus (or Diego Fagúndez when Reus needs a rest) playing as a more traditional No. 10 than Riqui ever has. This front office has made a ton of good moves to solidify that central midfield and defense, and just be hard to play against.
Do that and rely upon the high-end attacking talent to go out and win the game. It’s a good formula.
My Worry: They go into the season missing two of their DPs, as Joseph Paintsil could be out until April. Reus, meanwhile, is 35 and is going to be asked to carry a big workload. And with the departures of Mark Delgado and Gastón Brugman, did they lose too much central midfield ball progression?
I’m less worried about Dejan Joveljić’s departure, but that’s not nothing, either. It’s a lot of change for a team that collected 64 points and a trophy last year.
First-Choice XI
4-2-3-1: McCarthy; Nelson, Garcés, Yoshida, Yamane; Sanabria, Cerrillo; Fagúndez, Reus, Pec; Ramírez
Did you know the Crew had a higher PPG in the regular season without Cucho last year than with him? Do you remember that they outplayed Tigres in the Concacaf Champions Cup without him?
If there’s one thing we should all have learned by now, after four years of watching Wilfried Nancy as a manager in this league, it’s that he won't throw in the towel just because he doesn’t have his ideal squad out there. Instead, he'll squeeze more out of fringe rotation players than anyone ever thought they could give.
His tactical philosophy has proved resilient, the vast majority of the squad is back, and $20 million worth of help is likely on the way.
My Worry: Cucho was one of the best big-game players in MLS history, and Christian Ramírez wasn’t too bad himself. That’s like half the team’s total goals and a huge chunk of their attacking chemistry. Even if that $20 million of help gets here soon, it’s a lot to ask for immediate integration (on both sides of the ball – Cucho’s defensive work in shaping opposition distribution patterns was underrated!).
As I said above, Nancy’s blueprint has proved resilient (and beautiful; this will still be my favorite team to watch). But it’s also very high risk, and a single mistake can start a failure cascade. If more of those mistakes are happening as they integrate new pieces, it’ll be a tough first couple of months.
First-Choice XI
3-4-2-1: Schulte; Amundsen, Camacho, Moreira; Arfsten, Nagbe, Zawadzki, Farsi; Rossi, Chambost; Russell-Rowe
The Loons very cleverly made their big 2025 additions in the middle of 2024 and rode their excellent summer transfer window into the playoffs. That produced a memorable Round One series win over RSL (never go against Dayne St. Clair in a PK shootout) and a palpable sense of optimism amongst Minnesota fans heading into the season.
The biggest reason for that optimism is the attack, led by Kelvin Yeboah up top and ably supported by two attacking wingbacks (Joseph Rosales playmaking on the left, Bongi Hlongwane finishing from the right) and two No. 10s (Robin Lod and Gass Theorem candidate Joaquín Pereyra). Add Tani Oluwaseyi to a system that emphasizes generating transition opportunities, and there’s a lot to like.
My Worry: Have they done enough to strengthen the central midfield and defense? To paraphrase The Athletic’s Jeff Rueter: they’re set up well against teams that don’t have strong possession through the middle. But against teams who can play like that – like the Sounders and the Galaxy – things tended to get ugly.
Also, it’s worth noting Tani’s been starting alongside Yeboah in preseason, with Pereyra as a true 10 and Lod coming off the bench. I’m not sure if that’s a temporary thing or not. And I’m just going to mention Hassani Dotson’s trade request and offer no comment.
First-Choice XI
3-4-2-1: St. Clair; Díaz, Boxall, Harvey; Rosales, Trapp, Dotson, Hlongwane; Pereyra, Lod; Yeboah
For the fifth consecutive year, I’m drinking the Five Stripes’ Kool-Aid. They went out and again broke the league transfer record, spending more than $20 million on center forward Emmanuel Latte Lath. They also spent about half that to bring back old friend Miguel Almirón and got another DP – veteran Mateusz Klich – from D.C. United while absorbing just $300k of his salary (I still don’t understand this from D.C.’s perspective).
This is a very, very talented front six, and should have the ability to shift between a 4-2-3-1 and a 3-4-1-2. And while things look a little bit thin in some spots right now, they’ve still got two open U22 slots, Chris Henderson doing the talent ID and an owner who’s willing to spend. So reinforcements will be coming.
My Worry: There’s no real elite, ball-winning/transition-stopping d-mid on the roster for one, and for two, that backline is iffy – especially compared to the ones in the tier above. Add in the fact that Brad Guzan (who, to be clear, was very good last year) is into his 40s, and things feel a liiiittle bit flimsy in a spot where the best teams are traditionally strong as hell.
Oh, and I’m not panicking about this, but No. 10 Alexey Miranchuk was pretty meh last season. I’ll chalk it up to arriving mid-year amid a roster and philosophical overhaul, but if it’s late March and he’s still struggling…
First-Choice XI
4-2-3-1: Guzan; Amador, Williams, Gregersen, Lennon; Slisz, Klich; Lobjanidze, Miranchuk, Almirón; Latte Lath
The Red Bulls have somehow had an offseason that’s been very encouraging (they’ve brought in both starters and depth along the backline, and a veteran DP No. 9) and frustrating (there’s still an open DP slot and a real appetite in the fanbase for a blockbuster move of the sort that Miami, Atlanta and both LA teams tend to make).
Still, whether that move comes or not, the Red Bulls will:
- Impose their playing style upon 90% of the teams they come up against.
- Have one of the best defenses in the league because of that.
- Win a lot of games as long as Emil Forsberg is on the field.
That months-long absence Forsberg suffered last year (during which RBNY went straight into the toilet) was a blessing in disguise in some ways, as it meant he was fresh for the final few games of the season and then for the entirety of the playoffs. Which, of course, ended with the club’s second-ever MLS Cup appearance.
The pieces are here to make another push like that if things break right.
My Worry: They didn’t really have any answers without Forsberg last year, so riddle me this: If he plays enough during the regular season to propel RBNY up the standings, does he have any gas in the tank for the playoffs? Conversely, if he misses a bunch of regular-season time and stays fresh for October and November, how much do the Red Bulls suffer in a much tougher East this year?
Then there’s the other DP, newly arrived Eric-Maxim Choupo-Moting. He’s been awesome in preseason, but he’s played 2,000+ regular-season minutes just once in the past decade.
What I’m saying is a lot rests on the health of a pair of mid-30s guys. I’d feel more confident if they went big on their final DP slot. We’ve been saying that for a decade, but that doesn’t mean it’s not worth saying again.
First-Choice XI
4-2-2-2: Coronel; Morales, Hack, S. Nealis, D. Nealis; Edelman, Carballo; Forsberg, Harper; Choupo-Moting, Morgan
The Crown didn’t do as much as I’d expected this winter, and honestly, I’m not sure that’s a bad thing. They were a 51-point team last year that got a lot of value out of young players on the way up, and heading into 2025 they’ve bet on those young players to improve (Patrick Agyemang is the starting No. 9; Liel Abada is probably the starting right winger; there is no doubt about who the central defensive pairing is now) while reinforcing them with a DP veteran who’s tailor-made for Dean Smith’s system.
That veteran is Wilfried Zaha, the 32-year-old winger who’s been a very productive player in very good leagues for the past dozen years. He won’t likely change anything about Charlotte’s tactical approach; he should just do what previous left wingers on the team have done with higher proficiency.
It’s a good bet.
My Worry: You can counter your way to 55 or even 60 points, but low-possession teams haven’t won many trophies in this league over the past dozen years unless they are also relentlessly high-pressing teams, which Charlotte are not.
Which is to say there needs to be some sort of Plan B this year. That becomes an absolutely urgent, five-alarm-fire of a need if soon-to-be 35-year-old Ashley Westwood slips at all.
First-Choice XI
4-3-3: Kahlina; Ream, Privett, Malanda, Byrne; Bronico, Westwood, Diani; Zaha, Agyemang, Abada
You could talk me into anything from 60 points and a deep playoff run to 40 points and a complete rebuild next winter for everyone here.
For what it’s worth, the parity of MLS is such that a buddy of mine suggested every single team belongs in this category. It’s hard to argue that point.
The Lions only made a couple of moves this winter, but they were big ones: Facu Torres got sold to Palmeiras for a reported club-record $14 million and replaced, like-for-like, by Croatian right winger Marco Pašalić. And Eduard Atuesta is in from that same Palmeiras side to start in Oscar Pareja’s double pivot alongside César Araújo, which is very much not a like-for-like since Atuesta is a methodical orchestrator/creator, while the injured starter he’s replacing, Wilder Cartagena, was a box-to-box destroyer.
Pašalić's goalscoring record can’t match Torres’s, but he seems a little more direct, which I think makes sense for this team. That’s especially true with Ramiro Enrique seemingly the first-choice No. 9 (a role he earned last year and deserves to carry into this season, and same with Martín Ojeda at the 10).
On balance, I actually think this makes Orlando stronger because:
- Atuesta should make them more dynamic with the ball.
- They have more than enough defense around him to make up for his against-the-ball shortcomings relative to Cartagena’s.
My Worry: That second part may not be true, largely because the center-back pairing is still questionable at best. Is Rodrigo Schlegel really a starting CB for a contender in 2025? Is David Brekalo going to have a Gass Theorem year? Is Thomas Williams ready for minutes? Does Robin Jansson have one more Best XI-caliber year in him as he hits his mid-30s?
There are depth issues in central midfield – exacerbated now following the conscious uncoupling with Nico Lodeiro – winger, and both fullback slots. Luis Muriel was… not great, and may not play much this season. Very bad use of a DP slot! Pedro Gallese has always been up and down.
And then there’s how Facu was their main guy. Thirty-four goals across all competitions over the past two years is a lot, and there’s no guarantee they’ve done enough to make up for it.
First-Choice XI
4-2-3-1: Gallese; Santos, Jansson, Schlegel, Thorhallsson; Atuesta, Araújo; Angulo, Ojeda, Pašalić; Enrique
They made the move they needed last weekend in acquiring Josh Atencio, the rangy, transition-stopping, ball-winning d-mid that they so badly required (and they so clearly lacked in their playoff beatdown against the Galaxy last season).
He slots straight into an XI that's mostly back – along with a few other depth pieces via the academy, SuperDraft, and some wheeling-and-dealing from the front office – after registering 50 points and a third-place finish in Leagues Cup last year. It was, by basically every measure, a very successful first season under head coach Chris Armas with room to grow.
An underrated part of this roster comes from the flexibility of their two best players, Cole Bassett and Djordje Mihailovic. Bassett can play either as an 8 or a pressing 10; Djordje can play either as a more traditional 10 or a playmaking winger. That gives Armas the ability to mix and match his personnel with tactical considerations in mind, all without ever changing the formation, structure or principles of play.
My Worry: Of their final 16 games against MLS teams last year (across all competitions), they won just four of them. That coincided almost exactly with the sale of Moïse Bombito, a human eraser of a center back. Chidozie Awaziem – a very good MLS center back – is there now as Bombito’s replacement, and Atencio’s defensive nous at d-mid should lead to fewer emergency defense moments this season.
But man, it got ugly and stayed ugly without the Canadian international last year.
I’m also mildly concerned about the goalscoring (is Rafa Navarro legit?), but not in comparison to the potential defensive (and goalkeeping) issues.
First-Choice XI
4-2-3-1: Steffen; Vines, Awaziem, Maxsø, Cannon; Ronan, Atencio; Mihailovic, Bassett, Cabral; Navarro
St. Louis went hard last summer, bringing in five new starters – and an interim coach – to rebuild a team whose 2023 success was a house of cards. They’ve continued the rebuild into this offseason, bringing in at least two more new starters and a new, permanent head coach in Olof Mellberg. In a lot of ways, it feels like a second crack at an expansion season.
The good news is they’ve got proof of concept with their best players. Marcel Hartel and Cedric Teuchert were both awesome upon arrival last summer, and Eduard Löwen has been good to very good since Day 1. Simon Becher was a pleasant surprise, and Roman Bürki has strung together two excellent seasons in goal.
They’ve got talent just about everywhere, and where they don’t have talent they’ve at least got potential. I like this roster.
My Worry: The defense remains questionable, and Mellberg’s track record as a manager is underwhelming. That might not mean much – Wilfried Nancy’s track record as a manager before getting his first MLS gig was non-existent – but it’s worth noting, especially as he changes the shape from the 4-2-3-1 that worked so well under interim John Hackworth to the 3-4-2-1 he’s preferred in his 200-ish games in charge of various clubs in Scandinavia.
So… I don’t know. What if the stuff that worked last year was a product of Hackworth’s system? Will Mellberg change? What if Jannes Horn and Timo Baumgartl don’t actually shore up the defense? What if Becher’s goalscoring was a mirage, and João Klauss is just the guy he’s been the past 18 months?
I’m on the more optimistic side about this team, but there’s reason for caution.
First-Choice XI
3-4-2-1: Bürki; Horn, Baumgartl, Kessler; Wallem, Durkin, Löwen, Totland; Hartel, Teuchert; Klauss
Ok yeah, I’m officially buying it. The one thing you can count on Gregg Berhalter to do no matter where he goes, club or country, is to build out a structure and fix the defense. And what we’ve seen so far in preseason – I know, I’m an idiot to over-index on preseason form or results – suggests he’s doing the same for the Fire. This comes in conjunction with the team adding five new starters (maybe six if Sam Rogers beats out Carlos Terán to partner Jack Elliott), which should gas up everything about how they operate.
And, well, that’s the other thing: with Berhalter in charge, you can bet your life that there will be a very clear “how they operate.” You can already hear players talking about it, with homegrown attacker Brian Gutiérrez discussing at length the team’s structure and identity whenever he gets a chance, and other Fire players echoing the same sentiment.
The final thing to remember: Gyasi Zardes, Ola Kamara and Kei Kamara are all traditional No. 9s who had their best seasons under Berhalter. Hugo Cuypers is that same type of No. 9, and in Gutiérrez, Jonathan Bamba and Philip Zinckernagel, he’s got attackers around him who know how to provide the final ball.
My Worry: It’s the Fire. It’s almost impossible to think things will work out for the best. This team has been cursed for the past 15 years, as have the city’s entire contingent of pro sports teams since the Cubbies broke their curse in 2016 (shoutout 2021 Chicago Sky tho).
Do I believe in sports curses? No. Well, maybe. I don’t know. Ask me again in October.
First-Choice XI
4-2-3-1: Brady; Gutman, Elliott, Terán, Barroso; Acosta, Kouamé; Bamba, Gutiérrez, Zinckernagel; Cuypers
Talent is the most important ingredient in the stew of success, and Austin have spent a lot of money to increase their talent.
It started last summer with about $7 million on right winger Osman Bukari, then continued into this winter with nearly $25 million combined spent on left winger Myrto Uzuni and center forward Brandon Vazquez. Add in some other less, but still not negligible acquisitions – $3 million on Nicolás Dubersarsky, about $1.5 million on Oleksandr Svatok – and a host of free agent signings, and this should be the most talented Austin roster of the club’s brief existence.
In fact, they’ve probably got enough talent to go out and brute force some wins by… having more talent. They should be particularly good in both boxes.
My Worry: I’m not 100% convinced they’ll be good between both boxes. I like the idea of their midfield balance, but Ilie Sánchez is in his mid-30s, Dubersarsky and Besard Sabovic are unproven in MLS, and Dani Pereira’s been a free 8 in theory, not in practice. Plus none of these guys is a true chance creator, which puts a lot of pressure on that front line.
I’ve also got big questions about the entire defense, all of whom were around last year when Austin’s xG allowed was scraping the bottom of the barrel (among West teams, only the Quakes were worse).
New head coach Nico Estévez has a ton of toys to play with, but he’s got a lot to fix, too.
First-Choice XI
4-3-3: Stuver; Biro, Hines-Ike, Svatok, Desler; Sabovic, Ilie, Pereira; Uzuni, Vazquez, Bukari
NYCFC have basically $15 million worth of talent, stretching from the backline to the front, that previous head coach Nick Cushing couldn’t (or wouldn’t) develop last year, even when they were dying for a winger* who could add some off-ball punch and secondary scoring.
\ Folks around the club tell me Agustín Ojeda’s been immense this preseason. He’s my prediction for 2025 Young Player of the Year.*
New head coach Pascal Jansen should be able to do more with that. And they’ve got a returning, ace No. 9 whose goal tally did not seem fluky (99th percentile in non-penalty goals; 96th percentile in non-penalty xG), very good fullbacks, an elite No. 8 who’s a one-man field-tilt machine, center back depth and one of the favorites to win Goalkeeper of the Year.
Also, they could have two open DP slots.
My Worry: That's because they're reportedly selling DP No. 10, Santi Rodríguez, who was their best and most productive player last year. It was a Godfather offer, to be fair – a reported $17 million from Botafogo. You’ve got to take that.
But between that and the loan (and subsequent injury) of starting d-mid James Sands, they suddenly have two massive question marks in central midfield. And given the CFG tactical blueprint, central midfield is where a lot of games are won or lost.
So they’ve got work to do, but as always, NYCFC are a black box. Nobody has any idea of whether that work is just getting started, or about to be completed, or not even on the radar.
Are they waiting for summer to bring in Kevin De Bruyne? That’d be cool! Could they be a home for former academy prodigy Gio Reyna, who needs to get playing time somewhere? Hell yeah! Is there another version of Santi on the way? That’d be dope. Or is it the Maxi (Moralez) and Maxi (Carrizo) show at the No. 10? I’d be into that, but I don’t think that’s how titles are won.
So yeah, black box. No idea what the real plan is.
First-Choice XI
4-2-3-1: Freese; O’Toole, Tanasijević, Martins, Gray; Parks, Haak; Ojeda, Moralez, Wolf; Martínez
A few weeks ago, it looked like Dallas were headed toward Wooden Spoon contention. They since upgraded right back, one of their center back spots, the No. 10 and, by virtue of upgrading that No. 10 spot, the No. 8 (since Patrickson Delgado can now play there full time). They’ve got a new No. 6 as well, who should probably help them with some of their defensive issues, and the new head coach is the guy who helped the most talented winger on the roster have his breakout season as a pro in the Dallas pipeline four years back.
They’ve still got a guy who should be one of the best No. 9s in the league, plus one of the better goalkeepers in the league. And while there are a lot of moving parts here – like, A LOT a lot – that new head coach, Eric Quill, has gotten rave reviews at his previous two stops for playing an intuitive formation and tactical system that puts players in their best spots and lets them get to work. So I’m thinking the learning curve won’t be too steep.
My Worry: These pieces fit in theory, but in practice, we just don’t know. Is Ramiro (the new d-mid) gonna be any good? What about any of the new center backs? Can any of the wingers on the roster be starting-caliber? Will they get the happy, productive Lucho, or the Mr. Hyde version?
I’m bullish, but the bottom could drop out here real quick, especially if they can’t defend.
First-Choice XI
4-2-3-1: Paes; Farfan, Abubakar, Urhoghide, Moore; Ramiro, Delgado; Julio, Acosta, Kamungo; Musa
Just a gut-punch of an offseason for ‘Caps fans, who had to watch as the most successful head coach in the team’s MLS history was dismissed and then as the team was put up for sale, followed by the third DP – Stuart Armstrong clearly elevated the side in the playoffs, and was a big part of them playing the best ball they’d played since their arrival in the league – got homesick and headed back to the UK.
Still, this group’s got an excellent one-two attacking punch in Brian White and Ryan Gauld, an excellent d-mid, a very good backline, and a history of recent success. They’ve won three straight Canadian Championships and made the playoffs three of the past four seasons, and basically everyone relevant is in their prime*.
\ Kind of a monkey’s paw situation, though, as they really could’ve used another year of Armstrong and Fafà Picault.*
That includes Ecuadorian orchestrator Pedro Vite and Canadian box-to-box ball-winner Ali Ahmed. If those two guys level up, then the whole team will follow.
My Worry: Their big offseason acquisitions are two attackers (Jayden Nelson and Emmanuel Sabbi) who might not raise their ceiling. There's no proper backup for Gauld, while White’s backup is Daniel Ríos, who’s been… okay.
What I’m saying is Gauld and White have been remarkably healthy over the past few years, and if either misses any time – or if White slumps like he did in 2022 – that’s all, folks.
They’re on a knife’s edge here. That’s not a great place to be when three of the four teams just behind them in last year’s standings seem to have gotten better.
First-Choice XI
4-3-2-1: Takaoka; Adekugbe, Blackmon, Veselinović, Laborda; Ahmed, Cubas, Vite; Sabbi, Gauld; White
The Timbers return two-thirds of the most productive trio of DPs in the league last year. And while the one guy they parted with (Evander) was the best of them, it’s not like they didn’t replace him, as they went out and spent a good chunk of their winnings on his direct replacement, Portuguese midfielder David Da Costa.
Da Costa’s probably not going to be the goalscorer Evander was, but the Timbers tend to get plenty of that from other spots on the field, so it’s not likely to hurt them too much. Where Da Costa looks superior to Evander is on the defensive side of the ball, where his effort is much more reliable* and his impact has been much more sustained throughout his young-ish career. He can help the point-of-attack defense for a team that badly needed it last year.
\ Evander can be an awesome defensive presence when he chooses to be, but he only chooses to be about once a month.*
There’s also a bit more depth – Joao Ortiz and Jimer Fory might both start but even if they don’t, they’ll contribute; Kevin Kelsy is likely going to get a lot of minutes at the 9 even if Felipe Mora holds the job down for one more year – and, hopefully, a return to form from the goalkeepers.
My Worry: However you want to finesse it, this team was carried by its DPs last year. Of that group, one’s gone, one’s injured and one’s old. Fory and Ortiz might be starters, but neither’s résumé exactly screams “clear upgrade.” Kelsy is very, very toolsy, and is the type of young No. 9 to take a flier on, but he was not an effective soccer player for Cincy in 2024.
So do they have the pieces to survive if their DP production takes a 15% hit? Boy, I dunno.
Head coach Phil Neville has had to experiment with lineups and formations throughout preseason. I’m putting a 4-2-3-1 as their default below, but don’t be shocked if it’s a 3-5-2 until Jonathan Rodríguez is back.
First-Choice XI
4-2-3-1: Crépeau; Fory, Miller, Zuparic, Mosquera; Chara, Ayala; Rodríguez, Da Costa, Moreno; Mora
The hope is Walker Zimmerman stays healthy and returns to his best, and Hany Mukhtar stays healthy and returns to his best. At the same time, Sam Surridge – the third DP – finally starts looking like a 15-goal scorer, Gastón Brugman becomes circa 2022 Dax McCarty, and new winger Ahmed Qasem can add a third attacking heat this team’s never had.
Will Edvard Tagseth, another new signing, add some ball progression from central midfield? I think that’s what he was brought in for, but through most of preseason he was actually playing as a sort of right midfielder who’d tuck inside to let new right back Andy Najar overlap.
For the past five years, this team’s competence (and occasional excellence) was based upon their ability to dominate in both boxes. In theory, they have the pieces to be that team again.
My Worry: For one, they sure weren’t that team last year, and for two we’ve already seen head coach B.J. Callaghan scrap some of his plans. Word initially was that he wanted to go with a 4-3-3, but after a couple weeks of preseason went back to the type of counterattacking 4-4-2 (or 4-4-1-1 with Hany in a free role) that’s been this team’s primary alignment and tactical gameplan since their inception.
So if there’s improvement, it’ll have to come from personnel. But most of Nashville’s key players are on the wrong side of 30 – Zimmerman, both fullbacks, Brugman, goalkeeper Joe Willis, and backup No. 9 Teal Bunbury. Hell, even Hany will be blowing out 30 candles by the end of next month.
Maybe Qasem or Tagseth can help, but when’s the last time Nashville really killed it with a new signing from overseas? You’d have to go all the way back to Hany.
First-Choice XI
4-4-1-1: Willis; Lovitz, Maher, Zimmerman, Najar; Muyl, Brugman, Yazbek, Tagseth; Mukhtar; Surridge
I want to believe. Diego Luna and Emeka Eneli are two of my favorite players in the league, and Diogo Gonçalves has the profile of a guy who could succeed here at a high level. I like the fullbacks (who I hear will be wingbacks this season with a formation change in store) and the center backs have been pretty good the past few years.
They always empty the tanks for head coach Pablo Mastroeni. Playing hard is a non-negotiable, and we’ve got a lot of data that says if you’re playing hard, the floor is 40 points. And so they make the playoffs every single year, and over the past few years, that’s included some pretty memorable performances and upsets.
They develop their young players. They probably upgraded in goal. They are used to people like me saying “this team’s in trouble” and then going out and collecting 50+ points.
My Worry: This team’s in trouble. Three of the four best attackers – Chicho Arango, Andrés Gómez and Matt Crooks – from last year’s record-setting team are gone, and they haven’t really been replaced. Gonçalves is supposed to be a big part of that answer, as is young winger (or maybe super-attacking wingback as they shift to a 3-4-2-1) Dominik Marczuk, but neither of those guys were great last year. Or even good.
Luna was, but there’s a difference between being the third name on the opposing scouting report and the first. It’s a jump. And who’s the starting No. 9? And if they move to three center backs, is 20-year-old Kobi Henry ready for that lift?
They’re betting on Mastroeni’s ability to develop five different players while implementing a new formation and adjusting the tactical approach. That’s a lot!
First-Choice XI
3-4-2-1: Cabral; Vera, Henry, Glad; Katranis, Ojeda, Eneli, Marczuk; Luna, Gonçalves; Ajago
Year 2 under Laurent Courtois should, in theory, be better. He’s got a core of guys who understand and have some comfort in his system, and there have been a few targeted additions – center back, center forward – of guys who should absolutely help.
There is also the fact that this team did well to put high-upside young players into spots where they could succeed last year. Caden Clark coming in from the left as a second forward to score bangers? Check. Jahkeele Marshall-Rutty going endline-to-endline attacking space? Check. Nathan Saliba running the show from central midfield? Check. George Campbell carrying the ball off that backline? Check.
This team ended up being a lot of fun. It didn’t look as much like the Crew as I’d hoped (remember, Courtois was the highly successful coach of Crew 2 before he came to Montréal), but some of the seeds they’d planted sprouted, and they got themselves a postseason appearance to show for it.
My Worry: Even when things were going well last year it was a lot of snatched-victory-from-the-jaws-of-defeat type of stuff, aided in large part by a Josef Martínez (now in San Jose) stretch-run heater.
Can they actually make Courtois’ vision of flowing, ball-dominant, positional play real? I think they’ve got the center backs for it, but it takes more than talent. There’s a serious level of drilling, discipline and tactical rigidity required (that’s the paradox of attractive, free-flowing soccer) to make it work, and without that, you get a kind of failure cascade thing happening (which I’m now realizing I mentioned in the Crew’s blurb, too; at least I’m consistent!).
Plus we’ve seen Clark, Marshall-Rutty and even Giacomo Vrioni be productive in spurts before, and then go dormant for months (or in Clark’s case, entire seasons). I’m really looking forward to watching this team because it’s a lot of “in theory, this is going to work” and I love that.
But folks, the floor is very low here. And it’s much more likely they touch that than their perceived ceiling.
First-Choice XI
3-4-2-1: Sirois; Neal, Waterman, Campbell; Pearce, Saliba, Piette, Marshall-Rutty; Clark, Duke; Vrioni
These are teams that, I think, have a real vision for what they want to be, and I’d honestly bet on taking some real steps to get there. But for one reason or another, it’s hard to imagine them climbing all the way toward 50 points (or in Houston’s case, staying there).
Man, I’m nervous about having Philly this low. Tai Baribo, Dániel Gazdag and Mikael Uhre scored 48 goals between the three of them last year (all comps). All are back, and reinforcements are here with a new club-record signing: Uruguayan striker Bruno Damiani.
Quinn Sullivan was awesome. The fullbacks were good. Jakob Glesnes will probably be better after a miserable year.
I’m still shocked that Ernst Tanner parted ways with Jim Curtin, who will surely have his pick of jobs this summer. But Bradley Carnell has had some success in this league, and he and Tanner seem aligned on getting Philly back to the all-out, crash-bang Energy Drink Soccer style that has proved durable.
My Worry: Are any of the d-mids starting caliber? We don’t know yet, and even if they are, it’s a good bet they’ll be a level or three lower than José Martínez was. Same with the center backs vying to take Jack Elliott’s minutes and partner Glesnes.
Andre Blake is in his mid-30s and has become a bit injury-prone over the past few seasons – he missed around 2,000 minutes last year, and he struggled BADLY with his distribution.
For all the goals this team scored when they were really cooking, it’s that spine from Blake to the center backs to Martínez that was really the foundation of all of it. They were a top-three team in the league at each spot, and now they’re top-three at none. Arguably not even top 10.
Tanner needs to have crushed it with these winter signings.
First-Choice XI
4-4-2 diamond: Blake; Wagner, Glavinovich, Glesnes, Mbaizo; Jean Jacques; Lukic, Gazdag, Q. Sullivan; Baribo, Uhre
I spent all offseason preaching how robust the Dynamo’s game model had been the past two years, how impressive they’d been without Héctor Herrera or Coco Carrasquilla, how Jack McGlynn is a perfect fit for what they need in central midfield, how it’s likely Ezequiel Ponce will take a step forward, and how a new DP No. 10 will juice the whole thing.
I still believe a lot of that. Houston have the pieces to be a fun and pretty good team. In theory. Also, Ben Olsen’s done some great work over the past few years getting both development and buy-in. There’s a foundation.
My Worry: There simply isn’t enough talent. It’s not just Coco and HH who are gone; it’s starting goalkeeper Steve Clark, and soon starting center back Micael will be out the door as well. It’s on a club-record fee to Brazilian giants Palmeiras – the type of deal the Dynamo have to make, especially given their GAM situation – but he was awesome last year, just a huge part of their success.
Valuable depth pieces like Latif Blessing and Brad Smith are gone, too. Sebas Ferreira was a bust of a DP, but he got a goalscoring jag in the middle of last year that won this team points. There is no guy like that on the current roster behind Ponce. What if he struggles? There were some worrying moments last year:
Where’s that DP No. 10? Nico Lodeiro should help some, but he's 35 years old with his best days long past. Reinforcements in this window have been minimal. I’m sure some are coming, but the clock’s ticking.
First-Choice XI
4-2-3-1: Tarbell; Escobar, Steres, Sviatchenko, Dorsey; Artur, McGlynn; Ibrahim, Bassi, Kowalczyk; Ponce
The Revs, on the other hand, have made all the moves this offseason. I count at least four new starters from this window, which brings it up to eight (maybe nine, depending upon what happens at right back) new starters added over the past 12 months. This is a different team than the one that began 2024 with a 2W-10L-1D faceplant.
How’s it going to look? Well, here is an excellent and exhaustive breakdown from Seth at The Blazing Musket: CLICK!
Everything I read there, and the clips to back it up, makes sense. Nothing about the game plan that head coach Caleb Porter outlined seems overly complicated or counter-intuitive.
My Worry: The Revs were a rolling disaster last year, with the worst expected goals differential in the league. Are all eight of the new(ish) starters going to hit? What happens if one of the center backs doesn’t? How many injuries can they survive? They’re especially thin behind Carles Gil, which is a worry as he’s now solidly into his 30s and hasn’t been the most durable guy in the world.
The other thing is player development. The Revs have done that well this decade, and need to continue doing it well this year – Noel Buck bounce-back season? Peyton Miller breakout? – if they’re going to reach their potential. But player development has never really been Porter’s strong suit.
I’m impressed by the work the front office did in completely remaking this roster over the past two windows. But man, there are a lot of variables at play here, and a head coach who’s made the playoffs just once in his last five full seasons in charge.
First-Choice XI
4-2-3-1: Ivačič; Sands, Fofana, Ceballos, Bye; Yueill, Yusuf; Ganago, Gil, Langoni; Campana
Can Bruce do it one last time? The most successful head coach in MLS history is surely writing his final chapter over the next few years in San Jose, a team that badly needs someone to completely overhaul the club culture. And that’s been Bruce’s M.O. since he was coaching at the University of Virginia: get everyone in the org aligned and on the same page, put your best players in spots where they can lead the team, and roll it on out.
It worked in D.C., LA and New England. The Quakes are betting it’ll work there, too.
And so Bruce has done a very Bruce thing: He brought over five veterans (four of whom are likely to be starters) from his previous stop in Foxborough. None of these guys – Dave Romney and Nick Lima on the backline, Mark-Anthony Kaye and Ian Harkes – are high-level talents anymore, but all are locker-room guys who Bruce trusts to set the tone.
That level of harmony has led not just to success, but also to an underrated environment for player development. Which is relevant given all the young talent San Jose’s got on this roster.
My Worry: I’d feel so much more confident if I didn’t think Arena was going to try to start Chicho Arango and Josef Martínez together in an old-fashioned 4-4-2. That is just a defensive disaster waiting to happen. A 4-2-3-1 with Josef coming off the bench makes so much more sense on paper, though asking Josef to be a super-sub could undo a lot of that locker room harmony (and upend a lot of tables piled with chicken and rice) I was talking about above.
There’s also how Chicho was bad the second half of last year, Daniel was bad all of last year, and there’s no guarantee any of the kids will actually progress (though man, do I have high hopes for Niko Tsakiris and Max Floriani).
No matter what, I think they’ll be much better than last season. But they could literally double their points total from 2024 and still miss the playoffs. It’s just a massive hole they need to dig out from.
First-Choice XI
4-4-2: Daniel; Costa, Rodrigues, Romney, Lima; López, Kaye, Harkes, Espinoza; Chicho, Josef
I really like this expansion roster build. They’ve gone into it thinking about partnerships – between the fullbacks and the DP wingers, between the No. 6 and the No. 8s, between the two center backs – and how they’ll work together, and how they’ll work within the overall framework of the team.
Both DPs should be high-level players in this league. I love the Luca de la Torre signing. And some of the further-down-the-depth-chart moves show a real shrewdness for MLS roster building:
- Jasper Löffelsend can give good minutes at three spots.
- Hamady Diop, Heine Bruseth and Alejandro Alvarado Jr. are high-upside young(ish) players who could thrive with a change of scenery.
- Aníbal Godoy is a reliable veteran ball-progressor who knows how to involve wingers.
The process is good.
My Worry: I think they could end up being well below par in both boxes. No. 9 Marcus Ingvartsen has never been a consistent goalscorer, and goalkeeper CJ dos Santos has never been a consistent starter. Paddy McNair will probably be a good MLS center back, but Andrés Reyes is unreliable (remember his MLS Cup showing?) and Chris McVey has mostly been a backup.
They had talked about bringing in a U22 No. 10 to juice the midfield creativity, but that hasn’t happened yet. Right now it’s maybe Godoy and de la Torre starting as free 8s. That’s not enough.
They have the flexibility to make additions throughout the rest of the window, and then in the summer. I think they’ll be good – for an expansion team.
First-Choice XI
4-3-3: dos Santos; Negri, Reyes, McNair, Kumado; de la Torre, Tverskov, Godoy; Lozano, Ingvartsen, Dreyer
I’m not gonna call them no-hopers, but these three teams need a ton of work.
They finally went out and got the DP No. 10 they’d promised ahead of last season. Manu García has a pretty good track record over the past six or seven years, though it’s much more in line with, say, Pep Biel than the likes of Riqui Puig, Evander, Lucho Acosta or even Marcel Hartel.
They also spent to bring in TAM winger Shapi Suleymanov, then were the first through the door in the new cash-for-player trades (or, as our friends at Soccerwise call it, “RAM” – “Real Actual Money”) by spending to bring in Dejan Joveljić from the Galaxy. He’s a DP, and he’s good, but I maintain he’s only a marginal upgrade (if that) over Willy Agada, and Sporting needed help more urgently elsewhere.
My Worry: Sporting needed help more urgently elsewhere. Both center backs are questionable, d-mid is questionable, and if Jake Davis is at right back (which might not be the case if Jan Jurčec is on the way) instead of central midfield, then there is a lack of defensive range, ball-winning and toughness in the engine room.
Are any of the goalkeepers ready? They didn’t look like it last year. Is Stephen Afrifra, who was very promising in limited minutes in 2024, going to be trusted to play more in 2025? He should be.
But overall, even if Sporting get 80th percentile outcomes on all of these questions, it feels like that’s still not going to be enough.
First-Choice XI
4-3-3: Pulskamp; Ndenbe, Fernández, Rosero, Davis; Thommy, Radoja, García; Sallói, Joveljić, Suleymanov
They returned their two best players from last season and made a whole ton of changes around them over the past two windows, as befitting a team that keeps missing the playoffs.
The good news is one of those two returnees is Christian Benteke, who won last year’s Golden Boot and whose aerial dominance gives D.C. a direct shot up Route 1 basically any time anyone gets a chance to pick their heads up. The other returnee is Aaron Herrera, the veteran right back who’s one of the best chance-creating fullbacks in the league.
My Worry: That might be all the chance creation they get. Right now the plan seems to be to start newcomer Hosei Kijima as a pressing 10 with Gabriel Pirani (23rd percentile in xA among wingers and attacking midfielders last year; 5th percentile the year before) and Jared Stroud on the wings. The big attacking signing was João Peglow, a Brazilian who had one goal in 1,700 minutes across the past two seasons in the Polish top flight, and who’s never scored more than three goals in a year.
That’s not very much firepower.
The goalkeeper is young and new. The center backs are a mishmash of veterans, none of whom has the speed to comfortably play a high line. Kijima is, right now, the starting No. 10, the top backup at the No. 8, and the top backup at left back. What?
I still don’t understand the Mateusz Klich move. He wasn’t great, but he was pretty good. Why pay almost the full boat – including taking up a DP slot – just to have him suiting up for Atlanta? What?
Was it to open up another U22 slot? Ok, then why aren't there more U22s on this roster? It can’t have been for GAM, given they’re practically swimming in it following the sales of Matai Akinmboni and Ted Ku-DiPietro.
My guess is this team will have a pretty good (relatively speaking) first six weeks, because they’ll press a lot and everybody’s sloppy with the turnovers the first two months of the year. But as teams settle in and clean it up, and as it gets hot as hell, pressing becomes less effective. The talent differential will become too much.
Related: from mid-May to Oct. 1 of last year, D.C. won five of 22 games across all competitions.
First-Choice XI
4-2-3-1: Joon Hong; Schnegg, Rowles, Bartlett, Herrera; Enow, Peltola; Pirani, Kijima, Stroud; Benteke
They bring back their best player in Federico Bernardeschi. They went out and got center forward Ola Brynhildsen and winger Theo Corbeanu on loan, which in theory should improve the attack.
The midfield full of veterans returns. Jonathan Osorio, Matty Longstaff and Deybi Flores were all okay last year, and only Osorio is on the wrong side of 30.
Between Richie Laryea and Henry Wingo, they should have depth and know-how at right back. It’s not inconceivable that Sean Johnson has a bounce-back year in goal.
Robin Fraser is the new head coach, and he’s a direct link to the glory days of last decade. Maybe he’ll bring the magic back.
My Worry: There’s not enough creativity in that midfield, Brynhildsen hasn’t produced outside of Norway, and the center backs were poor last year, as were the left backs.
Mostly, though, it’s hard to imagine things changing that much for the better as long as Lorenzo Insigne is still there. Dude’s just a karma sink. Here’s a blurb from Tom Bogert’s reporting on GiveMeSport:
Toronto came to Insigne with three different clubs in Europe – one in each of the top flights of Italy, Spain and Turkey, sources say. Insigne's camp conveyed to Toronto the player did not prefer to go to the Middle East. Toronto also agreed to provide a significant buyout that would see Insigne receive the majority of the money remaining on his contract, which pays him north of $15 million per year until the summer of 2026.
Insigne turned them all down, sources say.
Now, transfer windows in the vast majority of Europe are closed and Insigne is still in Toronto. The Turkish window just closed and Toronto are pivoting to other roster plans.
From where I sit, the “other roster plans” look like just being a pain sponge for a year and waiting for a bunch of these contracts to come off the books. Of guys on the active roster, only Bernardeschi, Laryea, Osorio and Wingo are guaranteed through all of 2026.
So, you know, just get through 2025. Maybe develop a young player or two, hope Bernardeschi stays bought in, hope Brynhildsen scores some goals, and hope for sunnier days ahead.
First-Choice XI
4-3-3: Johnson; Petretta, Rosted, Long, Laryea; Osorio, Flores, Longstaff; Corbeanu, Brynhildsen, Bernardeschi
