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Is the MLS Schedule Change Good or Bad for the Union?
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If you missed it last week, Major League Soccer decided to flip its schedule from summer to “winter” –
We’ve traditionally used the term “winter schedule,” but now we use quotation marks because the league is going to take a lengthy break from mid-December to mid-February. The season is basically cut into two halves.
Right now, the MLS campaign goes from late February to early December. That’s more or less what the Union have played since joining the league in 2010. When the change takes place they’ll go from August to May instead.
They are mostly playing in the same months but the main difference is no MLS through the heart of June.
Is this good for the Union or bad for the Union? Let’s lay out some bulletpoints:
- After the Flyers and Sixers wrap up their seasons, the only teams playing until the Eagles kick off are the Phillies and Union. This schedule change means we’re only getting the Phils in late May, June, and the first part of July. It’s gonna be kind of a bummer to go through those prime weather weeks with no games at Subaru Park, when the Union enjoyed some exclusivity and weren’t swamped by the four majors.
- The games in November, December, February, and March are going to be cold, but we’re a mid-Atlantic market. We’re not Toronto or Minnesota or Montreal. You can play outdoors in Chester on this schedule. It’s not ideal, but it’s tenable.
- Right now, the Union are in a lengthy break waiting for the playoffs to resume. It totally sucks, and this schedule change eliminates that. It also eliminates MLS playing through international breaks, which means multiple guys won’t be missing Union games to go play for their countries.
- The MLS playoffs often peter out, especially here, because the competition runs right into the heart of NFL, college football, and then the beginning of the NBA and NHL seasons. Doing it this way means your postseason takes place around the same time as the hockey and basketball playoffs. It’ll be good to play these meaningful games in nice weather instead of shit weather.
- Aligning the transfer windows means the Union won’t be signing guys in the summer, halfway through the season, who have just played a full year in Europe. This is going to make the transition for new players much easier and eliminate the adjustment period that we typically see. It will allow the league to be much more competitive for top transfers.
- Champions League MLS teams won’t be at the start of their season. We’ll be much better in the competition.
- Taking a break in December can be a momentum killer. Imagine your team is on fire, then everything comes to a screeching halt for two months.
- On the other hand, if you’re shit in the first half of the year, now you get a two-month break to figure it out before resuming in February.
I’ve been anti-winter schedule forever, because we have nice summer weather here and have historically played through June, July, and August. But if you’re gonna do it, this is the best way to do it. I just hate the fact that there won’t be Union games in the late spring and first part of summer. It feels like a big kick right in the nuts after 15 years of soccer on the banks of the Delaware, with big crowds and big tailgates and 75-degree temps. So that part sucks the most. But when you look at all of the positives that come from aligning the calendars, and avoiding significant conflict with football, it opens the door for MLS to keep growing and keep getting better and better, and that’s beneficial to the Union.
Ultimately, this is probably going to be good for the game and good for the league even if losing June games at the Soob kind of blows.
Honestly, I think the bigger positive for the Union from the recent batch of MLS news is that the second paywall is going away. I constantly hear from people who say they stopped watching the team because the games went from PHL17 to Apple TV. Under the new setup, you’ll still need an Apple TV subscription to watch the game, but you’ll no longer have to pay the annual fee for the “season pass” to watch the games. So you can access the games with the regular sub, and there really are some great series on Apple TV. I recommend Silo, Foundation, and Ted Lasso, for starters.
Kevin has been writing about Philadelphia sports since 2009. He spent seven years in the CBS 3 sports department and started with the Union during the team's 2010 inaugural season. He went to the academic powerhouses of Boyertown High School and West Virginia University. email - k.kinkead@sportradar.com