MLS announces significant roster rule changes
Major League Soccer has announced three roster rule modifications that give clubs increased flexibility in roster construction and more benefits when players are transferred or loaned to clubs outside of MLS. Take a look here.
Houston sign German winger Ennali
Houston Dynamo FC have acquired winger Lawrence Ennali from Polish top-flight side Górnik Zabrze. The 22-year-old German is under contract through 2026 with an option for 2027. He occupies a U22 Initiative roster spot and is the largest such signing in Dynamo history.
Philadelphia acquire Adeniran from St. Louis
The Philadelphia Union have acquired forward Samuel Adeniran from St. Louis CITY SC. In exchange for Adeniran, St. Louis receive $150,000 in 2024 General Allocation Money (GAM). They could receive an additional $300k in conditional GAM as well.
Toronto FC sign defender Wingo
Toronto FC have signed defender and former Seattle Sounders FC homegrown player Henry Wingo. Wingo, 28, is under contract with Toronto through 2026 with an option for 2027. He was a free agent after last competing for Hungarian side Ferencvárosi TC. To complete the deal, Toronto acquired Wingo’s Discovery Rights from D.C. United in exchange for $75,000 in 2025 General Allocation Money (GAM).
WARNING: Roster rules discussion ahead. Please make sure your helmet is strapped securely before fastening the helmet of those who need assistance around you.
New MLS roster rules dropped yesterday and today we woke up to a major worldwide IT outage. Coincidence? I’m not going to say yes or no. I’m just asking questions.
Look, it’s not a secret that the roster rules can be a little complex to the point of debilitating confusion. I’ve spent years doing my best to decipher it all and, no joke, learned something new and pretty critical earlier this week that I won’t even begin to try and explain while you’re only wearing a helmet.
We are still going to talk about roster rules though. Don’t be scared. I have great news. The changes that went through yesterday actually simplify things. They also provide a major short-term boost for some teams right as the Secondary Transfer Window opens and will provide a major long-term boost for the league as a whole. Just give me a second to lay it out. I promise I’ll keep this simple. Starting with an ultra-simplified vocabulary lesson.
Designated Player: You can pay an infinite transfer fee and an infinite salary to this player and they will only take up 12.5% of a team’s salary cap instead of all of it. If they’re 23 or younger, they only take up around 3.5%.
U22 Player: You can pay an infinite transfer fee for this player. The only rules are that they have to be younger than 22 when you sign them and their salary has to be less than 12.5% of your team’s salary cap. If they meet this criteria, you can reduce their cap hit to around 3.5%.
GAM: Money that teams can spend to raise their salary cap or to execute trades within the league.
That’s it. For our purposes today, you just need to know those three things to understand the major shifts that went down yesterday. Starting with…
If you’ve played pretty much any video game in the past 10 years, you’re probably familiar with the concept of archetypes and skill trees. Basically, you pick the path you want your character to follow and their traits and skills will develop over time based on that path.
Want to smash a bunch of stuff into tiny pieces? You’re probably going to want to pick the path named something like “BRUTALITIZATION” or whatever so you can boost how strong and smashy your character is while understanding your character might be dumber than most. Want to be a little more clever? You’re probably going to pick a path that has something to do with improving speed or magic at the expense of how many plates your character can get off the ground for their one-rep max on Romanian Deadlift.
With the new changes, teams will now choose their archetype. Literally, they have to declare which one they’re picking for this window and then they’ll need to do it again before next season. Their options are to either be a team focused more on the top end of the roster or they can opt to take risks on younger players while spending a little more on mid-range guys.
The first option is to have three DPs and three U22 players. Teams around the league have already been allowed to do this, but the amount of U22 players you could have directly tied into how much you were paying your three DPs. Basically, if you wanted all three U22 spots available to you instead of just one U22 spot, one of your three DPs had to be much less expensive or much younger than the other two. Now, teams don’t have to worry about that restriction. Spend as much as you want on all three DPs. You can still have all three U22s.
The second option is to have just two DPs. If you have just two DPs instead of three, you can have four U22 players plus an extra $2 million in GAM to spend that season. For the sake of this current window, it will just be an extra $1 million. That’s a lot of extra cash to throw around. Essentially, you’ve raised your salary cap by a couple million. There’s a real opportunity to spend more than ever on the middle of your roster… if you’re cool with taking a risk on a less reliable U22 player instead of a more experienced (and more expensive) DP.
Now, we get to sit back and play armchair Chief Soccer Officer with the archetype’s team’s pick. To me, there’s already a clear choice as to the best path, but you might disagree. Either way, there’s more flexibility for teams to spend big than ever before and the quality of rosters around the league should take another step forward over the next couple of years. We should even start to see the effects in this window. Teams could look very, very different when we get back from Leagues Cup. Teams will certainly look very different by the time we reach opening day in 2025.
The second big thing you need to know is that teams get more GAM for transfers now. You probably didn’t even know that teams could turn transfer fees into GAM, right? Then again, who am I kidding, you’re reading this newsletter, of course you knew.
Anyway, instead of teams only being allowed to turn their outgoing transfer fees into $1,215,506 worth of GAM, they can now turn those fees into $3 million worth of GAM. If you’re a team like Atlanta United and you just sold three players for $40+ million, you’re absolutely going to take some of that and turn it into GAM. Atlanta have virtually just raised their salary cap by $3 million. And, unlike the GAM you get from choosing the four U22 archetype, Atlanta can use that GAM whenever they want. They don’t have to spend it all this season.
Again, it’s a very MLS way to do it, but teams can spend more than ever now. It’s another step forward for the quality of the league as a whole and it might make your team better than they’ve ever been… or put them even further behind teams actually willing to spend.
See? Just two easy-to-understand and uncomplicated things to know about. That wasn’t so bad, was it? You may remove your helmet.
Philadelphia’s Baribo named Player of the Matchday: Tai Baribo's first career hat trick earned the Philadelphia Union striker MLS Player of the Matchday presented by Michelob Ultra honors for Matchday 27.
- Greg Vanney addressed the Marco Reus transfer rumors.
- Christian Benteke took home Energy Moment of the Match presented by Celsius honors for Matchday 27.
- Matt Doyle covered what every Western Conference team needs in the summer transfer window.
- Here’s your Team of the Matchday presented by Audi.
Good luck out there. Put it in the back of the net.
