2024 MLS Salaries Released

For the first time in 2024, the Major League Soccer Players Association (MLSPA) released salary information for its players. The bi-annual tradition brings the chance for fans and pundits to dig into the numbers and see who’s making too much (or too little) and which teams are spending a lot or not much at all.

It’s a big day of judgement if you are a Sporting Director (if your team has one). Did you spend a ton of your owner’s money and have little to show for it? It’s also a day of awkwardness in locker rooms around the league as everyone suddenly sees if you are earning your keep.

Before getting into the new information, it can always be helpful to look at past salary data as a reference point for how to view this new information.

• Fall 2023
• Spring 2023

If you are just here for Sporting Kansas City data, we’ve got that covered for you.

A Few Notes

Throughout the story, when referring to a number, I’m referring to a player’s guaranteed compensation. That number is often higher than their base salary because it includes pro-rated bonuses across the life of a contract.

Additionally, this is not the number that hits a team’s salary budget. That can be impacted by mechanisms like Designated Player status, the U-22 Initiative, TAM, GAM and transfer fees, which aren’t included here. Some teams lay out massive fees to acquire players. The salary numbers alone are an incomplete picture, but they add to the story.

Highest Paid MLS Players

As you can see, one man tops the list and it’s not even close. Lionel Messi, perhaps the greatest soccer player to ever live, is over $5 million clear of second place Lorenzo Insigne (who is massively overpaid when you compare their production). And that doesn’t even factor in the deals Messi has with Apple and others or his ownership stake in Inter Miami.

He’s still paid a massive amount of money in MLS terms. In fact, Messi is so highly paid, he makes more than the total rosters of 25 of the leagues 29 teams!

Joining Messi on the list as a new arrival to the top is teammate Sergio Busquets. After playing on a Targeted Allocation Money (TAM) deal in 2023, Busquets is now the 3rd highest paid player in the league at just under $8.8 million.

There are a few other additions to the top 20 with Emil Forsberg coming in at number seven at just over $6m, Luis Muriel at 12th at $4,336,150 and Sporting KC’s Alan Pulido who climbed substantially to be the league’s 15th highest paid player, despite the league erroneously making it look like he took a pay cut as recently as last week.

[table id=22 /]

To focus further on Sporting Kansas City, you have to go down the list quite a bit from Pulido’s 15th spot:

• 63rd – Nemanja Radoja ($1,530,000)
• 87th – Daniel Salloi ($1,300,000)
• 100th – Erik Thommy ($1,106,250)
• 115th – Johnny Russell ($1,000,000)
• 133rd – Remi Walter ($900,000)
• 180th – Khiry Shelton ($750,000)

MLS Millionaires

The league now boasts 115 millionaires in 2024. That’s up just one over the 114 millionaires from last fall. There are relatively minor increases since last year, up from 112 players in the spring of 2023. The numbers climb more substantially the further back we go. There were just 91 millionaires in the spring of 2022 and 78 in 2021.

Sporting KC have five players above that threshold with Radoja re-joining the list. It was probably a clerical error that removed him from the list last fall. If so, there are the same number of millionaires with some names climbing onto the list and others falling off.

While there was only one new contract paying over $1m, the average in the league continues to rise. The new average salary is $594,390, which is up 9.4 percent from $543,207 in the fall and up 12.1 percent from last spring ($530,262).

The average is obviously massively skewed by players like Messi and in that case, the median can be a better indicator of salary movement. The new median salary is $308,750, up from $282,125 last fall. Going back two years to the spring of 2022 the median was only $248,333, showing a 24.3 percent pay increase for the dead middle player in the league over two years. I could use a 24 percent raise!

Salaries by Team

Miami retained the top spot in team spending with their two massive DPs (Messi, Busquets) flanked by $1.5m signings in Jordi Alba and Luis Suarez. Toronto FC come in second with two of the league’s six highest paid players (Insigne, Bernardeschi).

The worst bang for a buck has to be the Chicago Fire with Nashville SC close behind. Chicago have spent over $25m, not even including the massive transfer fee outlaid for Hugo Cuypers and sit 14th in the Eastern Conference as of this writing. Nashville SC come in 4th in spending at just over $21m and they were the first to fire their coach this season despite only being in 10th in the East.

At the other end of the spending are Real Salt Lake, coming in 3rd from the bottom but leading the Western Conference and are 3rd in the Supporters Shield standings. That can be misleading though since the rumored $6m transfer fee for Chicho Arango isn’t included in these numbers.

St. Louis City have the league’s lowest payroll at a tick over $12m but that doesn’t factor in transfer fees that would push them way up the total spend. They barely beat out CF Montreal by a few thousand dollars for being the tightest with their wallets on salary outlays.

As for Sporting KC, they were 15th in the league last fall but have dipped slightly to 18th at present day. That’s still an overpay if the standings are any indication as Sporting KC are 26th in the league heading into the weekend with some of the league’s teams having played one more match than them.

[table id=23 /]

Another interesting way to look at team spending is laid out by The Athletic. They break players into three categories. Players earning a ‘true DP’ salary (above $1,683,750) who cannot be bought down with TAM or GAM, players in the TAM/GAM bracket ($683,750 to $1,683,750) and those below the max budget charge ($683,750).

Miami’s two true DPs alone make more than every other team in the league outside of Toronto FC.

All MLS clubs in total salary spend. Obviously not the full story without transfer fees and such, but here we are https://t.co/sN3La1p0EJ pic.twitter.com/Fm0bD39LPR

— Tom Bogert (@tombogert) May 16, 2024

Other Sporting KC Tidbits

• Tim Melia is the league’s 9th highest paid goalkeeper ($637,500) while SKC rival St. Louis boast the league’s most expensive keeper in Roman Burki ($1,657,469).
• Pulido ($3.6m) lands at 3rd in highest paid center forwards behind D.C. United’s Christian Benteke ($4.4m) and Orlando City’s Luis Muriel ($4.3m).
• The MLSPA lists Erik Thommy ($1.1m) as an attacking midfielder. He comes in at 15th on that list.
• Sporting KC were once famed (infamous?) for the spending on their center backs. Now, Dany Rosero comes in at 56th ($510k), Voloder at 60th ($478k) and Fontas at 63rd ($450k).
• Despite being the 2nd highest paid player on the team, Nemanja Radoja is only the league’s 6th highest paid defensive midfielder. In 9th? Former Sporting KC man Ilie Sanchez ($1.267m).
• Former Sporting KC target Kellyn Acosta landed himself a solid deal, raking in $1.56m when signing with the Chicago Fire. If Sporting KC had offered him that much, he’d have been the second highest paid player on the team.

Other Tidbits

• The LA Galaxy have actually decreased their wages while increasing their winning. New stars Joseph Paintsil and Gabriel Pec have a lower combined total and Chicharito did in 2023. However, that leaves out their massive transfer fees.
• Seven players are still on MLS contracts despite not being on teams. The standout? Jozy Altidore and his $2.24m wage bill, followed by former teammate Michael Bradley ($725,000).
• The total wage bill across the league is $518,902,285!
• And we’ll end with these beautiful charts from The Athletic!

NEW: Part two of @tombogert and my #MLS salary day coverage for @TheAthleticFC:

💸 Salary spend only a part of the picture
📈 Comparing modern spending to pre-DP era
👑 Michael Bradley keeps his crown
⚖️ Which teams spend more, less than 2023 totalshttps://t.co/i1AXgMNkZJ pic.twitter.com/ryyG0uJbbI

— Jeff Rueter (@jeffrueter) May 16, 2024

2024 MLS Salaries by Players

[table id=24 /]