MLS Realignment Idea

Since I had great success with the NHL adopting my idea for realignment, I'm going to do the same favour for Major League Soccer.  In advance, you're welcome, MLS.

So, what need's realigning? Well, to start off, I think that most soccer leagues in the world have 2 important things going for them: a balanced schedule and promotion/relegation.  I love the idea of a balanced schedule (play every other team twice... once at home and once away), because it means that the regular season standings are an actual representation of how a team stands compared to its opposition, instead of having some teams with inflated points totals because they play in a weak division.  The MLS actually had a balanced schedule back in the 2010 and 2011 seasons until expansion made having that balanced schedule difficult due to the length of season. For reference, since 2011 each team has played 34 games in a season and before that it was 30.  So that's the area I'm aiming for.

I also like the idea of promotion/relegation, because it gives all teams throughout the standings something to play for later in the season.  However, true promotion/relegation like in European leagues would never fly in North America, because team support would drastically drop for any team in the lesser division with no chance to win... and MLS would not let that happen to any of their franchises.  But, can we have a system that mimics pro/rel while allowing every team a chance to win it all?  I think so.  Here's my plan (finally)...

Starting in 2015, MLS will have 20 teams.  I propose that the league be split into two divisions.  The first division would be the top ten teams from the previous season and the second division would be bottom.  The top eight teams in Division 1 make the playoffs as seeds 1 through 8 and the top two teams in Division 2 make the playoffs as seeds 9 and 10.  A one game play-in round between 7 vs. 10 and 8 vs. 9 would be the first rounds and then it's a standard home and away three round playoff setup.  That takes care of having every team being able to play for something.

Promotion/Relegation would be taken care of with the bottom two teams from Division 1 being relegated to Division 2 and obviously, the top two from 2 being promoted to 1.

A balanced schedule would be achieved with a team playing each other team in its own division twice (18 games) and in the other division once (10 games) for a total of 28 games.  The teams in each division therefore have the exact same schedule.

There is one drawback though.  The balanced schedule element of this would be destroyed by expansion or contraction, until the league gets up to 24 teams.  However, once at 24 teams, the number of games reaches 34 in this plan... the exact number of games teams play now, while being balanced.  Therefore, a 24 team league is perfect for this.

Again, you're welcome, MLS.

One last problem: out of all the people that I know that actually read this blog, none of them actually watch soccer or MLS... that I know of.