All data based on a start date of 09/01/2023 using the Your World preset.
The top tier of USA football
29 teams (St Louis added for 2023)
15 in Eastern Conference
14 in Western Conference
Each team plays 34 games in regular season (teams from their own conference twice and teams from the other at least once)
Team with best regular season record is awarded the Supporters Shield
Top 7 teams from each conference qualify for the playoffs.
8th and 9th Qualify for the Wild Card game to join the other 7 in the Playoffs
The 2 conference winners qualify directly for the semi finals
No relegation (closed shop)
MLS has a pretty complicated set of league, squad registration and player acquisition rules. Here are various links that explain this in more detail. Whilst this may seem initially overwhelming, once you have a handle on the basics it can lead to a wholy unique FM experience.
Comprehensive video guides to the MLS rules from Uncle Sam FM, Gaming Grandpa and others
Two comprehensive guides to the ins and outs of Soccer stateside from FM blogger FMEadster
A guide to all things MLS brought to you by the official Sports Interactive blog site, The Byline
*As always this is only a suggestion, the leagues listed are in order of importance, feel free to run as many or as little leagues as you think your system can handle. The setup above gives a nice regional feel.
It is advisable however to run as many top tier leagues of major nations as you can to keep the continental club competitions competitive
The better the training facilities the more chance (already visible) players will develop.
Here are the facilities ranking from worst to best -
Poor
Basic
Below Average
Adequate
Average
Good
Great
Excellent
Superb
State of the Art
The training facilities available for Juniors (only).
Does NOT apply to visible players already at the club. All visible players currently at the club use Training Facilities regardless of age.
In theory the better these facilities the greater your players will be developed on the day of intake. But there are a lot of factors at play.
Here are the facilities ranking from worst to best -
Poor
Basic
Below Average
Adequate
Average
Good
Great
Excellent
Superb
State of the Art
The quality and quantity of unseen youth coaches that affects the quality of players in your youth intake
Junior coaching is ranked as follows from worst to best -
Basic
Fairly Basic
Average
Adequate
Good
Excellent
Exceptional
This determines how large a pool of players your team can recruit from. It is the size of your recruitment network. It increases your chances of getting the best young players from your area, nation and beyond.
Some clubs of course will have no youth recruitment at all, which means no youth intakes.
Recruitment is ranked as follows from worst to best -
Limited
Basic
Fairly Basic
Average
Adequate
Good
Excellent
Exceptional