MLS Riding a Messi-Fueled Wave Into Championship Weekend

Major League Soccer, at long last, again has its biggest star on its biggest stage.

Inter Miami, fueled heavily by an epic playoff run by Argentine star Lionel Messi, will face the Vancouver Whitecaps in Saturday’s MLS Cup, with both teams clinching their spots with conference final wins this past weekend. For both teams, the rise to the championship game takes on a rags-to-riches feel, with Inter Miami not having advanced beyond the first round of the postseason in its five prior seasons of existence, and the Whitecaps previously not moving past the second round in their first 14 MLS seasons.

The key story around the upcoming match, however, is the 38-year-old Messi, who is writing another epic chapter in what has already been a legendary soccer career. This postseason has included 13 goal contributions from Messi, including an assist in the conference final against NYCFC to extend his league record for scoring in a single MLS postseason. 

“Leo has accustomed us to the extraordinary,” said Inter Miami coach Javier Mascherano of Messi after the NYCFC win. 

Fan Metrics 

Major League Baseball and the National Hockey League have enjoyed sizable lifts in attendance, viewership, social media consumption, and other key measures of fan affinity over the last two seasons. That’s hardly a coincidence as those leagues finally saw Dodgers two-way phenom Shohei Ohtani and Oilers center Connor McDavid—by many accounts the best players in their respective leagues—into the championship round after years of pursuit. 

That also is very much the dynamic of what’s happening to MLS right now. Viewership for that league is much more opaque thanks to its groundbreaking, and recently adjusted, rights deal with Apple. MLS, however, said it averaged 3.7 million gross live match viewers across linear and streaming during the regular season, up 29% from last year. Total ticketing revenue reached a league record, despite a slight dip in overall attendance to 11.2 million. A series of other historic milestones were set this year in digital engagement.

Additional playoff viewership numbers are expected Tuesday, but what’s already clear is that Messi is helping fuel a broader swell in fan interest.

The closest historical parallel for MLS to what’s happening now with Messi was with global superstar David Beckham, who, along with fellow standout Landon Donovan, led the L.A. Galaxy to the 2011 and 2012 titles. The current situation, however, is happening with MLS in a far stronger and more expansive position in its own history. 

Messi, a strong candidate to also win the 2025 Most Valuable Player award, will now be facing Vancouver star Thomas Müller, who helped lead Germany to wins over Messi’s Argentina in the 2010 and 2014 World Cups.

“The nice thing about it is not only playing against the greatest player who played our game and is still playing our game, it’s more that, I think, when you have a pairing like this, more people are watching,” Müller said.