After a Major League Soccer Board of Governors meeting on Wednesday, Dec. 13, the league announced on Friday evening, December 15, that they were “planning” to be represented by their MLS NEXT Pro teams in the 2024 Lamar Hunt US Open Cup. MLS stated that they would then reevaluate their participation for future years at a later date.
Five days after MLS announced their decision, U.S. Soccer stated “after thoughtful consideration,” that MLS’ request for a waiver to use MLS NEXT Pro teams would be denied. This decision came at the “recommendation of U.S. Soccer staff and adopted by the Pro League Task Force.”
Both organizations have stated they will continue to work together to enhance and improve the Lamar Hunt US Open Cup.
Needless to say, this news came as a shock to the staff at TheCup.us, a media outlet that has been covering the US Open Cup extensively for the last 20 years. Most would argue that removing MLS teams from the competition would have done significant damage to the Open Cup, which is open to all professional and amateur teams under the US Soccer umbrella. The tournament, which has been the United States’ only true national championship since it was launched in 1913, would have denied all lower division professional and amateur teams from competing on the field with the country’s top division. Imagine if Premier League teams like Arsenal or Liverpool pulled out of the FA Cup.
Aside from those MLS fans not being able to see their team compete, it would also deny lower division clubs the opportunity to face off against MLS teams. This format is unique in American sports. What would an event whose primary draw is the David vs. Goliath matchup be without Goliath?
On top of that, taking away the teams that draw the most fans and replacing them with reserve teams that rarely draw more than a couple thousand fans per game, at most, would have been a blow to the tournament’s bottom line and the relevance of the tournament. (MLS NEXT Pro does not publish attendance figures)
Since MLS first entered the tournament in 1996, it has been no secret that there are teams in the league that value the US Open Cup more than others. There are teams, who would likely not compete in the tournament. However, this tournament has always featured starting XI lineups as teams get through playing lower division teams and into the latter stages of the tournament. Teams are not playing a mostly reserve based roster from even the Quarterfinals.
The number of starting XI players playing for a MLS team vs. a USL team is no different than a Manchester United or Chelsea playing against a team from EFL Championship or League One. This happens worldwide and it’s done because managers feel that they can risk a less-than-top starting XI and still win the match, which would result in a reward of getting those same starting players a needed break.
This risk and reward equation is done consistently across all countries and their cup competitions on a yearly basis. It can result in upsets (or “cupsets”) which create great storylines, of course, but are devastating for the fans of the MLS team that is upset. When MLS managers get this equation wrong, they are accused of not taking the cup seriously, when it’s just a misjudgment of their team’s depth and/or a USL team’s quality. That is not the same thing and it’s unfair to call any team that doesn’t play a less than starting XI lineup against a USL team as not taking the cup seriously. The way to eliminate being upset for an MLS team is to have quality beyond the starting XI in a roster, not by demanding a starting XI against “inferior” competition. Playing in multiple competitions simultaneously is a part of this sport and teams manage it worldwide.
The Timeline of Events
Based on our sources within US Soccer, MLS and the federation began discussions in August of 2023 on how to improve the US Open Cup in a way that would make both organizations satisfied. While no details of these discussions have been made public, it’s clear now that MLS first team’s participation was part of the discussion points.Within a month or two of that, longtime Open Cup committee member and MLS Executive VP Todd Durbin resigned from the committee. That departure left the committee without MLS representation, something that remains as of the publication of this article. The Open Cup committee generally implements the US Open Cup policy as approved by the US Soccer Board of Directors and then ratified by the general membership body (called the National Council). They also direct US Soccer staff on how to operate the tournament. This includes deciding what dates the tournament is played on and lots of other particulars of the tournament. (Here is an archive of the same page linked above from June 2023 with Todd Durbin listed)
UPDATE: US Soccer has confirmed to us that Todd Durbin was replaced by recently hired MLS EVP of Sporting Product & Competition Nelson Rodriguez and confirmed at the September board meeting, the website just hadn’t been updated yet.
At the end of the qualifying rounds for the 2024 US Open Cup just prior to Thanksgiving, US Soccer also announced the schedule for the 2024 tournament proper. This remained largely unchanged in terms of the number of rounds and the dates of the competition.
2024 LAMAR HUNT US OPEN CUP SCHEDULE
First Round: Tuesday, March 19 – Thursday, March 21
Second Round: Tuesday, April 2 – Wednesday, April 3
Third Round: Tuesday, April 16 – Wednesday, April 17
Round of 32: Tuesday, May 7 – Wednesday, May 8
Round of 16: Tuesday, May 21 – Wednesday, May 22
Quarterfinal: Tuesday, July 9 – Wednesday, July 10
Semifinal: Tuesday, Aug. 27 – Wednesday, Aug. 28
Final: Wednesday, Sept. 25
Based on US Open Cup policy, the deadline for entering next year’s Open Cup for professional teams is at the end of each calendar year (Dec. 31) although our sources indicate that US Soccer was pushing the pro leagues to have their paperwork in sooner so the tournament staff could begin scheduling and conducting draws for the competition at least two months prior to its start in March 2024. The deadline for all teams to get their paperwork in for the 2023 US Open Cup was on Dec. 20, 2022.
Reasons for MLS to make this decision
Fixture congestion
MLS has routinely stated that there is too much fixture congestion on the schedule. The US Open Cup takes up 6 potential scheduling windows during the season.
However, since the US Open Cup is a single elimination tournament, MLS regularly schedules makeup dates on US Open Cup dates as teams are eliminated and those midweeks become available.
With 26 MLS teams in the tournament, by the Round of 16 a minimum of 10 will be eliminated, and only playing 1-2 US Open Cup games. This does not include any upsets. By the Quarterfinals, 18 teams will be guaranteed to be eliminated, playing only 2-3 US Open Cup matches.
Contrast that with the Leagues Cup where the entire league is scheduled at least two matches, with many essentially guaranteed at least a third game. The Leagues Cup also completely breaks the MLS schedule for the tournament, while US Open Cup is interspersed into the season, finishing before the MLS Cup playoffs begin.
MLS would also prefer to not schedule matches during major international tournaments in the summer. Each MLS team is scheduled for 5-6 matches during the 2024 Copa America played in the United States.
Getting time for younger players in meaningful matches
MLS’ goal of having a pipeline from academy to their first team includes getting meaningful minutes against similar competition in US Open Cup matches for their reserves and academy players. MLS feels that the US Open Cup is too restrictive in that regard and they would rather just enter their MLS NEXT Pro teams directly.
However, the US Open Cup policy and handbook contradict this notion.
These roster rules have been in place since 2017, and have only gone through one minor revision in the pandemic. In January 2021, the US Open Cup policy was amended and removed a provision limiting the number of international players on any gameday 18-man lineup (starters and substitutes combined) to a maximum of five. The removal of this rule thereby defaulted any international player rules to the rules of the professional league the team belonged to.
If there are any restrictions to roster sizes or loans or international players beyond these listed above, they are done only at the league level and are either decided by MLS themselves or through collective bargaining with the MLS Players Association.
In fact, MLS teams have already regularly used MLSNP players, with an extreme case that happened in the 2023 Round of 32 on May 10. Los Angles FC traveled to Monterey Bay FC (USL Championship) and in that game, 10 of the 11 starters in that game were players loaned from LAFC 2 of MLS NEXT Pro.
Money
Sources at MLS state that they are unhappy with the general economics of the tournament, namely three things: the prize money given out for the competition, the take of the hosting fees that come into US Soccer to support this, and the amount of the travel reimbursement given out to the visiting teams.
Prize Money
Prize money for the US Open Cup winner and runner-up are roughly equivalent to the prize money given out to the MLS Cup winners and runner-up. Both champions receive $300,000, the US Open Cup runner-up receives $100,000 and the MLS Cup runner-up receives $150,000.
Beyond the finalists though, the prize money differs a lot more, as MLS Cup playoffs awards a total of $1.1 million dollars while the US Open Cup only has a total of $475,000. Of that US Open Cup total prize pool, $75,000 is prize money specifically reserved for non-MLS teams.
It would be great to see the prize money increase overall for this tournament, but to believe that the prize money for the US Open Cup is somehow that much more paltry compared to the other major domestic cup competition in this country is just not based in the facts, and certainly not at the very top for the finalists. To say that the prize money is the reason “teams don’t take it seriously” is ridiculous on its face, because why should MLS teams take MLS Cup seriously by that argument?
Hosting Fees
US Soccer takes a flat hosting fee from every match of the tournament, ranging from $750 for a first round match to $325,000 for the Final. On top of that, US Soccer takes a percentage of event net revenue (event gross revenue minus sales tax) after an amount is met, similar to a standard deductible on your income taxes. This ranges from 15% of all sales above $100,000 for matches from the start to the Quarterfinals, 50% of all sales above $150,000 for the Semifinals, and 50% of all sales above $375,000 for the Final.
US Soccer has for many years treated semifinals and finals as similar as possible to a US Men’s National Team or US Women’s National Team game, where the entire operation is theirs, from the on-field MC, to the PA announcer, to the TV crews, to the advertising and scoreboard operations. For those games, the home team provides what they normally would for a national team game, such as security and other stadium staff.
This would be similar to a NCAA Tournament game held on a school’s field or court, where it is a “neutral” game that just happens to be hosted by one school.
Beyond those three final games of the tournament, very few other matches meet the standard deductible of $100,000 in ticket sales, meaning US Soccer mostly only takes the flat hosting fee the rest of the tournament. Even sold out matches early in the tournament do not meet this threshold. The exact amounts per game are not disclosed, however, nor is the entire total amount taken in each season. Only the total revenue and expenses for the Open Cup in a given Fiscal Year is released by US Soccer in their audited financial statements (see below)
In addition, referee pay is no longer the responsibility of the home team as of the 2023 US Open Cup and their pay is instead baked into the hosting fee. The referees are then paid directly by US Soccer. Referee pay for US Open Cup games is collectively bargained between PRO (the referee assignment organization owned jointly by US Soccer, the Canadian Soccer Association, and MLS) and the referee union, PSRA.
Travel Reimbursements
All teams that travel in the tournament proper of US Open Cup receive a travel stipend from US Soccer with a maximum limit of $15,000 per match, doubling to $30,000 for the Final. This stipend can be used for flights, ground transportation, hotels, and meals on a per diem basis. Teams must show all receipts from traveling to receive this money. From talking with team officials, this amount of money is generally sufficient if only ground coach transportation is required to travel for a match. Once flights are required, this amount stops being enough to cover everything.
This travel stipend is a major reason for the regionalization of matchups and draws for the tournament, as any travel overruns above the stipend are the responsibility of the team, and also if a match is hyper local, such as two teams from the same city, US Soccer will not have to provide the maximum amount of the stipend.
The Overall US Open Cup Budget
| Fiscal Year | Revenues | Expenses | Profit |
| 4/1/2021-3/31/2022 | $26,700 | $168,720 | -$142,020 |
| 4/1/2020-3/31/2021 | $645,223 | $25,602 | $619,621 |
| 4/1/2019-3/31/2020 | $1,496,683 | $1,489,753 | $6,930 |
| 4/1/2018-3/31/2019 | $1,075,674 | $1,192,013 | -$116,339 |
| 4/1/2017-3/31/2018 | $1,501,411 | $1,138,863 | $362,548 |
| 4/1/2016-3/31/2017 | $999,962 | $922,519 | $77,443 |
| 4/1/2015-3/31/2016 | $1,327,523 | $1,072,601 | $254,922 |
| 4/1/2014-3/31/2015 | $1,080,298 | $1,002,711 | $77,587 |
| 4/1/2013-3/31/2014 | $1,193,912 | $959,038 | $234,874 |
| 4/1/2012-3/31/2013 | $1,120,596 | $593,886 | $526,710 |
| 4/1/2011-3/31/2012 | $629,978 | $377,678 | $252,300 |
| 4/1/2010-3/31/2011 | $442,772 | $371,151 | $71,621 |
| 4/1/2009-3/31/2010 | $404,705 | $429,963 | -$25,258 |
| 4/1/2008-3/31/2009 | $351,981 | $423,748 | -$71,767 |
| 4/1/2007-3/31/2008 | $300,252 | $408,892 | -$108,640 |
| 4/1/2006-3/31/2007 | $236,402 | $439,801 | -$203,399 |
| 4/1/2005-3/31/2006 | $188,004 | $402,911 | -$214,907 |
| 4/1/2004-3/31/2005 | $182,202 | $414,143 | -$231,941 |
| Total | $13,204,278 | $11,833,993 | $1,370,285 |
To break this all down even further, listed above are the actual Revenue and Expenses for the Open Cup as reported in the federation’s yearly audited statements. Such revenues and expenses that would be a part of this would include:
Revenues:
- Hosting fees
- Entry fees
- Forfeited performance bonds
- Fines
Expenses:
- Prize money
- Travel stipends
- Tournament operating costs
- Referee pay (new, and not shown in this table, yet)
This does not include any revenue from sold marketing rights for the tournament, including any TV deals. That is a separate line item on US Soccer’s statements.
Prior to 2023 for the last 20 years, US Soccer sold all commercial rights to Soccer United Marketing (abbreviated SUM, a marketing company wholly owned by Major League Soccer) and this includes the US Open Cup. Since the Open Cup is mixed into the national team’s TV money, it is hard to quantify how much money the US Open Cup brought in, even from the 2019-2022 deal with ESPN+ that was specifically sold by SUM. If MLS has had an issue with how much money the Open Cup has brought in, their own marketing company could have used the 20 years they had the tournament as their client to bring it to better heights.
On the whole, it makes no sense for US Soccer coming from MLS that they want to decrease the revenues on this budget (hosting fees) while also increasing expenditures (travel reimbursements) for a tournament that runs on a mostly balanced budget for the operations of the tournament. US Soccer is under no obligation to run this tournament at a major loss. If MLS doesn’t want US Soccer taking in so much in hosting fees, a grand way to do to that is to not host the games in the first place. Nobody is making them host. Yet, they continue to do so, for obvious reasons, as hosting is a big advantage to winning vs. the lower divisions. If they have an issue with how much US Soccer takes for semifinals and finals, then US Soccer is also free to go back to neutral site finals, which would result in likely just a lump sum payment for the facility use, similar to a US National Team game, and all the ticket proceeds go US Soccer.
One more note regarding the financial aspect of the US Open Cup: The federation’s ability to increase the prize money and to improve travel reimbursements is centered around its ability to market the tournament, and therefore attract sponsors. More specifically a much talked about title sponsor. If US Soccer wants to make the tournament more financially lucrative for the teams involved, they need to attract sponsors. However, MLS’ attempt to remove their teams from the competition would appear to be counterproductive because MLS teams (which have the largest fan bases and are the Goliath in the “David vs. Goliath” matchups, which are the main draw of the competition) exiting the Open Cup would severely handicap the federation’s ability to sell the tournament to potential sponsors.
Reasons US Soccer have to deny this waiver
Professional League Standards
US Soccer Professional League Standards is the document used to govern the sanctioning of all professional soccer in this country. FIFA grants US Soccer exclusive authority over the professional and amateur game in the United States, although Congress only grants that authority specifically over the amateur game and selecting national teams per the Ted Stevens Amateur Sports Act as written in 1978 and modified in 1998.
While that authority over the professional game is being challenged in court by NASL in an antitrust lawsuit, US Soccer still maintains that control as of now and does so in part through this document. The PLS document is authored and modified by the Professional League Standards Task Force, which is then sent to the professional leagues for review and feedback before being submitted for approval by the Board of Directors at US Soccer.
The most recent revision of this document was ratified by the board March 17, 2023 and can be found here. As stated in the first section for Division I Men’s Outdoor Soccer, of which MLS is the only league sanctioned as such, all teams are required to participate in US Soccer and CONCACAF competitions for which they are eligible for.
US Open Cup team eligibility rules
US Soccer also requires the same thing of Division III leagues as well, of which MLS NEXT Pro is one of three leagues sanctioned at this level. However, Open Cup policy specifically makes any professional team who is owned by a higher division professional team ineligible. As the rule currently is, the teams that fall under this rule are the 25 MLS NEXT Pro teams that are owned by MLS teams. The remaining two teams, Chattanooga FC and Carolina Core FC, are independently owned and are still eligible for the U.S. Open Cup. D.C. United is the only United States based MLS team without a MLS NEXT Pro team, so if this plan would have been approved, D.C. United would have not had any representation in the tournament at all.
This rule was enacted before the 2016 U.S. Open Cup as the second, lower division teams owned by MLS was growing from 5 to 9 in USL Championship (named USL Pro at the time).
The Open Cup committee has a policy that two teams with either an affiliation or shared ownership in the competition must be separated at all times in the competition, until it is impossible to separate them in the Final. This is easily accomplished with a few of these pairs of teams in the competition, but would become increasingly difficult as the number of pairs increase, while still maintaining regionalization of the pairings and limiting travel costs.
In fact, a different restriction is the reason the Second Round of the 2022 and 2023 US Open Cup has had a cross country match each time. The early rounds of the tournament are supposed to be as local as possible, but the additional restriction implemented by the committee is that teams from the same entry pool may not face each other immediately in the round that they enter the tournament. Because of this, Division II teams could not face Division II teams and Division III teams could not face Division III teams in the Second Round of those two tournaments. Because of the lack of enough Division III teams in the Western US and the lack of enough Division II teams in the southeastern United States, the leftover Division II teams in the west and the leftover Division III team in the Southeast would face off.
There were five matches where the two teams were 1000 miles or more apart in the Second Round. This included a 2200 mile road trip between Oakland Roots of USL Championship traveling to Greenville Triumph of USL League One. These matches were ONLY the result of the restriction placed by the committee that prevented teams from the same division level from facing off in the Second Round.
It can be shown, therefore, that travel lengths and costs go up as more restrictions are placed on who can face off in the U.S. Open Cup in a given round.
To compensate for these teams for being ineligible, the following year in 2017 the rule was added to allow unlimited loans from ineligible teams to their parent organization. This enabled these players to be cup tied to the main MLS team and not the reserve team.
As far as we can tell, no major soccer playing country currently allows reserve teams in their cups. Spain, Germany, and the Netherlands all used to and have famous stories about those second teams, but they have since been restricted from playing in the Copa del Rey, DFB Pokal, and KNVB Cup, respectively. The largest European country we can find that still allows them is Poland in the Polish Cup.
Commercial value
Name of the competition
The US Open Cup policy used to state that the “competition shall be known as the Lamar Hunt U.S. Open Cup”, but was recently changed during the pandemic by the Board of Directors of US Soccer to state “The competition name shall be determined by the Federation’s Board of Directors and has been known since 1999 as the “Lamar Hunt U.S. Open Cup”. This may seem like a subtle wording change, but it opens up the avenue for the U.S. Open Cup to have a title sponsor of the competition (similar to the The FA Cup being titled as the Emirates FA Cup). While we cannot say how close the federation is to obtaining a title sponsor, but TheCup.us has confirmed that this is something that US Soccer has been working on since this change was made during the pandemic.
As mentioned earlier, US Soccer may feel that the commercial value of the title sponsor would be negatively impacted without MLS’ first teams in the tournament.
TV value
Prior to 2019, the U.S. Open Cup had no TV contract except for the Final, which bounced around from Fox Soccer Channel and its properties, to ESPN and its properties, to even Gol TV. Starting in 2019, the entire competition was played on ESPN+ from the First Round to the Final. US Soccer would partner with, and pay a production company, VISTA Worldlink to produce all of the games in 2019. However, our sources confirmed that all production costs for that year were paid by US Soccer through their own budget, and not by ESPN. The deal was initially for four years, but the pandemic canceled two of those years. In 2022, not all matches were shown on ESPN+ in the first round, but US Soccer covered the remaining matches on their YouTube channel at their cost.
After the federation’s deal in 2023 with Warner Bros. Discovery, Bleacher Report’s YouTube channel would show select matches, with CBS obtaining a sublicense to show even more matches throughout the tournament, including both Semifinals and the Final. Again, just like with ESPN+, the broadcast costs were done at US Soccer’s expense, but now they had multiple broadcasters to show the matches. Once Lionel Messi started playing for Inter Miami CF and would be playing in the Semifinal match at FC Cincinnati, US Soccer was also able to secure a Spanish language broadcast on NBC Universal’s Telemundo.
Between all of these extra deals, including the money gained from having Lionel Messi in just one match, as he was injured for the Final, our sources state that the money that came in from that allowed them to, for the first time, provide much more in travel stipends for the qualifying rounds this past fall. In prior years, US Soccer would NOT pay for any travel in qualifying matches, with the lone exception being if a flight was required, of which US Soccer would cover $200 per person on the traveling party for the flights.
Without MLS teams in the tournament, US Soccer may not be able to get as much money from any TV deal they would negotiate for the tournament.
What happens now
From here, US Soccer and MLS have continued their discussions and negotiations, but any discussions would include MLS’ full participation with their first teams in the tournament, per sources close to the situation. We expect in January to early February for the final list of participating teams to be announced and the first two rounds to be drawn and the schedule fully released.
Based on the composition currently of the professional leagues and statements already announced: We expect Division III teams to enter in the First Round scheduled for March 19-21, while Division II teams will remain entering in the Second Round (April 2-3). This also adds up with the 32 amateur Open Division teams already announced entering in the First Round.
Also, because only 32 Open Division teams were announced and not more, we are also expecting more MLS teams to be seeded into the Round of 32 than in 2022 and 2023. In those two years, 8 MLS teams were seeded, while for 2024, as many as half the league (13) could be seeded into that round, with the other half entering in the Third Round. US Soccer has already announced that at least the 9 US-based CONCACAF Champions Cup teams will enter in the Round of 32.
Whatever happens this month, US Soccer does have an interest in making the U.S. Open Cup as big as it can be, especially now with all marketing done in house. Changes don’t happen overnight, but this tournament is trending in the right direction in a lot of areas and is increasing to a new record size every year. MLS’ complaints are easily refuted by facts in some places, but if they truly want their younger players to get more minutes, they can change their own rules to accommodate. But taking the teams out completely kills any chance of the competition being what they are asking for, let alone what US Soccer wants it to be.
