Major League Soccer isn’t always the prettiest. It’s not always the most tactically advanced. But what MLS is — and always has been, really — is a welcome home for the weird. From a suspended Norwegian defender playing a DJ set out of the back of a monster truck at halftime of one of his team’s games to a chain-smoking head coach who looked like he could be Pitbull’s dad describing his team as “a barrel of shit,” MLS has given us more — far more — than its fair share of bizarre in its 25 years of existence.



In many instances, that weirdness has been embraced. The lovable, long-haired American goons who couldn’t stop scoring stoppage-time goals for one of the unlikeliest Supporters’ Shield winners of all-time; the insanely reckless goalkeeper who couldn’t stop referring to himself in the third person; the boy-wonder midfielder who was as skillful as he was reclusive; all of them became...