Extraordinary circumstances spur change. Lasting change. And perhaps the first concrete example of coronavirus-related disruption in sports arrived late last week: Liga MX, Mexico’s top soccer league, voted to scrap its promotion and relegation scheme for five years.

The decision sparked furious debate throughout Mexican soccer, with prominent players pushing back and fans disturbed. They see greed, and impending institutional demise. Some, including legendary defender Rafa Marquez, have argued that the move to a closed system will allow MLS to surpass Liga MX and become the preeminent soccer league in North America.

But in reality, it is just the opposite. It’s a move toward the MLS model. It’s an acknowledgement that MLS franchises, despite smaller and less passionate fan bases, are more attractive investments than Liga MX clubs right now. And it’s an implicit statement that most soccer powerbrokers worldwide are afraid to make, but that many would agree with: There’s logic in MLS’ Americanized structure. And Liga MX, apparently, is ready to fall in line.

Alejandro Irarragorri, a Liga MX owner, laid out the case on Saturday. He wrote that MLS “has been growing in an orderly, slow, but constant way in all senses: commercially, infrastructure, financial structure, reach and sports. Its fundamentals are solid, its market very large, relevant in purchasing power and growing in taste and appetite for soccer. Today, MLS clubs have a much higher annual turnover than our league.”

MLS, in other words, has many things that Liga MX craves.

View photos Could Atlanta vs. Club America become a twice-a-year showdown in a MLS-Liga MX North American Super League? (Rich von Biberstein/Icon Sportswire/Getty Images) More

Liga MX, however, also has many things that MLS craves. Which is why the two leagues entered into a partnership in 2018 that already includes two new interleague competitions, and why leaders north and south of the border envision so much more. MLS commissioner Don Garber has called a combined league “the ultimate dream” and, hypothetically, “a powerful force in professional sports.”

In this light, it’s difficult to not view last week’s Liga MX maneuvering as a step toward a North American Super League. Irarragorri even brought it up in his extensive statement. “It’s probable that a possible creation of a North American league in the short term would be better for MLS, in the medium term for Liga MX, but in the long term it’s better for both,” he wrote. He called the potential “immense.”

To skeptics, it remains a Soccer United Marketing fantasy. To realists, though, it’s the future.

Why a North American Super League makes sense

Let’s be very clear: The primary reason a North American Super League makes sense to those with the power to create it is money. Closed leagues are designed to put profits in owners’ pockets. A closed league with vast reach – from Mexico City to Seattle, and Toronto to Los Angeles, and New York to Tijuana – could be lucrative.

But it’s also important to understand that profits don’t automatically mean exploitation. Yes, big-time sports are littered with billionaires exploiting labor. But profits and potential also enable investment. Fans should want MLS or any American soccer league to drive revenue. Of course, they should also pressure owners to pour that revenue back into the sport, but revenue is an integral puzzle piece. That’s how the sport grows.

It’s also how leagues create entertaining products. What has held MLS back, for decades, is a combination of risk aversion and a meager TV deal. Top sports leagues get massive sums for broadcast rights. Those sums filter down to teams, who spend them on players, which ups the quality of the league. MLS has never gotten those massive sums, and some owners – not all – have been unwilling to increase spending without guarantees that increased spending will lead to those massive sums. To them, the revenue must come first.

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