Asked about long-standing rumors on a unified North American top-flight during the MLS All-Star Game on Wednesday, Garber said he didn’t think it would ever happen, in part because of the logistical hurdles that would emerge.
The leagues have separate unions, contractual policies and season structures. Additionally, travel between the countries in a combined format could prove exhausting to teams over the course of a full season.
“I don’t think we’d ever do that,” Garber said on FS1. “I think we can get the benefits of a merger without actually having to go through the process with unions and structure.
“You get a great All-Star Game, you expand the Leagues Cup, the Campeones Cup. You have so manny different programs that deliver all of that value for fans regardless.”
The All-Star Game on Wednesday pitted MLS’ top players against Liga MX stars in an attempt to draw interest from both the U.S. and Mexico viewership markets.
Collaboration between the leagues has been a hot topic, with Liga MX president Mikel Arriola discussing the issue with Goal last week.
Said Arriola: “It’s super intuitive to continue increasing presence of the Mexican teams there, especially to grow hand in hand with MLS because if we don’t grow hand in hand with MLS, what will happen is that if they have larger sizes in their squads in [wages] and they will continue to remove players from us.”
Originally published by Goal.
