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Milan Iloski’s opening salary with the Union is just over $550,000, according to data from the MLS Players Association released on Wednesday.

It’s a healthy raise from the $156,000 he was earning at the start of the year with San Diego FC, until he was released from that contract by mutual agreement. The Union acquired him in early August, signing him to a deal with funds from MLS’s Targeted Allocation Money system.

That was the big local news in the autumn edition of the labor union’s salary data. The twice-yearly release is always welcomed by fans and amateur capologists as they dig into the big earners, the bargains, and the busts.

Topping the list of summer newcomers, both in salary and name recognition, is Los Angeles FC’s Son Heung-Min. The South Korean superstar’s paycheck is $11,152,852, second-highest in the league behind Lionel Messi’s $20,446,667.

Messi has stood at No. 1 since his arrival at Inter Miami two years ago, and with the same number. He just signed a new contract that will keep him on the field in South Florida through 2028, including when the Herons open their new stadium next to Miami’s airport next year. We’ll find out the numbers in it next spring.

The second-biggest summer arrival was Thomas Müller in Vancouver. His starting salary with the Whitecaps is $1,436,956, just below the threshold for loading up a contract in MLS’s Targeted Allocation Money system without hitting Designated Player status.

Müller agreed to a deal that would give him less money up front in exchange for a bigger paycheck next year. The arrangement got the German legend in the door without Vancouver having to make other roster moves.

Miami’s vice?

Next on the marquee is another Miami newcomer, and another of Messi’s good friends, Rodrigo de Paul. His guaranteed compensation is $3,619,320, despite not being a Designated Player.

How is that possible? Plenty of people will say it shouldn’t be. It was no secret that the Herons had to do some pretty serious gymnastics when they signed him, with all three of their DP slots already taken: Messi, Jordi Alba (an even $6 million), and Sergio Busquets ($8,774,996). All three of those numbers are way too big to buy down with Targeted Allocation Money (TAM).

Let’s start with a reminder that the MLSPA always publishes two numbers: base salary and guaranteed compensation, which includes signing and guaranteed bonuses, plus marketing bonuses and agents’ fees, annualized over the term of a player’s contract, including option years.

Also, the numbers in these databases are also always annualized, which means they don’t necessarily reflect what a summer signing takes home down to the cent.

De Paul’s base salary is listed as $1.5 million, the maximum you can earn with TAM without being a DP. But even with that number being prorated to something lower, a lot of skeptics will say Miami is getting away with one.

The trick, it seems, lies in Miami signing de Paul on loan for the rest of the year before signing him for good this winter. That passes some of the salary burden back to his previous club, Spain’s Atlético Madrid.

ESPN reported when de Paul moved that MLS rules mandate “that no promise has already been made to exercise the permanent deal following the loan spell.” The Herons supposedly claimed that was the case, but no one believed them — and that same report said a new contract is ready for de Paul to sign this winter.

But at that point, things will be much easier, because Alba and Busquets are retiring after this season.

Miami has been caught bending the roster rules too far once before, in 2021. (The punishments were part of how Julián Carranza ended up with the Union.) But Messi and his friends weren’t in town yet back then. Now that they are, it seems the club might get away with this one.

Other names to know

The rest of the big summer signings leaguewide include two notable Americans: Medford native Paxten Aaronson and longtime U.S. national team goalkeeper Matt Turner.

Aaronson is earning $2,228,063 in his first year with the Colorado Rapids, which paid a nearly $8 million transfer fee to bring him back to the U.S. from Germany’s Eintracht Frankfurt.

Turner is earning $1,942,886 with the New England Revolution, which signed him on a year-and-a-half loan from France’s Lyon so he can have regular playing time before nex tyear’s World Cup.

Among international arrivals, New York City FC’s Nicolás Fernández is earning $3,650,000, and he paid some of that back by helping the Pigeons win at Charlotte in Game 1 of their playoff series on Tuesday.

Portland’s Kristoffer Velde is earning $3,027,000, and he scored his first Timbers goal in Sunday’s Game 1 at San Diego. Alas, it was too late to salvage a 2-1 loss.

Columbus’ Wessam Abou Ali is earning $2,157,375, but unfortunately he suffered a fracture in his right ankle in late September and is out six weeks. That might not be enough time to save the Crew’s first-round series against arch-rival Cincinnati, which won Game 1 at home on Monday.

Game 2 is Sunday in Columbus, and Game 3 would be Nov. 8 in Cincinnati.

Speaking of Cincinnati, they’ve got a case study on how to bring back a former star on a midseason deal. Brenner was a Designated Player striker from 2021-23, with a salary of over $2.2 million. He was sold to Italy’s Udinese, then reacquired this summer on a loan for the rest of this year with a purchase option.

His salary for now is just $280,120.

The Union’s payroll

Each player’s salary figure officially includes two numbers: the base salary and guaranteed compensation. The latter number includes signing and guaranteed bonuses, plus marketing bonuses and agents’ fees, annualized over the term of a player’s contract, including option years.

For conversational and reporting purposes, the guaranteed compensation number is the one usually used here and around the league.

Along with the team’s summer signings (Iloski and third-string goalkeeper George Marks) and departures (prospects Nelson Pierre and David Vazquez), you’ll notice that another name is missing.

Centerback Ian Glavinovich agreed to a mutual contract termination a few weeks after being given season-ending injury status for his rehab from a torn meniscus.

The only Union player who got a raise this summer is Jakob Glesnes. He signed a new contract in August, and his pay for the year went up by $71,875, where he’s pulling in $1.31 million this season.

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The annotations in parentheses mean the following:

(1) — Senior roster player; (2) — Supplemental roster player; (3) — Supplemental roster spot 31, loaned to the Union’s reserve team for the entire year; (4) — Off-roster supplemental player

(5) — Designated Player; (6) — Young Designated Player (age 23 or below); (7) — Cap hit bought down with Targeted Allocation Money; (8) — International status; (9) — Homegrown Player status

(10) — Under-22 Player status (via age) to reduce salary cap charge; (11) — Also has a “professional development role” with the team for work beyond the field; (12) — Currently loaned out

The big numbers leaguewide

Across the landscape, MLS teams are paying a total of $597,372,429 to 944 players.

The average salary is $632,809.78, down a little bit from the spring, the first time that number has exceeded $600,000. The median salary of $300,000 has not changed. The lowest salary in the league, which is set by the CBA, is $80,622. It’s also the most common salary leaguewide, as it often is, with 78 players earning that sum.

Atlanta has the most players on the minimum with eight, followed by Dallas with seven. Colorado has five, followed by Nashville, San Diego, St. Louis, and Seattle with four. The Union have none.

Team payroll comparison

This section is often unpleasant reading for Union fans, and it is again this time. The team’s payroll of $13,365,549 is the third-lowest of MLS’s 30 teams right now, ahead of only Dallas and Montréal.

Salary data do not include transfer fees, which occupy a significant portion of MLS team budgets and, these days, are often bigger than salaries. But the payroll comparison is still a snapshot of how teams handle the salary part of the equation. To learn more about teams’ histories with player sales and purchases, check out the data at Transfermarkt.us.

It’s also important to note that players loaned out internationally are usually still counted on the MLSPA’s books. That can have a significant impact on the payroll rankings. For uniformity’s sake, all players listed in the MLSPA’s records are included in the calculations here, whether they’re big names or not.

The most attention here usually goes to the top of the table, but this time the big headline is near the bottom. Toronto finally freed itself of big-money busts Lorenzo Insigne and Federico Bernardeschi, cutting the payroll from over $34 million in the spring — the second-highest total leaguewide — to $13.6 million now.

That’s fourth from last, and just over $200,000 above where the Union have been all along. The Reds will no doubt reload this winter, but it’s quite a sight for now.

Click here to see the team payroll comparison from the previous data set this past spring.

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The millionaires club

The number of millionaires leaguewide is up to 138, another record, from 131 in the spring and 126 at the end of last season.

As with the payroll rankings above, the table below may include some players who are loaned to clubs outside the league, but technically still on MLS teams’ books.

The positions listed here come from the MLSPA’s database. They might not all be perfect matches, but they’re close enough.

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Historical charts

Here are the latest versions of other charts that are recurring features in this analysis, showing changes in key MLS salary metrics over time.

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