Larry Berg voted as next MLS commissioner to succeed Don Garber

The Major League Soccer board of governors has voted to install Los Angeles FC co-managing owner Larry Berg as the league’s next commissioner.

Berg will succeed Don Garber as the head of the 30-year-old league, with a term starting on 1 January 2027. He will be the third commissioner in MLS history.

Garber, who has served as commissioner since 1999, has a contract with the league that runs until the end of 2027. The league announced Monday that he will transition to the role of chairman after Berg assumes the role, to ensure “a seamless leadership transition as MLS enters one of the most significant periods in its history”.

Berg is required to divest his shares of LAFC as part of the transition process, the league said.

The vote took place among all MLS owners on Monday at the league’s headquarters in midtown Manhattan in a closed-door meeting, after presentations given by Berg and David Nathanson, the other candidate for the post, earlier in the day. Nathanson’s background was largely in sports media. He spent significant time working for Fox, while also investing in the Seattle Sounders, Angel City FC (NWSL) and the Seattle Kraken (NHL).

Berg comes from a private equity investment background. He is a senior adviser at 26North and was previously a partner at Apollo Global Management and the chair of McGraw-Hill Education. He initially invested as a limited partner when LAFC was launched in 2014 and became one of the club’s managing owners in 2016 after an internal buyout. He is the co-chair of MLS’s sporting and competition committee.

LAFC first took the field in 2018 with former US manager Bob Bradley as coach and then-Mexico international Carlos Vela as headliner. The club quickly became one of the league’s model operations, perennial contenders on the pitch and a respected operation in many other departments. Sporting director John Thorrington, one of the club’s first hires, was named MLS sporting executive of the year in 2024, while LAFC was named the Operations Club of the Year in 2023.

The club has consistently been among the league’s most valuable franchises since debuting, with Forbes estimating a valuation of $1.32bn as of May. Berg’s experience of building a well-supported club in a major market will be crucial as MLS tries to make greater inroads in other cities, such as New York and Chicago. As commissioner, he will take cues from all of MLS’s owners, including those in smaller markets who haven’t historically invested in their rosters to the extent that LAFC have.

“Having worked closely with Larry over the past decade, I’ve seen first-hand the qualities that make him an exceptional leader, and I have complete confidence he is the right person to serve as Major League Soccer’s next Commissioner,” Garber said in a written statement. “I look forward to working alongside Larry during this transition and supporting him as he leads MLS into its next chapter.”

Berg has been a vocal supporter of MLS’s trajectory, stating in February 2020 that he believes MLS would “pass baseball and hockey to be the No 3 sport in the US behind football and basketball” by the end of the current decade. He cited the league’s burgeoning academy system as evidence, as well as the intrinsic pull of living in the United States.

“I think we’re already a league of choice to a certain extent,” Berg continued in that 2020 media day interview, “but whether we can be a top-five league or top-three league will really come down at the end of the day to money and our ability to compete for players.”

The most prominent example of an American sports commissioner who had team-owner experience was Bud Selig, who owned the Milwaukee Brewers before becoming Major League Baseball’s lead executive in 1992, although he was initially appointed on an acting basis.