The Inequality of Unbalanced Schedules in MLS

One of my main annoyances with the MLS, as a league overall, is its resilience of revert back to a balanced schedule similar to the 2010 and 2011 seasons.  For those that do not know a balanced schedule is one where every team plays every other team the same amount of times throughout the season. For example in a 20 team league Team A would play all other 19 teams once at home and once away for a total of 38 games.  This schedule structure is used in almost every other soccer league around the world.  MLS and other North American professional sports leagues have decided to use unbalanced schedules, which usually have a focus on Conference and Divisional rival games.  This creates an inequality in the “difficulty” of each teams schedule and I think this leads to an unfair advantage for a few teams, which could be easily eliminated by changing to a balanced schedule.

First, let’s take a look at the schedule structures the MLS has used in the last few seasons when not using a balanced schedule*.

2008

The 14 teams were split into two seven-team conferences. Each team played 30 games that were evenly divided between home and away games. Each team played every other team twice, home and away, for a total of 26 games. The remaining four games were played against four regional rivals, two at home and two away.

2009

The 15 teams were split into two conferences. Each team played a total of 30 games that were evenly divided between home and away games. Each team played every other team twice, home and away, for a total of 28 games. The remaining two games were played against two conference rivals, one at home and one away.

2012

Each of the 19 teams plays a 34-game regular season schedule, one that employs an unbalanced format that gives greater emphasis on in-conference matchups

Western Conference clubs will play each conference rival three times, and play once against each Eastern Conference club.

Eastern Conference clubs will play seven of their conference rivals three times, the remaining two conference rivals twice, and each Western Conference club once.

*I could only find full schedule breakdowns for the seasons 2008-2012

So you can see when not using a balanced schedule there can be a large difference in the composition of each team’s individual schedule.

To find out if there is a “difficulty” difference in the schedules of each team, because of the unbalanced schedule, I will find the “difficulty score” of each team and apply that score to how many times a team played them to find a total difficulty score of their season.  Comparison of the range of difficulty in seasons with a balanced schedule and one’s with an unbalanced schedule will show if the different schedule setup leads to unfairness.

Explanation of the Math

For each season I will add up the total points earned by every team and divide by the number of teams to find an “average” MLS team for that season.  Then take that “average” MLS team points and use it as the denominator against each individual team’s points total.  This new difficulty score of each team will be applied to each individual teams schedule and find a total difficulty score of the season.

For example if Team A had 43 points in the season but the “average” MLS team has 45.2 points

Team A would have a difficulty score of

43/45.2= 0.9513274336283186

If Team B played Team A twice in that season the difficulty of that would be

0.9513274336283186*2= 1.902654867256637

You would then continue this throughout Team B’s entire schedule to find their season’s difficulty.  This would then be done for every team that season to see the collective difficulties of each team.

2008 Season

Schedule Rank	Team	Schedule Difficulty	Standings	Difference
1	Columbus	29.09947644	1	0
2	Houston	29.17277487	2	0
3	Chicago	29.68586387	3	0
4	Salt Lake	29.71029668	7	-3
5	Chivas	29.73472949	5	0
6	Colorado	30.05235602	9	-3
7	LA	30.05235602	13	-6
8	DC United	30.17452007	10	-2
9	FC Dallas	30.19895288	11	-2
10	NE Revs	30.34554974	4	6
11	KC	30.36998255	6	5
12	New York	30.36998255	8	4
13	San Jose	30.46771379	14	-1
14	Toronto	30.56544503	12	2

The schedule difficulty range of this season was 1.465968586.

2009 Season

Schedule Rank	Team	Schedule Difficulty	Standings	Difference
1	NE Revs	29.25742574	7	-6
2	LA	29.48019802	2	0
3	Seattle	29.52970297	4	-1
4	Houston	29.57920792	3	1
5	Columbus	29.65346535	1	4
6	Toronto	29.8019802	12	-6
7	DC United	29.95049505	10	-3
8	Chicago	29.97524752	5	3
9	Colorado	29.97524752	9	0
10	Chivas	30.12376238	6	4
11	Salt Lake	30.1980198	8	3
12	FC Dallas	30.24752475	11	1
13	KC	30.3960396	13	0
14	San Jose	30.86633663	14	0
15	New York	30.96534653	15	0

The schedule difficulty range of this season was 1.707920792.

2010 Season

Schedule Rank	Team	Schedule Difficulty	Standings	Difference
1	LA	29.14803625	1	0
2	Salt Lake	29.29305136	2	0
3	New York	29.5347432	3	0
4	FC Dallas	29.58308157	4	0
5	Columbus	29.58308157	5	0
6	Seattle	29.67975831	6	0
7	Colorado	29.77643505	7	0
8	San Jose	29.77643505	8	0
9	KC	30.11480363	9	0
10	Chicago	30.25981873	10	0
11	Toronto	30.3081571	11	0
12	Houston	30.40483384	12	0
13	NE Revs	30.45317221	13	0
14	Philly	30.50151057	14	0
15	Chivas	30.64652568	15	0
16	DC United	30.93655589	16	0

The schedule difficulty range of this season was 1.788519637.

2011 Season

Schedule Rank	Team	Schedule Difficulty	Standings	Difference
1	LA	33.02955665	1	0
2	Seattle	33.20689655	2	0
3	Salt Lake	33.65024631	3	0
4	FC Dallas	33.69458128	4	0
5	KC	33.73891626	5	0
6	Houston	33.82758621	6	0
7	Colorado	33.82758621	7	0
8	Philly	33.87192118	8	0
9	Columbus	33.91625616	9	0
10	New York	33.96059113	10	0
11	Chicago	34.09359606	11	0
12	Portland	34.13793104	12	0
13	DC United	34.27093596	13	0
14	San Jose	34.31527094	14	0
15	Chivas	34.40394089	15	0
16	Toronto	34.53694581	16	0
17	NE Revs	34.75862069	17	0
18	Vancouver	34.75862069	18	0

The schedule difficulty range of this season was 1.729064039.

2012 Season

Schedule Rank	Team	Schedule Difficulty	Standings	Difference
1	San Jose	32.50448431	1	0
2	DC United	33.01569507	3	-1
3	Salt Lake	33.07959641	5	-2
4	Seattle	33.14349776	7	-3
5	KC	33.25	2	3
6	LA	33.27130045	8	-2
7	Chicago	33.50560538	6	1
8	Columbus	33.61210762	10	-2
9	Vancouver	33.97421525	11	-2
10	New York	34.03811659	4	6
11	Houston	34.03811659	9	2
12	Dallas	34.22982063	13	-1
13	Colorado	34.35762332	14	-1
14	Portland	34.54932736	17	-3
15	Montreal	34.6132287	12	3
16	Philly	34.74103139	15	1
17	Chivas	34.80493274	18	-1
18	NE Revs	35.42264574	16	2
19	Toronto	35.84865471	19	0

The schedule difficulty range of this season was 3.3441704.

Schedule Difficulty Range Table

Year	Schedule Difficulty Range
2008	1.465968586
2009	1.707920792
2010	1.788519637
2011	1.729064039
2012	3.3441704

Analysis

When starting out my theory was that balanced schedules would lead to a smaller range in the difficulty of schedules.  If we look at 2010 through 2012 my theory holds up with 2010 and 2011 being balanced schedule seasons having smaller ranges then 2012, an unbalanced schedule season, having a larger range than the balanced seasons.

The problem with my theory starts in 2008 and 2009 where the range in those seasons was less than the range in the two balanced schedule seasons.  I theorized that this happened because in the 2008 and 2009 seasons each team only played 30 games while from 2010-2012 they played 34 games.  So to see if my theory held up I adjusted the 2008 and 2009 season to be balanced schedules to compare the ranges of the unbalanced and balanced versions of 2008 and 2009 seasons.

2008 Adjusted Season

Schedule Rank	Team	Schedule Difficulty	Standings	Difference
1	Columbus	25.07630522	1	0
2	Houston	25.58232932	2	0
3	NE Revs	25.58232932	3	0
4	Chicago	25.80722892	4	0
5	Chivas	26.03212852	5	0
6	New York	26.03212852	6	0
7	KC	26.08835341	7	0
8	Colorado	26.08835341	8	0
9	Dallas	26.08835341	9	0
10	Salt Lake	26.14457831	10	0
11	Toronto	26.25702811	11	0
12	San Jose	26.31325301	12	0
13	LA	26.42570281	13	0
14	DC United	26.48192771	14	0

The schedule difficulty range for this adjusted season was 1.236947791.

2009 Adjusted Season

Schedule Rank	Team	Schedule Difficulty	Standings	Difference
1	Seattle	27.50883392	1	0
2	Columbus	27.61484099	2	0
3	Houston	27.61484099	3	0
4	Chicago	27.66784453	4	0
5	Chivas	27.66784453	5	0
6	LA	27.77385159	6	0
7	NE Revs	27.82685513	7	0
8	Colorado	27.87985866	8	0
9	Toronto	27.93286219	9	0
10	Salt Lake	28.03886926	10	0
11	DC United	28.09187279	11	0
12	Dallas	28.25088339	12	0
13	KC	28.46289753	13	0
14	San Jose	28.5689046	14	0
15	New York	29.09893993	15	0

The schedule difficulty range for this adjusted season was 1.590106007.

The new adjusted seasons show that if these seasons were balanced schedules there would have been less disparity in the schedule difficulty, which creates a league where the best teams rise to the top not the ones who had a relatively easier schedule.

The Effect of Unbalanced Schedules

2008

Top Western Conference teams got an advantage because they were able to play the lower seeded Western Conference teams more and did not have to play the Top Eastern Conference as much as most of the Eastern Conference.  If a balanced schedule was used my adjusted season projected that Colorado Rapids would have made the playoffs instead of Real Salt Lake this year.

2009

New England, Toronto, and DC United all got an advantage this season because they were able to play the lower seeded Eastern Conference teams more.  While Columbus, Chicago, and Chivas were all at a disadvantage because of having to play higher seed teams more often.  Again, If a balance schedule used my adjusted season projected that Colorado would have made the playoffs instead of Real Salt Lake, who went on to win MLS Cup this year and have become a powerhouse in the MLS who knows what would have happened to them if they did not win the Cup that year.

2012

The top Eastern Conference were at a huge advantage because most of them were able to play the lowly teams in the bottom half of the Eastern Conference three times each, while the Western Conference which was collectively stronger this year than the East did not get to beat up on the bottom half of Eastern Conference as often.  This gave the top Eastern Conference teams’ inflated final standings positions.

Conclusion

In a league where playoff qualification, home field advantage in the playoffs, draft order, allocation ranking¹, and amount of allocation money received², the re-entry process rankings³, and lottery rankings⁴ are all based on the previous season’s standings having unfair scheduling affects every part of a team not just qualifying for the playoffs.  MLS, being a league that has all of these player acquisition mechanisms related to the standings, needs to change back to a balanced schedule to eliminate the systematic inequality created by an unbalanced schedule which gives a few teams an advantage.   

¹used to determine who has first priority to acquire USMNT member who signs with MLS after playing abroad, or a former MLS player who is returning to the league after going to a club abroad for a transfer fee

²you can see an explanation of allocation money here http://viewfrommyroom2.blogspot.ca/2013/07/and-there-goes-another.html

³a form of free agency where all players who were not resigned by their clubs are put into a quasi-draft

⁴used to assign Generation Adidas⁵ players who signed with the league after the draft or players who were offer contracts but did not sign them prior to the draft

⁵players who’s salary does not count against the cap