MLS weekend wrap-up: Key takeaways from Matchday 17

The Club World Cup is the most lucrative club tournament on earth. Teams get nearly $10M just for qualifying and up to $100M for winning the whole thing. That money, though, will not make it to the players. MLS has strict, longstanding rules around bonus payments that were determined well before the Club World Cup became so valuable. Despite multiple attempts from the MLS Players Union to renegotiate it, MLS appears unwilling to budge.

Seattle's issue isn't with the tournament: it's with the idea that the club could earn $100M there, but the players would take home pennies of that thanks to an outdated bargaining clause the league refuses to change. "It is the players who make the game possible," the MLS Players Association said in a statement on the issue. "It is the players who are lifting MLS up on the global stage. They expect to be treated fairly and with respect." Amen.

The LA Galaxy is finally on the board

Los Angeles fans, you're clear to exhale. After a record-setting 16 straight MLS games without a win, last year's MLS Champion finally picked up its first victory of the season. The Galaxy beat Real Salt Lake 2-0 with goals from Paraguay's Lucas Sanabria and Ghana's Joseph Paintsil.

"I'm proud of these guys because they've stuck with it," said long-suffering Galaxy coach Greg Vanney. "They deserve this. It's a hard-fought first win."

Hard-fought is right. Few teams have waited longer for their first win than the Galaxy did. With a few winnable games against fellow Western Conference stragglers St. Louis and Colorado coming up next, though, this relieved Galaxy side could get itself on something resembling a roll.

Will the Galaxy recover and make the playoffs? No. But with this opening win in the rearview mirror, the Galaxy will finally be able to take a deep breath again.  

Lionel Messi has found a rich vein of form

Inter Miami went through a rough spell in May. The team went winless across three games and dropped behind its Eastern Conference rivals. Team captain Lionel Messi, sensing the frustration from Miami's fanbase, gave a rare public interview to set the record straight. 

"We have to keep working and think about what’s ahead of us," Messi said. "There are three or four more games to finish the month, and we have to finish in the best manner possible to take on the Club World Cup. I think we have what it takes."

Boy, was he right. Miami has been on fire since Lionel Messi's interview, and Messi himself has been the one stoking it. Miami put five goals past perennial trophy favorites Columbus this weekend, and Messi was involved in every single one of them. So much for that rough spell, huh?

MLS will return to action in two weeks on Saturday, June 14.