The 2026 L.A. Galaxy may not be serious, but team captain Marco Reus is

Major League Soccer's Los Angeles Galaxy are many things—celebrated, reviled, decorated, questioned—but they are rarely consistent. In 2023, the club shouldered a deserved (and ultimately successful) fan boycott that led to the ousting of its president; in 2024, it won the MLS Cup in grand style; in 2025, it sank right back into ignominy, putting in the worst title defense in MLS history and failing to win any of its opening 16 league games.

Are the Galaxy an entertaining club in the modern era? Yes, even if some of that entertainment is of the rubbernecking, car-crash variety. Is it serious one, though? That's a little harder to pin down. Other MLS franchises certainly present a more serious front, from Inter Miami's South Florida strut to Nashville's Music City muscle. Both of those teams are fighting for first in their conference with just one loss to their names. 

The Galaxy, meanwhile, are riding an EKG of a form chart—win, loss, draw, loss, win—and sitting outside the Western Conference playoff zone. It certainly doesn't look serious. Which makes the attitude of Marco Reus, its latest superstar Designated Player, all the more refreshing. 

"When I speak, everybody should listen," Reus said, quite seriously indeed, after scoring a brace in his team's tense 2-1 win over Real Salt Lake. The Galaxy may not be serious, but Reus certainly is.

Leading a new wave

36-year-old Reus arrived in Los Angeles in the summer of 2024 after twelve years with German club Borussia Dortmund. Blessed with a good head on his shoulders and a rocket of a right foot, Reus's mission was simple: to bring the Galaxy back to their league-leading best. He delivered that in his first season, winning the 2024 MLS Cup alongside the potent attacking lineup of Spain's Riqui Puig, Ghana's Joseph Paintsil, Brazil's Gabriel Pec and Serbia's Dejan Joveljic.

Reus was the first of his generation of German superstars to arrive in MLS, but he wasn't the last. National team legend Thomas Muller followed suit a year later, joining the Vancouver Whitecaps and leading them to an MLS Cup final; young journeyman Timo Werner came next and is poised to do the same with the San Jose Earthquakes in 2026. The trio is leading MLS's Western Conference with quiet confidence. They share 21 goal involvements across 10 MLS matchdays this season. All are impactful, but it's Reus who has delivered the most game-deciding strikes this season: his goals and assists have been the difference that sealed eight of the Galaxy's twelve points in 2026.