With the announcement of the five 2025 MLS MVP finalists last week, one thing became very clear: Messi is inevitable. After the final round of regular season games were played, Messi stood above all others, taking home the Golden Boot and all but sealing the deal on the MVP race.
This will make Messi the second player in MLS history to win multiple MVP awards and the first player to win the award in consecutive seasons. This allows us a unique opportunity to directly compare two MVP-caliber seasons for the same player. So, let’s dig into the data a bit, shall we?
The MVP finalists this season were stronger than last season
While it may feel like Messi was destined to become MVP, the race this season was arguably closer than many would have expected. As discussed in a previous piece, Anders Dreyer from San Diego FC put up stellar numbers that rivaled Messi this year and it could be argued was the leading candidate until the final game week when Messi scored three and added an assist to secure the Golden Boot and boost his stats.
That said, it wasn’t just Dreyer that had a stellar season. Evander looked revitalized with his new team in Cincinnati, Denis Bouanga with LAFC and Sam Surridge had strong seasons, both competing for the Golden Boot.
Looking at the total goal contributions among the MVP finalists compared to last season, we can see that they all have outperformed the finalists from last year (with Messi and Evander outperforming themselves).
Outside of Surridge, who as a number nine is rarely involved in setting up goals, all the MVP candidates for 2025 had higher goal contributions than the MVP candidates in 2024. To further drive home how much stronger this season’s MVP ballot was, just look at Denis Bouanga – not only did he score more goals this season than last year’s Golden Boot winner Christian Benteke (24 vs. 23) but he also has as many goal contributions than last year’s MVP winner (Messi with 31). All of that and he is fourth in goal contributions.
Messi’s was much more impactful in 2025
While almost all this season’s finalists outperformed the finalists from last season, Messi stands above the rest. Messi ended the regular season in style with a hat trick against Nashville which helped him secure the Golden Boot by a five-goal margin with 29 goals. This, along with his 16 assists on the season, gives Messi a grand total of 45 goal contributions in the 2025 season. This number not only beats out all the other 2025 MVP finalists but eclipses his goal contribution total from last season (31).
While its clear that Messi’s numbers in 2025 are significantly higher than his numbers from last season, its important to note that he played significantly less minutes in 2024. Last season, Messi only logged 1489 regular season minutes, compared to the 2421 regular season minutes he logged in 2025. That’s a difference of 932 minutes! Put another way, Messi essentially played 10 more full games in 2025.
So, while the difference in his seasons may seem stark, when we level the playing field a bit and look at his ‘per 90’ statistics, there is a little less variance.
We can see that Messi actually underperformed a bit in 2025 when it comes to goals, assists but overperformed in areas around expected goals and expected assists. So, one could assume that if Messi had been fit and played more minutes last season, we could have seen similar numbers to what we saw this season. Numbers which would have absolutely blown the rest of the MVP finalists out of the water.
The question I always like to come back to, however, is how important were his goal contributions? We have discussed that when thinking about a player’s value to their team, one of the metrics we can look it as how their goals/assists directly relate to a team’s league points. When we look at how many of the goals Messi scored were the difference between Inter Miami winning a game or tying a game, one major theme pops out: Messi was much more impactful to Miami’s success in 2025 than in 2024.
Not only did Messi score more goals and register more assists in 2025, he also more directly contributed to Inter Miami’s league table points. He was involved in six more goals that were game winners which means he was directly involved in helping Miami win 18 more points this season, contributing to a total of 35 points which is double the number he contributed to last season. This is also means he was directly involved in helping Miami secure more than half of their league points in a season where they were competing to win the Supporter’s Shield. Last season, Messi was only involved in less than a quarter of the team’s points.
When we adjust for per 90 minutes, we see a similar story. In 2025 Messi was directly involved in a average of 1.4 team points per 90 minutes – higher than his average of 1.0 team points per 90 last season. The only player with a better per 90-point contribution is Columbus’s Cucho in 2024, who had a 1.5 average which resulted in 36 points contributed or 55% of Columbus’s 2024 league points.
While the statistics offer a glimpse into the nuances of Messi’s performance across the 2024 and 2025 seasons, one undeniable truth emerges: Messi continues to redefine the landscape of MLS. His increased impact on Inter Miami’s success solidifies his status as a game-changer. Remove Messi from the equation, and the MVP conversation shifts dramatically, with players like Cucho, Evander and Dreyer staking their claim.
But this is Messi’s world, and in 2025, he once again proved why he stands alone at the summit.
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