Muted Lionel Messi ceremony reveals MLS divide as commissioner issues clubs and players familiar warning

Lionel Messi stood center stage with an historic MVP trophy in his hands, photographers packed in below him angling for the perfect shot, and MLS commissioner Don Garber smiled off to the side in a ceremonious scene that Major League Soccer could only have dreamt of a few years ago.

But if you zoomed the lens out, the image looked far less glorious. The presentation took place in a largely empty stadium, rain pouring, the atmosphere failing to match the moment itself.

That quiet, rainy ceremony at Inter Miami's Chase Stadium on Tuesday captured more than just a logistical quirk. It also served as a fitting metaphor for a larger issue that MLS continues to ignore.

MLS Commissioner Don Garber addresses Lionel Messi’s media silence

Even as the 38-year-old Messi continues to elevate the league on the field and in its global appeal, his distance from the traditional North American media ecosystem has steadily exposed one of the league's long-standing issues.

“The international football community just thinks about their relationship with the media very differently than North America does," Garber said after the event in a quiet room within the stadium. "It’s just a difference in the DNA of our leagues here and in the leagues abroad. That’s something we have to manage.

“Our coaches are growing up in different environments, our players are growing up in different environments. That is something we have got to continue to plow through.

"I do believe that all of our players and all of our coaches — if we want our league to be more popular — are going to have to embrace access in ways that are going to be similar to what happens in the NBA and in the NFL and in other domestic leagues.

"But that’s a cultural education. We’re just going to continue to work for it. It’s just one of the things we have got to manage through.”

Garber may have repeated the line of working through the challenge, but his words do not match the league's actions. In fact, the trend seems to be moving in the opposite direction.

Messi is far from the only star in MLS who seldom participates in media these days, and teams have increasingly spent much of the past decade finding creative ways to skirt the league's long-standing post-game open locker room policy.

Media access has continued to diminish as Major League Soccer has become more international, which might align with how things are done in the sport across much of the world but it is counterproductive to the traditional American approach.

The juxtaposition of Tuesday morning's MLS MVP announcement perfectly underlined that cultural clash.

There was Messi becoming the first player in league history to win the individual award in back-to-back seasons, just days after helping Inter Miami lift its first MLS Cup. Yet almost no one was present in the stadium to celebrate it with him. Not teammates, not coaches, not owners.

It wasn’t just the absence of familiar faces that dulled the moment and deepened the disconnect. Only a few hundred fans sitting in the east stand attended the free event, which was as poorly marketed as it was scheduled.

What helped make the event feel so jarring were the circumstances surrounding it. The gloomy ceremony coincided with the start of the inaugural Messi Cup — a youth tournament organized by the Argentine — and went against Major League Soccer's wishes for a more traditional, higher-profile announcement.

🏅 MESSI e Inter Miami: LIONEL MESSI recibe PREMIO de MLS MVP antes del inicio de la Messi Cup - YouTube

Watch On

“Thank you very much for this award," said Messi, who scored 29 goals and delivered 19 assists in the MLS regular season. "It has been a very special year after everything we lived through. It was a long year with a lot of games and a lot of travel, but also a very historic year for the club."

Maybe this type of muted event is the perfect embodiment of the famously low-key Messi himself. Not much hoopla, not much spectacle, not much obligation.

Still, it was not in line with how Major League Soccer has historically handled its annual MVP announcements. It also contradicted MLS's stated desire for stars to embrace greater media visibility and for moments like these to serve as marquee showcases.

The image of Messi lifting his second straight MVP trophy in an empty, rain-soaked stadium is now etched in league history, a reminder of both how far MLS has come and how far it still has to go.