Bruno Damiani and Jovan Lukić’s first Union salaries are revealed

Though the Union paid a team-record $3.4 million transfer fee to sign striker Bruno Damiani, his salary isn’t all that different from the rest of the roster.

That number and many more were revealed on Wednesday by the MLS Players Association, which publishes all players’ salaries leaguewide twice each season. This batch was the year’s first, later than usual, but still a welcome dose of transparency.

Damiani’s base salary is $600,000, and his guaranteed compensation — the number commonly quoted as a player’s pay — is $726,700. It’s the sixth-highest salary on the squad, and it’s no surprise that the team’s three top strikers are all among the top earners.

Tai Baribo, the league’s leading scorer so far this season with 13 goals, is No. 5 at $810,000. Mikael Uhre, now in the last year of his contract, is earning $2.24 million. That is just short of the team’s salary record, still held by Marco Fabian’s $2.27 million in 2019.

The rest of the top six are also veterans: centerback Jakob Glesnes ($1,238,125), goalkeeper Andre Blake ($1,181,250), and left back Kai Wagner ($1,088,250).

Among the Union’s other newcomers this year, centerback Ian Glavinovich is earning $427,750. He is here on a one-year loan from Newell’s Old Boys in his native Argentina, and a purchase option presumably would not come cheap. A decision on the 23-year-old’s future likely won’t come for a while, not least because he’s been out since early April due to a torn meniscus in his right knee.

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Jovan Lukić’s salary is just $329,875, a bargain for a player who has quickly become an essential part of the Union’s midfield. Indiana Vassilev and Ben Bender are on unsurprising salaries for Americans in their mid-20s: $381,750 and $150,000, respectively. Each got a raise from his previous stop in MLS.

As for this year’s crop of rookies from the academy, forward Sal Olivas is earning the most at $104,702, and forward Eddy Davis III is earning the least at $82,622. To the Union’s credit, they aren’t paying anyone the league minimum of $80,622 in guaranteed compensation, though some players have that as their base salary.

Longtime captain Alejandro Bedoya took another pay cut to sign his latest one-year deal, now down to $204,500. His income is supplemented through work off the field with the Union’s front office, through a professional development program run by the league.

Around the rest of MLS, Inter Miami superstar Lionel Messi once again leads the way at $20,446,667. That is more than the entire payroll of 21 teams in the league, including the next-to-last-ranked Union’s. Toronto FC’s Lorenzo Insigne ranks second at $15,400,000, higher than eight teams.

Among this year’s big-name newcomers, Miguel Almirón is earning $7,871,000 (No. 4 overall) in his return to Atlanta United after six years at England’s Newcastle United. Expansion team San Diego FC’s Mexican star Hirving “Chucky” Lozano is at $7,633,333; the Chicago Fire’s Jonathan Bamba is at $5,581,806; and Atlanta’s Emmanuel Latte Lath is at $4,030,546.

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In Austin, Texas, Brandon Vazquez is earning $3,551,778 in his first year back in MLS, as he tries to earn his way back to the U.S. national team. A current U.S. national teamer, Luca de la Torre, is earning $1,535,331 in his native San Diego after many years in Europe.

In New York, Eric Maxim Choupo-Moting’s past glories at France’s Paris Saint-Germain and Germany’s Bayern Munich got the 36-year-old a $3,530,667 salary. And in Charlotte, N.C., Wilfried Zaha is on a more modest $2,751,667 during his yearlong loan from England’s Crystal Palace.

Two former Union players whom the team cast off due to salary demands got the raises they were looking for. Dániel Gazdag’s new deal in Columbus landed him $2,597,643, up from $1,757,500 in Chester last year; and Jack Elliott got $1,008,537, up from $893,750 here.

Each player’s salary figure officially includes two numbers: the base salary and the guaranteed compensation. The latter number includes signing and guaranteed bonuses, plus marketing bonuses and agents’ fees, annualized over the term of a player’s contract, including option years.

For conversational and reporting purposes, the guaranteed compensation number is the one usually used here and around the league.

This year’s “as of” date with the salary release is May 23, unusually a month after the spring transfer window closed. The players’ union waited another month to release the data.

The annotations in parentheses mean the following:

(1) — Senior roster player; (2) — Supplemental roster player; (3) — Supplemental roster spot 31, loaned to the Union’s reserve team for the entire year; (4) — Off-roster supplemental player

(5) — Designated Player; (6) — Young Designated Player (age 23 or below); (7) — Cap hit bought down with Targeted Allocation Money; (8) — International status; (9) — Homegrown Player status

(10) — Under-22 Player status (via age) to reduce salary cap charge; (11) — Also has a “professional development role” with the team for work beyond the field;

(12) — Currently loaned out; (13) — Change from his salary last year with Charlotte FC; (14) — Change from his salary last year with St. Louis City

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Across the landscape, MLS teams are paying a total of $585,578,208 to 902 players. The first number is a new record, fueled in part by the addition of expansion team San Diego FC. The second number is down slightly from last spring, which often happens in the first half of a year. Teams then bolster their rosters with summer signings to push toward the playoffs.

The average salary once again sets a new record at $649,199.79, the first time that number has exceeded $600,000. The median salary is also a new record, $339,876.50. The lowest salary in the league, which is set by the CBA, is $80,622, the first time that number has been over $80,000. It’s also the most common salary leaguewide, as it often is, with 66 players earning that sum.

Atlanta and FC Dallas have the most players on the minimum, with six each. The Colorado Rapids are next with five, followed by Nashville FC with four.

This section is often unpleasant reading for Union fans, and it is again this time. The team’s payroll of $13,365,549 is the second-lowest of MLS’s 30 teams right now. Only CF Montréal is lower.

Salary data do not include transfer fees, which occupy a significant portion of MLS team budgets and, these days, are often bigger than salaries. But the payroll comparison is still a snapshot of how teams handle the salary part of the equation. To learn more about teams’ histories with player sales and purchases, check out the data at Transfermarkt.us.

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It’s also important to note that players loaned out internationally are usually still counted on the MLSPA’s books. That can have a significant impact on the payroll rankings. For uniformity’s sake, all players listed in the MLSPA’s records are included in the calculations here, whether they’re big names or not.

That said, the total of 10 teams with guaranteed compensation sums over $20 million is a new MLS record, up from seven last fall. Six of them made the playoffs last year, including Supporters’ Shield-winning Miami and the eventual champion Los Angeles Galaxy. Three did not, including perpetual bottom-dwellers Toronto and Chicago. San Diego is the last team above the threshold.

Click here to see the team payroll comparison from the previous data set last October.

The number of millionaires leaguewide is up to 131, another record, from 126 at the end of last season and 115 last spring.

As with the payroll rankings above, the table below may include some players who are loaned to clubs outside the league, but technically still on MLS teams’ books.

The positions listed here come from the MLSPA’s database. They might not all be perfect matches, but they’re close enough.

Here are the latest versions of other charts that are recurring features in this analysis, showing changes in key MLS salary metrics over time.

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