Getting Reacquainted with the Los Angeles Galaxy, MLS's Joy Points Kings

He was just as surprised to be named MVP.

Thumbnail History
The olds whisper legends about how the Los Angeles Galaxy started its storied history as Major League Soccer’s first Buffalo Bills, losing the first three MLS Cup they played. Those early stumbles buried more than one relevant fact – e.g., they won their first Supporters’ Shield in 1998, their first CONCACAF Champions’ Cup in 2000 (not the feat it later became, to be fair) - but the Galaxy put together competitive teams from the jump, even if they didn’t have all that many trophies to show for it. With long-forgotten players like Mauricio Cienfuegos, Kevin Hartman, Danny Califf, Cobi Jones and (the semi-infamous) Carlos Ruiz leading the way, the Galaxy won a Double in 2002 – and came damn close to a triple (they were runners-up in the U.S. Open Cup that year). Some real successes followed – an MLS Cup in 2005, if with a decidedly average team (also, won by one of the flukiest goals in MLS history) and the Shield again in 2009 – but LA spent the rest of the 2000s bumping their asses against the ground as hard and often as any team in MLS. Turns out that playing in a world-famous city doesn’t do a team enough favors when roster rules and small budgets bind every team in the same shackles (ball gag optional). It ultimately took not just the arrival of the Designated Player Rule (2007), but also the subsequent expansion(s) of the same rule (2010 and 2012), for the Galaxy’s natural advantages to kick all the way in. Success wasn’t immediate - even David Beckham, aka, the OG DP, played with the peanut gallery calling him a flop over his first few seasons - but the opening of MLS’s Rube-Goldbergian budget rules set the stage for the five-plus-season period that made the Galaxy the most dominant team in MLS history. Between 2009 and 2014, LA won three MLS Cups, two Supporters’ Shields, and they went to one more MLS Cup besides. They owed a lot of that success to Landon Donovan, aka, the man whose name now graces the league MVP award, but Ireland’s Robbie Keane arguably put those teams over the top (his hit-rate in MLS was nuts). Those two, Beckham, some outstanding defenses, and unsung heroes like midfield back-stop Juninho turned the Galaxy into MLS first unstoppable force since the DC United teams of the late 1990s/early 2000s. Even if both Red Bull New York and the Seattle Sounders would like a word, MLS hasn’t seen a team as reliable as LA’s best teams since. After the 2014 MLS Cup, LA could only squeak into the 2015 post-season as a wild card and they missed the playoffs outright in 2017 (with a tap by the Wooden Spoon thrown in for good measure), 2018, 2020, 2021 and as recently as 2023. The Galaxy signed the biggest players they could to solve the problem – see, Zlatan Ibrahimovic and Giovani dos Santos – but they either scrimped on the foundation (my personal theory, fwiw) or just couldn’t put one together, any star can only shine so bright, etc. Maybe that’s what made LA’s comfortable 2024 MLS Cup win feel like a bolt out of the blue. With wingers Joseph Paintsil and Gabriel Pec running on either side of Devan Joveljic (traded after 2024), and the small, shifty No. 10(?) Riqui Puig pulling the strings, the Galaxy raced up the table by, often as not, running up the score. The sturdy yet dynamic midfields of Mark Delgado (also traded), Edwin Cerrillo and Gaston Brugman (also traded; just Brugman) bought those four stars time to be lethal and the rest is, as they say history. And then history threw up all over the fairy tale.

2025 Briefly

A face-plant into failure, a proverbial shitting into someone else’s bed, a nightmare inside a nightmare inside a nightmare, the Los Angeles Galaxy not just died, but had every reason to beg for the sweet release of death. Puig missed most of the season, Paintsil maybe the first 10-12 games, which left all the weight for generating offense on Pec. Disposed as wingers generally are to completing the play before the goal, the Galaxy suffered from a lack of good leading balls and generated just 14 goals over the first 17 games of 2025 and failed to win even once. With two-way system for managing the ball (aka, Delgado, plus Brugman to a lesser extent) gone, the Galaxy’s foundation crumbled, causing them to leak goals on the other side. By the mid-point of the season, LA hadn’t so much defended its title as handed it off to anyone capable of taking it.

Long-Term Tendencies v Recent Trends
Goals For: Very Over; Goals Allowed: Under
Over the full course of their history, the Galaxy have played well over the average on goals scored, while keeping comfortably on the right side of goals allowed. Their very best seasons (1998 and 2014) happened when a very sturdy defense and Bruce Arena’s second great run as a head coach supported one of MLS all-time great attacks. There’s a lot of reverting to the mean on either side of that, but nothing has defined the bad years (2017 to 2023) like defensive fragility: they’ve been over the league average for goals allowed in six of the past seven seasons. The data (maybe Satan) compels me to circle back to the global improvement in LA’s defense in 2024 because that season was a major outlier: the Galaxy’s defense has reliably sucked two teams’ worth of ass for seven of the past nine seasons. Sounds like something to watch closely as Puig’s recovery past “doing Firestone commercials” level of fitness – e.g., the fact the defense regressed as hard as it did in 2025 should raise major questions about the extent to which they’re pouring shit concrete into the foundation.

Players I Still Like/Additions So Far

At time of writing (December 28, 2025), the “Killer Ps” (i.e., Pec, Painstil, and Puig) appear poised to reunite – and just having Puig back as the brains of the operation could go some ways. With a respectful nod to one of the league’s elder statesman, Marco Reus, who lifted LA as far as he could over the second half of their doomed season, the Galaxy feel poised to rely suffocatingly on Puig (who, in the past, pushed through it), unless/until they replace Diego Fagundez. Cerrillo appears set for his Year 4 – a good thing – but the man does need a central midfield partner of some form to get LA back to anything like competitive. A stray social media post hinted that New York City FC’s Justin Haak may be en route – which tracks as a great signing for me – but getting central midfield square strikes me as a priority, as does getting someone in place to take over for the 37-year-old Maya Yoshida at CB. Jakob Glesnes (from Philly) feels like a responsible step in that direction - his two-way game is upper-tier for a CB when he's on - but I thought I heard a couple hiccups outta him in 2025 (maybe 2024? ) and don't think I was alone on that. At any rate, I see a bunch of names on the current roster and, while a few of them ring a bell, none do it in a way that convinces me the Galaxy will do better in 2026 without some upgrades.

Total Joy Points: 73
How They Earned Them (How This is Calculated, for Reference)
Supporters’ Shield: 1998, 2002, 2010, 2011
MLS Cup: 2002, 2005, 2011, 2012, 2014, 2024
MLS Cup Runner-Up: 1996, 1999, 2001, 2009
MLS Playoff Semifinals: 1998, 2000, 2004, 2010
MLS Playoffs/Quarterfinals: 2003, 2013, 2016, 2019, 2022
CONCACAF Champions’ Cup Winner: 2000
CONCACAF Champions’ Cup Runner-Up: 1997
CONCACAF Champions’ League Semifinal: 2013
CONCACAF Champions’ League Quarterfinal: 2012, 2014, 2016
U.S. Open Cup: 2001, 2005
U.S. Open Cup Runner-Up: 2002, 2006

Some Names to Google, Not Already Named Above (from their All-Time Roster)
Andrew Shue (the deepest cut), Jorge Campos, Greg Vanney, Tyrone Marshall, Peter Vagenas, Guillermo “El Pando” Ramirez, A. J. DeLaGarza, Omar Gonzalez, Luis Hernandez, Carlos Hermosillo, Abel Xavier