Eastern Conference: Grading every team's 2025 season | OneFootball

By Matthew Doyle

As a little holiday treat in between new signings – I hope you’ve all got notifications for Tom Bogert’s tweets turned on – I decided to sit down and hand out my grades for 2025.

And I’m talking about the whole season here, not just their MLS performance. We’re talking Concacaf Champions Cup, FIFA Club World Cup, Leagues Cup and both the US Open Cup and Canadian Championship. All of it matters.

I’m also factoring in both last winter’s transfer window and what they did this summer, as well as how well they did promoting new and younger players into bigger roles.

What I’m not taking into consideration are signings, departures and SuperDraft picks that have happened since MLS Cup. Those will factor into next year’s version of this column.

And finally, I’m not handing out letter grades here. I’m instead going to go with "Exceeded Expectations,” “Met Expectations” and “Below Expectations.”

Reverse alphabetical order, because I want to do something fun:

Toronto FC

Basically, nothing they’d planned for at the start of the season – not the holdover Italian DPs, not on-loan striker Ola Brynhildsen, not any of the veteran center backs – worked. At all.

And so the best thing that happened for Toronto was the mid-spring decision to tear it down. That came too late to save 2025, but put them on good footing to climb back up the standings in 2026. They’ve now got a good core of proven MLS guys (DP playmaker Djordje Mihailovic being the most notable) and clear direction in the front office.

I think I like where this is going. But nobody likes where it’s been for the past half-decade.

Grade: Below Expectations 

(I picked them to win the Wooden Spoon before the season, so I guess they technically exceeded my expectations. But I think an honest accounting would tell you they fell short of what they were aiming for internally.)

Philadelphia Union

Really, the 2025 grade starts with the decision to part ways with head coach Jim Curtin and hire Bradley Carnell as his replacement, which itself meant the goal was a return to the pure blood-and-guts, Energy Drink Soccer soccer Philly’s front office craved.

And it obviously worked. Philly won the Supporters' Shield, and Carnell won Sigi Schmid MLS Coach of the Year. Quinn Sullivan played his way into the US men's national team picture (before a very disappointing late-season ACL tear), while Tai Baribo played his way into a profitable, big-money transfer, and Olwethu Makhanya played his way into Defender of the Year discussions.

They made both big-money signings (Bruno Damiani was the club’s record signing, and is a very strong Gass Theorem guy for next year) and smaller, smart signings (Jovan Lukic is one of the most underappreciated players in the league). Plus, they won a lot of games.

Now, did the game model show its inherent weakness in the later rounds of both the US Open Cup (they got crushed at Nashville) and the Audi MLS Cup Playoffs (they lost at home to a New York City FC side missing about half their spine)? Yes. I think it’ll keep doing so.

But within the scope of what they wanted the year to be, 2025 was a massive success.

Grade: Exceeded Expectations

Orlando City

I will straight-up say I think the version of Orlando we saw right up until the semifinals of Leagues Cup was the best version we’ve seen of this club. In part, that’s because Marco Pašalić was sneakily an upgrade over Facundo Torres, and because Alex Freeman was a one-man, right-side wrecking crew, and because Martín Ojeda ascended to Best XI-caliber performance. Also in part, it was because head coach Oscar Pareja did a good job of melding all of that into a coherent whole.

But while they had much better underlying numbers than last year’s Lions and actually picked up one more point in the regular season, they finished much lower in the standings and then went out pretty meekly in the playoffs.

In the end, their over-reliance on past-it veterans like Luis Muriel and Pedro Gallese was a deathblow. If they had to do it all over again, bringing in a new goalkeeper at the start of last season and holding onto Ramiro Enrique (they sold him in the summer; they should not have done that), I think that would’ve made this a dark-horse MLS Cup team.

Que será, será.

Grade: Slightly Below Expectations. And in some limbo heading into 2026.

Red Bull New York

The 15-year playoff streak is dead.

The way it happened is kind of morbidly funny, as before the season RBNY global finally furnished this team with the kind of veteran, goalscoring DP (Eric-Maxim Choupo-Moting, who delivered far beyond what I’d expected of him) they’d been begging for for the past decade.

But that didn’t matter because the defense was soft and the midfield was… weird, I guess is the right word? And the wingers were all hurt basically all the time (except for the ones who were clearly in over their heads at the MLS level).

All this happened in conjunction with a continued shift away from the Energy Drink Soccer game model that was a little half-measure’y, to the point RBNY lost their identity. It felt like just another team.

Grade: Below Expectations

New York City Football Club

I think the best thing to come out of 2025 for NYCFC wasn’t the run to the Eastern Conference Final, or Matt Freese’s ascent to the USMNT No. 1. I think you could argue (though it’d be hard to do so with a straight face now) that Justin Haak’s evolution into one of the league’s best ball-playing CBs was maybe it, or Alonso Martínez's confirmation he’s an alpha goalscorer in this league was the thing (also a hard argument to make at the moment).

Rather, I think the best thing was the overall performance of head coach Pascal Jansen. He showed a willingness to look down the roster for veterans or SuperDraft picks or homegrown kids to not just fill holes, but actually change tactical blueprints in the moment as the match warranted. He seemed like a problem-solver out there, one who puts players in spots where they can develop and succeed.

Given the number of injuries this team endured, that was necessary. Overall, that fills me with confidence heading into next year even if this offseason (which, I know, is beyond the remit of this column) hasn’t really gotten off to a banging start.

Grade: Exceeded Expectations

New England Revolution

There were some silver linings – the year began with Esmir Bajraktarević getting a move to PSV, and Peyton Miller seems to be playing his way into a big European transfer as well, so the academy production that’s characterized most of this decade seems to be sticky. Plus, Carles Gil had another very good year, and mid-season signing Dor Turgeman sure looked the part of a high-level MLS goalscorer.

But truthfully, this season was disappointing. The Revs' front office spent multiple windows tearing down the previous iteration of this roster and building it to the liking of then-head coach Caleb Porter, who is now ex-head coach Caleb Porter. And I’m just not sure how many of these guys will be around the next time the Revs are trophy contenders. That includes Gil, who’s now officially into his mid-30s.

It feels like they lost two years.

Grade: Below Expectations

Nashville SC

In his first full year in charge, head coach B.J. Callaghan checked just about every box:

Gone was the pure sit-and-counter style that characterized the first five years of Nashville’s MLS existence. Nobody’s going to be mistaking Nashville for San Diego when it comes to ball dominance, but still… this team knows what they’re doing when they’re carrying 60% possession, as they showed in the Open Cup semis when they ripped Philly apart.

They still don’t have quite enough depth and are one match-winner short, but this really was a spectacular season for the ‘Yotes.

Grade: Exceeded Expectations+

CF Montréal

Changed the head coach again, and changed the front office again. They also changed over a ton of the roster, and while some of it was to the good (Thomas Gillier was excellent in goal, and playmaker Iván Jaime has a promising profile), I’ll admit some confusion as to the overall direction of things here.

That showed in Montréal’s finish: 13th in the East on just 28 points, a year after having snuck into the postseason. It felt like there was something to maybe build on a bit after 2024, but in 2025 they never really even approached it.

Grade: Below Expectations

Inter Miami CF

It’s three big things:

He was part of the reason they won MLS Cup, and part of the reason they have clarity on how to proceed in building a roster around Leo Messi, the now two-time defending Landon Donovan MLS MVP (and, let’s face it, odds-on favorite to make it three in a row).

I feel better about this team’s immediate future than I did at this point last year, and at this point last year, I actually picked them to win the double. Ambition, acumen, transfer window ruthlessness… they’ve got it all, and they’re leveraging all of it to win trophies.

I expected the trophies part (where Messi goes, trophies follow). But I wasn’t expecting to be so impressed by their mastery of the MLS roster-building process, especially after they Benny Hill’d their way through their first three years in the league.

Grade: Exceeded Expectations

D.C. United

Simply put: nothing worked. There was no young player who popped, no veteran who took the reins, no needle-moving mid-season addition, and no superhero performance from Christian Benteke to keep things afloat.

Instead, GM Ally Mackay made a series of failed winter signings, while head coach Troy Lesesne couldn’t get any of the new faces (nor any of the old) on the same page.

Both those guys were let go mid-season, but things didn’t get better. From June 1 onwards, D.C. United played 18 games across all competitions and won once. In the end, they brought home the Wooden Spoon.

There is a new head coach, René Weiler, who was appointed mid-season. And there is a new CSO, Dr. Erik Sogut, who was appointed near the end of the year. They’re on the clock for 2026.

Grade: Below Expectations

Columbus Crew

The pivotal moment of the Crew’s season came on Feb. 3, when Real Betis made an offer for Cucho Hernández that the team – which, to be clear, was doing right by a player who desperately wants to be part of Colombia’s 2026 FIFA World Cup roster – could not refuse.

There simply was no replacing him that late in the window. And so the Crew played largely the same type of ball in Year 3 of the Wilfried Nancy era as they did in Years 1 and 2, but without the superstar No. 9 up top to turn all those long sequences of possession into chances and goals.

This was compounded by an unsuccessful wager on Dániel Gazdag, who came to Ohio and immediately got the yips in front of goal, while at the other end of the pitch, defensive cornerstone Rudy Camacho got injured and barely played. They were thin, and they were mediocre in both boxes basically all year long. The brief moment when Wessam Abou Ali – Cucho’s replacement, who finally arrived late in the summer window – was healthy gave some hope, as did the development of young Taha Habroune in midfield. But those are pretty thin silver linings for a team that, 12 months ago at this time, figured they’d be competing for multiple trophies once again.

Nancy’s gone to Celtic now, while legendary midfielder Darlington Nagbe has retired. Simply put, 2025 was a gut-punch of a season for the Crew. And GM Issa Tall is facing pressure to turn it around for 2026 and beyond.

Grade: Below Expectations

FC Cincinnati

Cincy went HAM last winter, spending upwards of $30 million combined on No. 10 Evander and No. 9 Kevin Denkey. And if you just look at the standings (they finished second overall on 65 points) and the boxscore numbers (they combined for 33g/17a in the regular-season), it seems like the bets paid off.

But those two guys never quite got on the same page, Luca Orellano was never as dynamic as he’d been in 2024, and the midfield and defensive structures were always pretty wobbly. A few mid-season additions added extra punch and a bit of solidity – I am very high on Samuel Gidi – but this constantly felt like a team that was less than the sum of its parts.

That tended to show up in big games:

The only trophy they came close to was the Shield. They clearly wanted much more than that.

Grade: Below Expectations

Chicago Fire FC

Fifty-three points and a postseason win for a team whose futility over the past 15 years had become legendary? Yeah, I’d say it was a damn good year for the Fire in their first season under head coach/CSO Gregg Berhalter.

The biggest thing was putting together a coherent structure that put the players – especially the attackers – into spots to succeed. Philip Zinckernagel was a revelation, while Hugo Cuypers went a long way towards justifying the huge transfer outlay made by the previous regime. Jonathan Bamba wasn’t quite so good, but still had his moments, while homegrown attacker Brian Gutiérrez played his way into a significant transfer to Chivas (and onto the El Tri radar).

Surprisingly, the defensive structure wasn’t as sound as I’d expected it to be, and just as surprising was their understated approach in the transfer market. Berhalter seems more intent upon laying the foundations and maximizing the output of the guys already in town before he gets owner Joe Mansuetto to open the checkbook for a Son or Müller-type signing.

That, I think, was very smart. You don’t want to sign one of those guys to save a failing season; you want them to enhance what’s already very good, and to maybe turn it into something legendary.

The way 2025 went put Chicago in a very good position to do exactly that in 2026.

Grade: Exceeded Expectations

Charlotte FC

They made one huge acquisition (Wilfried Zaha as a DP) and one smart acquisition (Pep Biel on a TAM deal) to start the year.

They made two huge sales of players they’d developed in Patrick Agyemang and Adilson Malanda, and then developed a replacement for the first in Idan Toklomati while keeping the second through the end of the season. I liked all of the above.

They recorded a record-tying nine-game winning streak right when it looked like their year was going to fall apart. Thank the soccer gods for Kristijan Kahlina.

They climbed from fifth in the East on 51 points to fourth in the East on 59 points. That is real progress.

Once again, the Crown lost in the first round of the playoffs, scoring just one goal in three games. Ope.

The regular-season outcome was very good (though be warned the underlying numbers showed some regression from 2024). The tournament outcomes, though… in the past two years, Charlotte have played 13 games across the various tournaments MLS teams enter (playoffs, US Open Cup, Leagues Cup). They’ve won just one of those in regulation and just two overall.

They are who I thought they were.

Grade: Met Expectations. They can grind out regular-season wins, but that’s about it.

Atlanta United

Well, they won the offseason. You remember last winter when they got headlines for bringing back old friend Miguel Almirón and breaking the MLS transfer record on Emmanuel Latte Lath, right? And they also got a proven, successful MLS manager in Ronny Deila – someone who’d keep it simple, put players in their best spots and let superior talent win the game.

You know that nothing worked. None of the winter signings, nor any of the summer window scramble signings made to try to salvage the season. With Garth Lagerwey having departed the club for health reasons, it’s been Chris Henderson making these calls, and while Henderson’s got an exceptional track record, there’s not a lot to suggest this roster is actually better than the record they produced in 2025.

All of the above, of course, sent Deila out of Atlanta, and it’s now old friend Tata Martino on hand for the salvage job.

That’s a 2026 discussion, though. 2025? Just another bad memory in a string of them for Five Stripes fans.

Grade: Below Expectations by a mile.