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Soccer’s Next Don

With commissioner Don Garber’s quarter-century-plus tenure coming to an end next year (or sooner!), MLS has contracted executive headhunters to embark on a sprawling replacement search. A few well-known names have emerged as early targets—but with big-growth ambitions, they’d better get it right.

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Lionel Messi
During commissioner Don Garber’s tenure, which began just six years after MLS was founded, the league has evolved from a veritable sideshow into something closer to a main event in the U.S. Photo: Patricia De MELO Moreira/AFP/Getty Images
John Ourand
April 30, 2026

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For the better part of the past two months, the headhunters at Korn Ferry have been reaching out to sports business types—current and former league executives, team owners, media executives, etcetera, etcetera—amid a high-stakes search to find a replacement for MLS commissioner Don Garber. Garber has been the league’s commissioner since 1999, and while he hasn’t actually put a date on his retirement, his contract expires at the end of next year in the middle of the season. (Hence the urgency…)

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