Minnesota United has 48 points available to them over the rest of the season. I don’t even know how to guess at how many they’ll actually get.
At their current 1.3 PPG, the Loons would add just 16 points to the 24 they’ve netted so far, giving them 40. Last season, that would have been good for 21st place in MLS – though just one point out of the last Western Conference playoff spot – and an early start to the offseason.
1.3 PPG was the mark that finally spelled the end of Adrian Heath’s time with the Loons; it’s the second worst full-season performance since the team made the jump to MLS. Only 2018’s nigh-unwatchable 1.1 PPG is worse.
But 1.3 PPG doesn’t feel like an accurate representation of the team. Take their 1.8 PPG pace from the first third of the season, and Minnesota adds 36 points for a total of 60 – two points better than last year’s team record performance. Of course taking that split also means using their current 0.66 PPG pace for the middle third. If they actually keep that pace and get a dismal 11 points between now and November 7, it will be a very long fall.
(35 points, while an awful season, would still not put them in real danger of getting the Wooden Spoon. It’s nine more than Spoon winners DC United got last year and a whopping 14 more than San Jose got in 2024. The top of MLS is very, very good; the bottom is very, very bad; and the middle is very, very fat.)
I’ve already gone into some detail on why this swoon might be transitory, so there’s reason to believe they’ll get back on some kind of track. Maybe they really do end up settling into being a 1.3 PPG team; it’s bad, but it’s also twice as good as they’ve been since May 10.
One thing that could change the team’s trajectory is reinforcements through the transfer window. No one expects the team to go out and bring in Gabriel Martinelli from Arsenal or even Jadon Sancho on a free, but it’s entirely reasonable to expect that they’ll bring in players to move the team forward.
But will they have enough time to make the kind of impact Minnesota needs them to make?
There are certainly players who make a huge impact the second they land in MLS – Kelvin Yeboah was arguably better in his first half-season with the Loons than he has been since, for example – but it’s far more common for players to struggle a bit as they adjust to the league. That’s especially true for players who have had extended layoffs before coming to Minnesota, like Robin Lod or Adrien Hunou.
Looking past the outliers at either end of the spectrum, what can Loons fans reasonably expect from forthcoming summer signings?
| Summer | Player | g+ above replacement | Minutes Played |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2025 | Necatrios Triantis | 0.75 | 352 |
| Dominick Fitz | 0.03 | 151 | |
| Mamadou Dieng | -0.24 | 114 | |
| 2024 | Kelvin Yeboah | 1.39 | 709 |
| Joaquin Pereyra | 0.75 | 407 | |
| Jefferson Diaz | 0.45 | 797 | |
| Sammy Shashoua | 0.26 | 22 | |
| Anthony Markanich | 0.14 | 62 | |
| 2023 | Teemu Pukki | 1.95 | 1031 |
| Ismael Tajouri-Shradi | 0.97 | 347 | |
| Ethan Bristow | 0.36 | 588 | |
| 2022 | Alan Benitez | 0.84 | 570 |
| Jonathan Gonzalez | 0.14 | 195 | |
| Mender Garcia | -0.10 | 532 | |
| 2021 | Fanendo Adi | .03 | 210 |
| Franco Fragapane | 4.11 | 1531 | |
| Joseph Rosales | 0.16 | 112 | |
| Median | 0.36 | 352 |
Ethan Bristow’s production in Nectarios Triantis’ minutes is the median outcome for Minnesota’s summer transfer business over the last five windows. I have said some mean things about the Loons, but as usual, nothing is crueler than the truth.
Bristow probably wasn’t as bad as we remember him being — he didn’t get torched by LAFC every game he played for MInnesota, just the last one — but there’s no understanding of his performance that adds up to him being good. And “hey, this guy was probably marginally less bad than you remember him being” is the textbook definition of damning with faint praise.
The bad news is somewhat obvious: Even when they’ve brought in Designated Players or other high-money options, Minnesota hasn’t often found a single player that changes the trajectory of the team.
The good news is that while individual performance matters a lot, it isn’t the only way players contribute. Bringing in a starting-caliber player, even if they don’t hit the ground running, can facilitate other players getting into better positions or the team tactics to shift.
Minnesota has been primarily connected to attacking midfielders so far this window, which likely means a move to a 4-2-3-1. They should go all the way to a 4-2-2-2, but sadly they won’t. In any case, moving to a formation that utilizes four up top will open up back-post runs for Anthony Markanich, who has been largely marked out of the offense since he scored in the Loons’ May 10 draw against Austin.
So even if Minnesota resorts to a cut-rate attacking midfielder that produces Bristow-like returns, his actual impact may be larger simply by virtue of unlocking an option opposing defenses would much rather keep caged up. I think they’ll need to do a bit better than AZ Jackson to see defenses shift the way they want them to, but it isn’t as though they need to bring in Evander or bust.
There is no silver bullet for Minnesota, but that doesn’t excuse inaction by the front office. Yes, getting healthy is the best thing the Loons can do, but so is — at the very least — bringing in depth pieces that don’t force Cam Knowles to choose between giving key players time to recover and giving the team a chance to win.