MLP has announced the long-awaited rules to govern the 2025 season. Guidance has been provided about the number of teams, how many will make the playoffs, when and where matches will be played, and deadlines for dropping and adding players to team rosters. But, while MLP has provided a lot of information, the devil as usual is in the details. Many questions remain as to how these rules will actually work, and what kind of teams will be constructed.

Let’s first go over the major rules, and then list the burning questions that remain.

 

 

MLP 2025 will again consist of Premier and Challenger level teams, with 16 Premier and 6 Challenger teams. Premier teams will expand to six players per team (three men, three women), while Challenger teams will have four players per team. To be eligible, players must have a signed UPA contract. This is a new and significant change, as it will place some limits on the available player pool.

 

In Premier, 10 events will be held with each of the 10 teams hosting one event. Ten of the 16 Premier teams will make the playoffs. In Challenger, all six teams will make the playoffs.

 

Rally scoring in doubles play is out. Dreambreakers (singles play) will remain the same, with rally scoring to 21.

 

 

The season will start on April 24. But, the real work begins now. Teams are now allowed to trade players, up until February 15. On February 16, teams have to declare who they are dropping from their roster.  All teams must drop someone; they can keep at most three players. Players kept must have been acquired in the 2024 auction or by way of a trade; if acquired by waiver, they cannot be kept. On March 2, Premier teams will hold an auction to add players to fill their roster. Challenger teams will follow on March 3. To keep a player, teams must pay 50% of that player’s auction price. The March 2 auction has no cap; teams are free to spend what they wish.

 

There will be certain in-season waiver and trade deadlines. But, again, any waiver pickups must be UPA signed players. 

 

Those are the major rule changes. But, those rules raise some major questions that will only be answered when we hit the various deadlines for player acquisition. Those questions are going to loom very large over MLP 2025.

 

 

 

Last year, 48 players were Premier level. A total of 88 players were at any one time on Premier and Challenger rosters, combined. With the move to six player rosters and 16 Premier teams, this means 96 players are needed to fill the Premier rosters. An additional 36 players are needed to fill the Challenger rosters, for a total of 132 players, an increase over 2024 of 44 players. That is a lot.

 

 

In 2024, players who are regulars on the APP Tour were allowed to play MLP. Not so in 2025. That means, unless they sign a UPA contract, such players as Will Howells, Jack Munro, Jill Braverman, and Megan Fudge will be ineligible to play. By my count, about 17 players who played MLP 2024 are currently ineligible for MLP 2025. Of course, that number is subject to change, as players sign UPA contracts. But, adding 44 roster spots, while eliminating 17 players is a double whammy.

 

 

There are four teams moving up from 2024 Challenger to 2025 Premier. But, those four teams are the ones most hard hit by the exclusion of players who lack a UPA contract. By my count, more than half of the players on those four rosters are currently ineligible to play in 2025. Some of those teams may have to get five or even six players in the auction. That is a tough road.

 

 

This is the biggest question. Parity is important to any team sport. We have all seen how the NFL prioritizes parity and creates all kinds of rules to promote parity. In the NFL, bad teams one year often become playoff teams the next year; just look at the Washington Commanders this year. But, the MLP 2025 rules appear likely to result in a severe imbalance between the teams. At the top end of the spectrum, you will have a team like St. Louis. Their roster is Anna Bright, Hayden Patriquin, Gabe Tardio, and Kate Fahey. Obviously, they will drop Fahey. In the subsequent auction, St. Louis need only focus on picking up one good female player. While it would be nice to have six good players on your team, if you are St. Louis, you are much better off bidding high to get one very good player than to spend that same amount of money, spread around three average players.

 

Conversely, the four Challenger teams moving up will have maybe one or two Challenger level players to start with. They then need to add two, three or maybe even four starters to their roster. Forget about the fifth and sixth roster spots; just bidding to try to get three quality starters is a near impossible task. Further, no one available will be as good as the three keepers a team like St. Louis starts with.

 

Even Utah, which finished last in Premier 2024, starts out far ahead of the four promoted Challenger teams. Utah can keep three from Tyler Loong, Connor Garnett, Callie Smith, and Alix Truong. Whoever they keep, those three keepers will be better than nearly all players available in the auction. The four promoted teams appear headed to a very rough season.

 

 

Again, there is no salary cap. Thus, owners are free to spend as much (or as little) as they want in the auction. Depending on the approach taken by each team, my estimate is that about 35 players will be retained. It could be as high as about 40, or as low as about 20. In any event, of the 132 Premier roster spots, close to 100 will be filled in the March 2 auction. Available players are likely to include Quang Duong, Kate Fahey, Augie Ge, Jessie Irvine, and Meghan Dizon. These are top 20 (men or women) players. After that, there will be a few decent players, and then a huge dropoff. There will be players picked who are not top 75 (men or women) players. If a team needs just one player to fill a starting roster, and is not worried about having good #5 and #6 players, will a rich owner spend whatever it takes to get Duong or Fahey? Will an owner needing two good players spend whatever it takes to get Duong AND Fahey? We see in the Major League Baseball offseason how a rich team like the LA Dodgers gets to add multiple great players while 20+ poorer teams add no difference makers. Is MLP headed for that imbalance of resources?

 

 

Skill in the auction was very important in 2024. We saw how much difference a good general manager made, in both Premier and Challenger. Indeed, I would argue there was much more skill in drafting a Challenger team than a Premier team, because it is much easier to identify a top 20 player than it is to figure out who at the time of the auction was not a top 50 player, but would perform very well as the season went along. The disparity of skills of the various GMs was on display for all to see. To quote Bill Parcells, "You are who your record says you are." Now we come to 2025, and the new roster sizes and new rules. Teams have to find diamonds in the rough. Unless a team spends an inordinate amount of money, every team is going to have to pick several players who are not currently ranked in the top 40 men or women. There is skill in drafting a first round pick; but, it is far harder to identify a player not currently in the top 40 who will deliver starter-value play. Will underperforming teams from 2024 recognize that they probably need a new GM? About 25% of NFL teams typically replace their GM each year; will MLP teams understand that they need not only a GM who really can spot up and coming talent, but they probably could use a whole team of assistants to that GM. Will teams spend the money to set up a much needed scouting department?

 

It remains to be seen how the big questions get answered in 2025. My own prediction is that MLP 2025 is going to end up with massively unbalanced rosters. A couple of teams, such as St. Louis, New Jersey, and Dallas, are primed for big years, so long as they come to the auction ready to spend a lot to replace their one dropped player. Getting one good player in the auction will not be cheap, but it is a relatively easy task. However, teams with deficient 2024 rosters will have trouble correcting the problems with their roster. Then there are the four promoted teams. To put in bluntly, these teams have little to no chance. They are just too far behind talent-wise. They lack any top 10 players. Other than Jaume Martinez Vich, they lack any top 20 players. How are they to compete with a team like St. Louis, which starts with three top 10 players?

 

Obviously, injuries can happen, and injuries can have a big effect on a team. But, injuries can happen as easily to a bad team as a good one. The Premier teams with less talent and the four promoted teams need to figure out how to compete. They need to start with a good GM, who is given authority to spend money in the auction, and who is given a couple of scouts to help identify up and coming talent. The teams that follow that plan have a chance; the teams that do not follow that plan have no chance. It will be fascinating to watch how MLP 2025 plays out.

 

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