Talk:2021 Major League Soccer season

Fixtures and results
The current template used for fixtures and results isn't capable of showing all matches (for teams that play each other three times) and will also be half empty, as there are almost no cross conference matches. I'd say we should either switch to a similar table to last season's (this requires 34 collumns) or use that table only for cross conference matches and teams that face each other three times (requiring only 10 collumns) and add two separate home/away tables, one for each conference. A.Caseiro (talk) 13:56, 25 April 2021 (UTC)
 * I haven't been looking at the page so far this season, but I agree. I can start working on that soon, because a crosstable for MLS doesn't make sense, especially when there are maybe two or three interconference games for a given team. Jay eyem (talk) 16:24, 26 May 2021 (UTC)
 * I found out that the sports results module has support for two rows for each team allowing for two legs to be shown for the same match and got the idea of using two of those, one for each conference, with an extra collumn for cross conference games, where the top row would have the name of the teams they are playing. I started an example on my sandbox and thought asking your opinion as I noticed you already started making the full table under last season's format. A.Caseiro (talk) 17:57, 29 May 2021 (UTC)
 * Hmmm that's an interesting proposal, I certainly didn't know that existed. I guess my concern is that it might be confusing to the average reader who already didn't know how to read the crosstable. I'm also still concerned about the amount of blank space that will be in such a table, though it would certainly be less than what's there now. And I also feel a crosstable is just generally better suited for a balanced table, which MLS does not use. I am curious to see what an inter-conference table would look like under your proposal. I did start the table based on last year in my sandbox but it's a bit exhausting to put all that in manually. Certainly open to other opinions, and might be worth taking to WT:FOOTY if need be. Jay eyem (talk) 02:01, 31 May 2021 (UTC)
 * Ye, clearly an issue, I see up to the San Jose Earthquakes column, then nothing more to see. That format is incompatible to screen width, the table might be violating WP:ACCESS. It's certainly not user friendly for mobile and tablet. Govvy (talk) 10:13, 31 May 2021 (UTC)
 * just for clarity, who were you addressing? Jay eyem (talk) 03:02, 1 June 2021 (UTC)
 * No one and everyone! Govvy (talk) 07:29, 1 June 2021 (UTC)
 * My concerns on a round by round table are the width and the use of colours for important information. As @Govvy said the current crosstable has 27 collumns and is already too large for some screens, a round by round table would have 34 collumns, only making it worst. The round by round table is also dependant on colour to display home team and winning team, so there is no way to know if a score is a win or a loss without the color (this could be easily fixed by adding some * on the right and left side of the score for away and home matches respectively). Nevertherless, round by round tables have been in use in multiple USA competitions for quite some time (see this and this) and there has even been some talk on Module talk:Sports rbr table to add support for such tables. With the exception of cross conference matches, I don't think the crosstable is that hard to understant, maybe changing the null cells to grey instead of a dash will also make it more readable, but it's still less straightfowrd than the round by round table. Making the round by round table collapsible or splitting it in two are also two options to minimize effects of having a large table. A.Caseiro (talk) 10:28, 1 June 2021 (UTC)
 * You know the more I look at your crosstable broken down by conference, the more I like it. I share your concern about inter-conference games, but I think regarding the columns for the round-by-round results, my proposal is too large for the page. I think having tables for each conference would be the best option at the moment. We just need to make sure the inter-conference results are done well (I don't think anyone has more than two this year) and that nobody has more than two home/away games against a given opponent. I don't think greying out is necessary in that case, I think the dash looks fine. Jay eyem (talk) 18:48, 1 June 2021 (UTC)
 * I'll finish both tables next week and see if they don't look too hard to understand once filled. It may be a good idea to ask about the use of round by round results tables on WT:FOOTY as you initially suggested for future reference. I'll also try to do that next week. A.Caseiro (talk) 13:21, 4 June 2021 (UTC)
 * I've been on and off Wikipedia for a few months now, but what happened with this proposal? I think two separate tables would look better aesthetically than what we currently have. The current cross-table still has loads of issues with empty space and is not especially mobile-friendly. Jay eyem (talk) 17:02, 17 September 2021 (UTC)
 * Sorry, I hadn't enough time to finish the change then and ended up leaving it unfinished. Anyway, I've finally changed to the format I had proposed, if you think something can still be improved feel free to tell me. A.Caseiro (talk) 17:46, 2 October 2021 (UTC)
 * The format looks good. The way the away games are listed though is off. I am going to work on moving that column down to the Western Conference and listing it as a CCH in that table. Jay eyem (talk) 02:30, 10 November 2021 (UTC)

Shutouts or clean sheets?
The main Major League Soccer article, and prior MLS season articles, use the term "shutouts" when recording goalkeeper statistics. This is also the official term used by MLS on its website, and the official term used by U.S. Soccer. But this 2021 MLS season article uses the term "clean sheets". We should be consistent throughout articles, and change it to "shutouts" on this page. I tried once, but was reverted by User:Flix11 without explanation. Thanks. CUA 27 (talk) 15:58, 26 April 2021 (UTC)
 * It should be shutouts as that is the term commonly used in the US. It would be like forcing the use of "football" over "soccer" or "manager" over "head coach". --ArsenalFan700 (talk) 16:40, 26 April 2021 (UTC)
 * I agree with the analogies. This seems like a straightforward WP:ENGVAR issue. Things that work well on Premier League articles don't always work well with MLS articles. I'll give it a little bit more time to see if User:Flix11 or any others care to comment. CUA 27 (talk) 18:10, 27 April 2021 (UTC)

Actually, I withdraw my suggestion. The MLS new website now says "clean sheets", so I'll leave it alone. CUA 27 (talk) 18:23, 28 April 2021 (UTC)

awards section
Isn't Team of the Week and goals of the week awards overkill on stats? We do have WP:NOSTATS and as the season progresses the article content will increase, will that not heavily eat into the data-size as well? Govvy (talk) 09:47, 17 May 2021 (UTC)

W-D-L?
Why does this article the "W-D-L" format for standings when the MLS website uses "W-L-T" format? KitHutch (talk) 19:15, 18 July 2021 (UTC)
 * Agreed - this is driving me nuts SportingFlyer  T · C  23:50, 7 September 2021 (UTC)

Quick note on 2022 CONCACAF Champions League spot
According to this link from US Soccer, the highest ranked regular season American team that has not already qualified will receive the slot originally intended for the 2021 U.S. Open Cup. Thought that was worth mentioning here because I wasn't sure how we should highlight that in the table at this stage in the season, since technically no team has yet qualified. I figure we can either highlight second place in the Shield table now, or wait until the qualifier is unambiguous. Jay eyem (talk) 16:59, 17 September 2021 (UTC)