What is the Supporters’ Shield worth to the Union? Our writers debate the trophy’s value.

While it’s true that many soccer leagues around the world crown their champions based on whichever team has the highest points total at the end of the regular season, since it was founded in 1996, Major League Soccer has always had playoffs and a championship match to crown the title. Thus, the MLS Cup winner is the league champion.

The Supporters’ Shield (so named because a large number of fans wanted to give greater importance to the regular season) was first awarded to the MLS points winner in 1999 and it is now recognized as one of the major trophies of the league. The Union claimed this trophy in 2020 and are currently tied with LAFC on points. LAFC, for their part, won the Shield in 2019. Neither team has ever won the MLS Cup.

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In fact, the Shield-winning team has very rarely emerged also triumphant in the championship game of MLS. Given that history, are the Union better off not winning the Supporters’ Shield, since the winner of the trophy so often gets bounced in the playoffs?

Jonathan Tannenwald: My take on this is definitely contrarian, and I’m sure I’ll hear about it on Twitter. Of course the Union should try to win the Shield. Not least because it could give the players a chance to lift the actual trophy after it got stuck in a shipping delay two years ago. It’s become a great piece of Union lore that the item Alejandro Bedoya hoisted in 2020 was a Halloween costume accessory piece that Union staffers found and decorated to look like the real thing.

But whether or not it’s an actual jinx, the history of Supporters’ Shield winners in the playoffs is shockingly bad. Just seven times in MLS’s 26 seasons has the best team in the regular season won it all in the playoffs. It’s been five years since Toronto FC did the last double, with a team that at the time was viewed as perhaps the best in MLS history.

In fact, only one Shield winner in history has lost the final, and it’s a team Jim Curtin knows well: the 2003 Chicago Fire.

Meanwhile, nine Shield winners have crashed out of the playoffs right after entering, either in the first or second round with a bye. It’s been true with one-game rounds and two-game rounds alike. There will be one notable difference in this year’s postseason, because there’s no FIFA window between the end of the regular season and the start of the playoffs. In the last few years, the No. 1 seed would have to wait up to three weeks for its first playoff game, which killed momentum.

If you don’t believe in jinxes, I’ve got something for you, too. If the Union win the Shield and crash in the playoffs, the chorus of I-told-you-sos about their lack of big-money stars will be mighty loud. Better to appreciate going back to the Concacaf Champions League, then let Gareth Bale, Carlos Vela and Los Angeles FC deal with the naysayers. Even if it means the Union have to play the title game in SoCal instead of here.

Andrea Canales: The Union should definitely go for the Supporters’ Shield, precisely because there’s a legacy to the Shield and MLS Cup double that puts teams which accomplish the feat in conversation among the best squads in MLS history. The Union should be in that conversation this season already. What they’re accomplishing in terms of goals in favor versus goals against is unprecedented and frankly, astonishing. However, it’s all also arguably statistical baubles, record-book trinkets, if it doesn’t translate into league hardware. That’s what will prove that this Union squad is truly great. If they are, they have no need to fear any Supporters’ Shield curse or pressure, because the players are simply that good to overcome all of that.

I was watching in the stadium in California in 2003 when the Chicago Fire lost to the San Jose Earthquakes, and as strong as the Shield-winning Fire looked arriving to the final, the Earthquakes seemed like a team of destiny, given the odds they’d already overcome to even reach the final. They played that way, too, while the Fire seemed tight and never really hit their stride. It was a barn-burner game, 4-2. With so much parity in MLS, the best team can often come down to any given day, except in cases where teams prove they are undeniably the best, by overcoming whatever difficult circumstances they face. That’s what the Union can and should do in pursuing both the Shield and the Cup.

Fearing winning the Shield as a distracting hassle reminds me of what was known as the Sports Illustrated cover curse, except for the part where the guy who was on the cover the most without apparently much ill effect was Michael Jordan. Sure, it’s not easy to win both the SS and MLS Cup, but the Union have proven they can do hard things. Prove it again. Go for it. Write the Union into the league history books in bold, not merely as a scrappy team that punches above its salary weight, but as a squad that lives and plays out the meaning of the word team.

Kerith Gabriel: I don’t think any team, especially the Union, would let history — or superstition — get in the way of chasing down a trophy. Every playoff team has a bull’s-eye on its back by virtue of being a playoff team, so what winning the Supporters’ Shield has meant for MLS teams historically, frankly, is irrelevant.

There’s a ton of upside to bringing this trophy home. First and perhaps foremost, is just how attractive it is for recruiting purposes. It’s a heck of a lot easier to woo top talent as a two-time Supporters’ Shield winner on top of returning to the Champions League tournament.

For fans, it’s bragging rights heading into the playoffs, with the knowledge that any Union playoff run to the MLS Cup final would remain at Subaru Park — as the No. 1 seed in the Eastern Conference. If you don’t think this matters, call the Union’s ticket office in about a week and try to reserve seats for the first playoff game.

Finally, a little-known fact: Supporters’ Shield winners get a nice little bonus pot to split among the players. According to several outlets, the pot this year is estimated to be $150,000. And while the method of distribution of said dollars is up to the team, if split among the 27 players listed on the Union’s active roster players evenly, it’s close to $6,000 per player. I’d take six grand –– and a trophy.

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Look, all I’m saying is that if the team does fall short in its playoff run, it won’t be due to historical stats that pertain to how Supporters’ Shield winners have fared. There’s just too much good that comes from being the league’s best over the course of an entire regular season.

Tannenwald: I’m not saying the Union shouldn’t want to win it, or shouldn’t put everything into winning it. They absolutely should go for it.

I am saying it shouldn’t be considered a failure — or a coming up short — if they don’t win it. And from reading the tea leaves with Curtin over the last few weeks, I think he gets that.