Now in its twenty-fifth season, Major League Soccer is back and looks to be bigger than ever before. The league brings excitement, variety in their winners and now, perhaps some of the biggest names in soccer from across the world.

In its 25 year history, the league has had 11 different winners and a big reason why is that each MLS team has an equal base salary budget with which to build a 28-man squad. However, this hasn’t stopped some clubs from being able to attract global stars. Over recent years, the league has been able to attract big-time players such as Wayne Rooney (DC United) and Zlatan Ibrahimovic (LA Galaxy).

Last season, the cup was won by Seattle Sounders, who have been among the league’s most successful teams, winning the U.S. Open Cup four times, the Supporters’ Shield in 2014 and the MLS Cup in 2016 and 2019.

In the playoffs, the Sounders were able to defeat the Supporters’ Shield winning-team LAFC in the Conference Finals, leading them to face Toronto FC in the MLS Cup Final for the third time in 4 years. The Sounders won the game 3-1 in front of a franchise-record 69,274 fans at CenturyLink Field.

One of the big topics of discussion during the off-season was the introduction of two new teams. In its landmark season, the league will have the most teams it has had with the addition of Inter Miami CF and Nashville SC. This takes the total of teams to 26. Inter Miami CF is owned by English football legend, David Beckham, who came through on his promise of bringing an MLS team to Miami after his storied career with LA Galaxy.

This will be the first MLS season in which each team does not play every other team at least once.

One of the big coaching changes during the year was Montreal Impacts’ hire of Arsenal legend Thierry Henry, who had one of the most successful playing careers in the Premier League and will be looking to bring this success to the MLS.

Looking ahead to the upcoming season, the bookmakers favorite to win the MLS Cup is 2019 Supporters Shield winner, LAFC. Last season LAFC had statistically the best season in MLS history, finishing the year with 72 points. They have arguably the best player in the league in Carlos Vela, who finished the year with 34 goals and 15 assists. Those marks may never be matched, but if anyone can, Vela has the best opportunity to match his highs. LAFC will be looking to avenge their shock defeat to the Sounders and are an obvious pick to win it all.

According to Bovada, last year’s runner up Toronto is second favorite and Eastern Conference winner New York City FC is the third favorite.

The fourth favorite is last year’s winner Seattle Sounders, although this will be no easy task, as previous winners Toronto in 2018 and Sporting KC in 2019 have struggled in the following season as the previous winner is always the team that everyone wants to beat. There’s no doubt that they are one of the better teams in the league and as last year’s winner, they cannot be overlooked.

My outside favorite to win the MLS Cup is Atlanta United. Their 2019 season almost ended in a treble after they won the U.S. Open Cup and Campeones Cup. United is lead by their Venezuelan talisman Josef Martinez who is one of the leagues most prolific goal scorers. Even though they are in the Eastern Conference, they have the squad to win. There is also a feeling that they should have completed the treble last year and this will be something the team will be looking to rectify.

The league’s first game will see D.C. United take on Colorado at 1 p.m. ET on Feb. 29.