Lionel Messi won Major League Soccer’s 2024 Most Valuable Player award despite missing half the MLS season due to injury, load management and international duty.
MLS announced Friday that Messi edged Columbus Crew forward Cucho Hernández to the honor in his first full season with Inter Miami.
Messi won 38.4% of the aggregate vote to Cucho’s 33.7%; no other player earned more than 10%.
Messi was the choice for 40.8% of his fellow players, 43.2% of select media members, and 31.3% of club technical staff — the only one of the three groups, which each account for 33.3% of the weighted vote, that did not make Messi its top choice.