Could Neymar be heading to Inter Miami? A recent report from the Wall Street Journal that the 
Brazil Football and Al Hilal superstar recently purchased a $26 million home in Miami has sparked rumors that the winger could be the latest high-profile addition to the most high-profile team in MLS.
Miami head coach Tata Martino even addressed the rumors. “Now everyone who buys a house in Miami is coming?” he quipped. “With [ Lionel Messi] and the boys here, anything is possible, but I can’t imagine if the league doesn’t make the salary issue more flexible, how it would be carried out.”
There’s an obvious caveat here. Not every player who buys a house in Miami does so because they are going to sign with Inter Miami. But for the purposes of this exercise, let’s assume Miami and Neymar are actually interested in the move. Is it even possible?
MLS Roster Rules
The league has evolved since its 1996 founding, but spending is still restricted in order to create parity among teams
MLS has been set up to maintain parity between its 29 (soon to be 30) teams. Like the 
NFL or NBA, MLS uses a salary cap, albeit a much smaller one. While the current NFL cap is $255.4 million and the NBA is $140 million, MLS clubs had a salary budget of just $5.4 million. “That’s hardly enough to sign one player!” you might say. And you’d be right.
To get around this, MLS has introduced an increasingly complex set of roster rules and restrictions to get around this cap and allow teams to spend more ambitiously. Fully understanding these mechanisms almost requires a specialized degree, but for the purposes of this exercise, here are a few highlights.
- Allocation Money: The maximum budget charge for one of the 20 players on a senior roster is $683,750. MLS clubs can use “Allocation Money” to buy down players to fit under the cap, with players in this range eligible to earn up to $1,683,750. For example, if a player earns $1,200,000, the club would have to use $516,250 of allocation money to fit them into the cap. Each team gets a set amount of allocation money each season, and can also acquire it through player and asset trades, as well as converting portions of outgoing transfer fees.
- Prime Roster Spots: In 2024, MLS updated their rules to allow teams a total of six “prime roster spots”. These include both Designated Players and U22 Initiative players. Previously, each MLS club got three DP spots and either one or three U22 spots. Now, teams can choose between having three DP spots and three U22 spots, or only using two DP spots with four U22 spots. Teams are required to declare which model they will use before the start of the season.
Inter Miami’s Current Roster
The Herons have built one of the most ambitious rosters in MLS history
Owners David Beckham and Jose and Jorge Mas have assembled the most ambitious roster MLS has ever seen. Lionel Messi is the obvious headliner. His salary alone is a whopping $20,446,667 per season, and he also receives a portion of Adidas jersey sales and Apple’s TV revenue, as well as a stake in the club whenever he retires. His salary alone is more than the total payroll of over 20 MLS clubs.
Along with Messi, Miami have signed his former 
FC Barcelona teammates Luis Suarez, Sergio Busquets and Jordi Alba, as well as an impressive collection of talent from within MLS and South America.
This ambition means that Miami don’t have a ton of flexibility. They’ve opted to use the two DP and four U22 model mentioned above. Messi and Busquets are their two DPs. Busquets had a guaranteed compensation of $8,774,996 in 2024, well outside the range to have his contract bought down with allocation money to re-open the DP spot. They’ve also gone all-in on U22 players; Facundo Farías, Tómas Avilés, Benjamin Cremaschi, Federico Redondo and Emerson Rodríguez are all currently signed as U22 players. Farías was put on the season-ending injury list ahead of the 2024 campaign, while Rodríguez was loaned to Vasco da Gama.
Miami will already have to find a way to move at least one player out of a U22 spot before 2025. In order to sign Neymar, they’d need to bring their U22 player count down to three in order to free up a DP spot. Although there have long been whispers of MLS adding a fourth DP spot, that doesn’t seem likely to happen this winter.
Neymar’s Current Salary
The Brazil star would have to take a significant paycut to join MLS
If Neymar were to head to MLS, he’d do so at a significant pay cut. He’s on a reported $100 million salary with Al Hilal in Saudi Arabia, who paid a reported €90 million transfer fee to 
Paris Saint-Germain in 2023 to acquire him. After just five games with Al Hilal, Neymar tore his ACL in September 2023, and hasn’t played since.
His contract is set to expire in July 2025, and he could theoretically join Miami as a free agent, although his salary demands would firmly make him a Designated Player while also likely taking a significant pay cut to move to America.