Carlos Vela, Javier Hernández or Gonzalo Higuaín? Who has the best salary in MLS

The 2021 season of Major League Soccer is underway. Match by match, teams go all out in search of winning the competition. And to achieve all the glory, the franchises spend a significant sum of money hiring top international players. In that sense, this Thursday the payroll of the players' salaries was released. 

Mexican forward Carlos Vela is the highest paid player in MLS this season, with a total compensation of $ 6.3 million, including $ 4.5 million in salary, with Los Angeles FC. His compatriot Javier Chicharito Hernández, who plays for the Los Angeles Galaxy, is second with $ 6 million, all in salary, according to figures released Thursday by the Major League Soccer players' union.

Argentine forward Gonzalo Higuaín (Inter Miami) is third, with a compensation of $ 5,793,750, including a base salary of 5.1 million, followed by Spanish midfielder Alejandro Pozuelo (Toronto FC), with a compensation of 4,693,000, including $ 3.8 million in salary.

Vela could only play seven games in the shortened 2020 campaign due to a knee injury.Zlatan Ibrahimovic set the MLS record by collecting $ 7.2 million with the Los Angeles Galaxy in 2019, before moving to Milan the following year.

The union reported that the average base salary for footballers on the teams' top payrolls is $ 398,725. That's up from $ 345,867 in 2019 and $ 138,140 in 2014. A list of salaries for the 2020 campaign, shortened by the pandemic, wasn't released.