Orlando City’s Season to Remember – For Better and Worse

As someone who found their way to reading this article, you are likely a big-time soccer fan and an Orlando City fan. Probably in that order, but some might tell me to put that thang down, flip it, and reverse it. Or just to reverse it, without the Missy Elliott reference.

As an Orlando City fan, there are moments that you likely remember from every season since you pledged your fandom to the Lions. Some are personal and individual, like attending your first game or the memories of the excitement you felt after a big win, and others are big picture and more season based, like the memories of the run through the 2022 U.S. Open Cup tournament or the deep run in the 2024 MLS playoffs. There are also strangely memorable moments, like the 2020 MLS is Back Tournament and seeing MLS games played with no fans in attendance and kicking off on weekday mornings.

If you look back through your Orlando City fandom you can probably pick out memories from every season, which is to say that every season is memorable for different reasons.

In future years, when you think back on 2026, you might think of the ridiculous comeback against Inter Miami or the long-teased (on our PawedCast) acquisition of Antoine Griezmann and the joy of watching him play for the Lions.

Or, you might think about how you watched a team go all gas, no brakes throughout its season, playing in 34 games so far and having 16 of them (47%) feature a combined goal tally of at least five goals. The percentages are actually even higher for high-scoring games during MLS play, as Orlando City has played 27 MLS games, and in 14 of those (52%) there were at least five goals scored.

If you are looking to see some goals, make sure Orlando City is involved, the Lions have yet to play in a 0-0 game all season, and since Griezmann joined the team, the average number of goals scored in an Orlando City game is 3.7. Goals galore.

Unfortunately, although the all-gas offense ranks among the league’s top 10 in goals per game this season, a defense leaking like the Titanic after it struck the iceberg threatens to sink the team’s playoff hopes. Since Orlando City joined MLS for the 2015 season there have been 308 defensive seasons across all the teams in the league, and the 2026 OCSC defense ranks 306^th out of 308 for goals allowed per game. Mad Men’s famous “not great, Bob” line is an understatement when only two defenses out of 308 have been worse than this year’s group.

If we included every season in MLS history, all 563, it is actually worse. Only one defense in the pre-Orlando City era was worse than all 308 since the Lions joined the league: the 2001 Tampa Bay Mutiny. That team folded after the 2001 season. Yikes.

It may be Halloween season, but do not be scared. Orlando City is not in danger of folding after this season, but a defense that ranks 306th of 308 since joining the league and 560th of 563 in league history brings to mind the apocryphal story about a quote from the 1970s Tampa Bay (Buccaneers) coach John McKay, when asked what he thought about his team’s execution — “I’m in favor of it.” The Buccaneers are still around and the Lions will still be around in the future too, but my goodness do they need to figure out this badness. Disney’s villains sing about how it is good to be bad in the Boo To You Halloween parade, but that is the only place in Orlando where that should be true.

The defense’s poor performance is a shame, because the 2026 offense is the second best in the club’s MLS history and ranks 49^th among all offenses since the Lions joined MLS. During the last three seasons, Orlando City has been in the top 20% of all offenses, the issue is just that a defense that was really good in 2023 has steadily been getting worse year over year ever since.

The table below (all data from fbref.com) shows Orlando City’s goals scored and goals allowed per game during every season since the club joined Major League Soccer and the associated percentile of each value among all 308 MLS offenses and defenses since 2015.

When you think back on 2026, one way to remember this season will be that the 83% gap between Orlando City’s goals scored percentile and goals allowed percentile (and in this case it is, in fact, a single, solitary, percentile) is tied for the fourth largest since 2015.

Perhaps something is in the water in 2026, as three of the top six gaps are from this year, but as it relates to Orlando City, the offense has been memorable for the right reasons (Justin Ellis making the leap, Martín Ojeda making club history, supersub Tyrese Spicer and his game-winning goals, Griezmann being Griezmann, Iván An-goal-o etc.) and the defense for the wrong reasons (shipping goals more efficiently than FedEx).

The Lions still have seven regular-season games remaining, and it is possible they will record seven consecutive shutouts to wrap up the 2026 regular season. If they do (please make this happen), they will end up allowing 1.88 goals per game, which will likely move them just barely out of the bottom 10% of defenses since 2015. Depending on how the offense performs in those final seven games, there will likely still be a massive gap between goals scored and goals allowed per game, which is fitting for how we will probably remember this season.

Until the last whistle of the final game there is potential for some other narrative to replace the good offense bad defense storyline, but this deep into the season most teams are who they are and a major change is unlikely. Unlikely does not mean impossible, and what better way to memorialize 2026 than to go on a late run that makes us all forget about the opening months of the season?

I would remember that for years to come.

Vamos Orlando!