The longest anyone has led an MLS race without winning it: San Jose Earthquakes ended 42 of the 2002 Supporters' Shield race's 51 playing days in first place, 82% of them, and finished behind LA Galaxy. The longest unbroken spell of that lead ran 40 days. At the other end, Colorado Rapids won the 2021 Western race having led on one of its 80 playing days. Both lists below rank by the share of a race's playing days a team spent in first place. How that is counted is spelled out under the tables.
Companion pages: Closest MLS races and Biggest MLS comebacks and collapses.
| Rank | Race | Team that led | Days in first | Playing days | Share | Eventual winner |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 2002 Supporters' Shield | San Jose Earthquakes | 42 | 51 | 82% | LA Galaxy |
| 2 | 2001 Western | San Jose Earthquakes | 30 | 39 | 77% | LA Galaxy |
| 3 | 2021 Western | Seattle Sounders FC | 60 | 80 | 75% | Colorado Rapids |
| 4 | 2000 Supporters' Shield | Kansas City Wizards | 41 | 56 | 73% | Chicago Fire FC |
| 5 | 2000 Central | Tampa Bay Mutiny | 32 | 46 | 70% | Chicago Fire FC |
| 6 | 2018 Eastern | Atlanta United | 59 | 86 | 69% | Red Bull New York |
| 7 | 2015 Eastern | D.C. United | 64 | 94 | 68% | Red Bull New York |
| 8 | 2003 Supporters' Shield | San Jose Earthquakes | 38 | 57 | 67% | Chicago Fire FC |
| 9 | 2004 Western | LA Galaxy | 30 | 47 | 64% | Kansas City Wizards |
| 10 | 1996 Supporters' Shield | LA Galaxy | 58 | 91 | 64% | Tampa Bay Mutiny |
| Rank | Race | Winner | Days in first | Playing days | Share | First place for good |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 2021 Western | Colorado Rapids | 1 | 80 | 1% | November 7, 2021 |
| 2 | 2000 Supporters' Shield | Chicago Fire FC | 1 | 56 | 2% | September 9, 2000 |
| 3 | 2002 Eastern | New England Revolution | 2 | 48 | 4% | September 21, 2002 |
| 4 | 2016 Eastern | Red Bull New York | 5 | 87 | 6% | October 16, 2016 |
| 5 | 2013 Western | Portland Timbers | 6 | 78 | 8% | October 26, 2013 |
| 6 | 2018 Supporters' Shield | Red Bull New York | 8 | 99 | 8% | October 28, 2018 |
| 7 | 2020 Supporters' Shield | Philadelphia Union | 8 | 69 | 12% | November 8, 2020 |
| 8 | 2019 Eastern | New York City Football Club | 10 | 86 | 12% | September 7, 2019 |
| 9 | 2001 Western | LA Galaxy | 5 | 39 | 13% | September 8, 2001 |
| 10 | 2011 Eastern | Sporting Kansas City | 13 | 91 | 14% | October 15, 2011 |
Everything on this page comes from the same day-by-day season files the charts draw, with standings read as each day ended. All 92 charted MLS races from 30 finished seasons enter: every conference and Supporters' Shield race from 1996 to 2025. Wild card races are not ranked; their story is the playoff cutoff, not first place. The 2026 season joins these lists when it ends. A team's time in first place is counted once per season, at its longest, whichever of its charted races it came in.
Longest leads lost is the club that ended the most of a race's playing days in first place and did not finish first. Any club in the race qualifies, not the runner-up alone, because a club can lead for four months and finish fifth.
Winners who led least is the same count for the club that did win, ranked from the fewest days up. Its last column is the day the winner took first place for good, which the comebacks page ranks on.
Only days this race's teams played are counted, the same rule the closest races page counts closeness over. A strike or a pause freezes the standings, and a leader sitting out an idle stretch would collect time on top for nothing.
The ranking is by share rather than by the raw count, because a league's seasons are not all the same length and a short one would otherwise win by being short. Seasons cut short by a strike or a stoppage are ranked on what was played, which is the same rule and the reason for it. The count and the total are printed beside the share, so the order can be checked; where two rows print the same whole percent, the unrounded share put them in that order.
A day two clubs end level at the top is a day in first place for both of them, which is what holding first place means in English. So the two counts of one race can add up to more than the race's playing days. Races whose top two the standings cannot separate appear on neither list: with no winner, the data can name neither the club that lost a lead nor the club that kept one.
A lead measured in days and a lead measured in points are different questions, and the two lists often disagree about which season was the bigger collapse; the comebacks page ranks the same blown leads by size. Only finished seasons are ranked; every irregularity in the record is listed in the data notes.