Orlando City’s playoff push begins with coach Oscar Pareja in final days of his contract | Commentary

Let’s hope team owner Mark Wilf is right.

Let’s hope Orlando City is thisclose to signing Oscar Pareja, the greatest coach in franchise history, to a new contract.

But it sure seems strange that this is even a topic of conversation after Orlando City’s historically successful regular season and a 1-0 playoff-opening victory over Nashville SC Monday night at the Purple Palace — aka Exploria Stadium.

It sure seems strange that the Lions began their stated goal to win the MLS Cup in front of nearly 20,000 Oscar-adoring fans Monday night, and, yet, the man of hour — Oscar Pareja himself — was actually coaching under an expiring contract.

And, yes, it sure seems strange that Pareja and Luiz Muzzi, the team’s executive vice president in charge of soccer operations, are actually both without a contract for next season. That’s right, the man in charge of coaching the team and the man in charge of building the team, are on the last few games of their current contracts with Orlando City.

Just so you know, Wilf said before Monday night’s playoff opener that Orlando City has had some “good talks” and is in a “good place” in regards to negotiations with Pareja and Muzzi, but he didn’t say a deal has been sealed.

Before the playoffs began, Pareja and Muzzi were very vague about their contract status and didn’t seem at all eager to discuss their futures.

When Muzzi was asked about his contract status as well as the future of Pareja and some of Orlando City’s current players, he replied: “Right now, we’re focused on the playoffs and the MLS Cup. Once that’s over, we’ll talk about those other things.”

Said Pareja: “I have been having a great journey here in Orlando. Really. I have this opportunity for a club I wanted to coach in a city where I wanted to live, but right now we want more. … We are just focusing on the playoff games.”

Obviously, there is something happening behind the scenes that we are not really privy to right now. The Wilf family — the billionaire owners of Orlando City and the NFL’s Minnesota Vikings — has clearly seen enough to know that the Pareja-Muzzi tandem is working and working well.

Muzzi came to Orlando in 2019 and hired Pareja a year later. Before Pareja’s tenure, Orlando City had never made the playoffs in five years of existence under three different head coaches. Since Pareja’s arrival in 2020, Orlando City has made the playoffs in all four of his seasons and this year set club records for victories, points, road wins and goal differential.

Although the Lions have never won the MLS Cup, they are one of the few teams in recent years that are at least in the playoffs vying for it every season. As somebody wise once said, “You gotta be in it to win it.”

“Only four out of 30 clubs have made the playoffs the last four years,” Muzzi points out. “That’s no small accomplishment, but we are always pushing for more and you can’t be satisfied. We want to win an MLS Cup. We want to bring the Cup to the city.”

Mark Wilf acknowledges that he is happy and “excited about where the entire soccer brain trust” of Pareja, Muzzi and assistant GM Ricardo Moreira has taken the franchise. Which makes you wonder what the holdup is in signing the brain trust to new contracts?

Could it be that Pareja specifically is weighing his options? He does, after all, have tons of leverage. He is considered one of the top coaches in MLS and likely wants a huge salary increase from the estimated $300,000 annually he is making right now. Considering the Wilfs own an NFL team and are used to paying exorbitant salaries, you would think they could find $1 million a year in their couch cushions to pay Pareja.

Let’s hope they get a deal done soon because Pareja has shown in the past he is not afraid to jump to another job and take on a new challenge if the situation calls for it.

Let’s not forget, he started his MLS coaching career with the Colorado Rapids, but left after two years to join Muzzi at FC Dallas. In fact, because Pareja still had a year left on his contract in Colorado, Dallas had to give the Rapids a 2015 first-round draft pick and some allocation money to hire him. Pareja left Dallas five years later as the most successful coach in club history to join Club Tijuana in Liga MX.

Orlando City fans can only hope Pareja isn’t considering another career move.

“All of us are in a good place,” Wilf said of the negotiations, “but right now we’re in the position of wanting to put full focus on the MLS playoffs and going for the Cup.”

There’s no doubt that winning the coveted Cup is the No. 1 priority for Orlando City.

However, bringing back Pareja and Muzzi — the two men most responsible for building this championship-caliber team — is a close second.

Email me at mbianchi@orlandosentinel.com. Hit me up on X (formerly Twitter) @BianchiWrites and listen to my Open Mike radio show every weekday from 6 to 9:30 a.m. on FM 96.9, AM 740 and 969TheGame.com/listen