Statistical analysis of soccer games has been praised and derided since its inception a decade ago, and this season MLS entered the arena by utilizing the Castrol Index to evaluate and rate its players.

The Castrol Index is based on data compiled by Opta Index, which began cataloguing information from English Premier League games in 1996. In 2003, Michael Lewis' book "Moneyball" introduced soccer executives and coaches to the methods of data analysis used by Oakland A's general manager Billy Beane, a devoted soccer fan, and the increased sophistication of information gathered and dissected is explored by author Simon Kuper in an article published in the Financial Times.

Kuper contends that no longer must teams and coaches wade through a morass of often misleading or confusing information, and that bonafide statistical indicators have been developed to assess how players help their teams win.