This is an archived article that was published on sltrib.com in 2015, and information in the article may be outdated. It is provided only for personal research purposes and may not be reprinted.

Fifty-six days after Major League Soccer and the MLS Players Union reached an agreement on details of a new Collective Bargaining Agreement and avoided a labor strike, the league released its 2015 Roster Rules & Regulations.

Having been "operating under the old world up until today," MLS again, as it has so many times before, enters a new world with familiar restrictions replete with first-time mechanisms describing how the 20 clubs in the league can acquire players. Firstly, the 2015 MLS salary cap for players 1-20 jumps from $3.1 million in 2014 to $3.49 million in 2015. Also Designated Player hits, at minimum, jump from $387,500 to $436,250.

Roster sizes in MLS in 2015 will be capped at 28 first-team players.

The major sticking point of the contentious CBA discussions, free agency, is officially featured for MLS players 28 years of age with eight years of MLS service who are out of contract or who do not have their options exercised by the clubs. However, according to the release from MLS, "more details of the Free Agency Process" will be released upon the official ratification of the new CBA."

However, MLS president and deputy commissioner Mark Abbott confirmed in a conference call with reporters Friday afternoon that the CBA is yet to be ratified by the MLSPU. Regardless, the revised mechanisms officially went into effect Friday.

» Allocation Process — MLS will maintain a single, fixed and public list of players, known as the Allocation Ranking List, that are subject to the Allocation Process. MLS clubs will have the right to acquire players on the Allocation Ranking List based on the Allocation Ranking Order. The Allocation Ranking Order is determined by the reverse order of finish in the previous season, taking playoff performance into account. Once a club acquires a player via the Allocation Ranking Order, that club drops to the bottom of the order. A club's Allocation Ranking Order position is tradable.

Abbott said the two fundamental changes to the Allocation Process was about avoiding ambiguity about which specific players apply to the process. (For the full list, click here). Abbott said MLS also wanted to reduce the number of players the process applied to, therefore, making more players available through a "first-come, first-serve basis."

The Allocation Ranking list is comprised of players in following categories: Select U.S. men's national team players, select elite U.S. youth national team players and players transferred out of MLS garnering a transfer free of at least $500,000.

Currently RSL sits No. 11 of the 20 MLS clubs in the Allocation Ranking Order. San Jose, L.A. and Chicago Fire are 1, 2 and 3 on the list.

» Discovery Process — As part of the revised Discovery Process, in 2015 clubs may place seven players on their Discovery Lists, a reduction from 12 players in 2014. This reduction is intended to encourage clubs to add to their lists only players they intend to sign. In order for MLS clubs to maintain the confidentiality from other MLS clubs of the players they are seeking to recruit, the league office will not publicize the names of players on a club's Discovery list, nor specify if a claim has been filed to add a particular player to a club's Discovery List. Clubs may add or remove players to their Discovery List throughout the year, and each club's Discovery List does not reset at the end of the MLS season.

"This was done to simplify the process and incentivize teams to invest more in scouting and recruitment," said Executive VP of player relations and competition Todd Durbin.

So, yes, megastars like Cristiano Ronaldo and Lionel Messi can find their way onto a Discovery List with any one of the 20 clubs in MLS. Also clarified was the case of Jermaine Jones, who went to the New England Revolution — not the Chicago Fire — in a controversial coin flip last year under the old league guidelines. Had Jones entered MLS this season, Jones would've been a discoverable player, not on the allocation ranking list.

»Ins and outs — The new DP charge of $436,250 leaves clubs with three Designated Players — like Real Salt Lake — with an extra charged fun of $146,250. Under the constructs of the new CBA, captain Kyle Beckerman and forwards Joao Plata and Sebastian Jaime are RSL's three DPs. Plata, who just turned 23, will cost a $200,000 qualifying as a Young DP. Clubs still have the opportunity to buy down the budget charge of DP with allocation money accumulated.

Asked why MLS continues to reward clubs for failing to make the MLS Cup playoffs, Abbott said, "I think part of a belief that we are trying to provide teams an opportunity compete in the league and there are mechanisms that all leagues have, the draft is a common mechanism that is used in most North American leagues that allows teams that performed worst the year before to have an opportunity to get players out of the draft, which would help them be more competitive in future years and providing allocation amounts to clubs that didn't qualify is an extension of that principle."

-Chris Kamrani

Twitter: @chriskamrani