First and foremost, if you haven’t checked out Javier Hernandez’s solid job on the red card mandate from PRO–the organization that governs the MLS officiating crews–be sure to do so. While I’ll end up partially disagreeing with one of Javier’s main premises, he does a great job of putting the red card rate in MLS into context relative to other major leagues around the world, and by that standard, Major League Soccer is definitely producing an outsized share of ejections.
Where I differ with his take, though, is that the numbers don’t take into account the differences in style and pace of play from league-to-league.