St. Louis CITY SC captain and goalkeeper Roman Bürki and vice-captain and defender Tim Parker were voted in to the 2023 MLS Best XI, presented by Continental Tire. Bürki was recently named Allstate MLS Goalkeeper of the Year and Parker garnered another first for his career with a Best XI nod.
CITY SC is one of four teams in 2023 who recorded the most selections for one team with two players. St. Louis became the fourth expansion club to have multiple selections in the Best XI and the first to have two selections as an expansion team since Atlanta in 2017.
Bürki led the league in goals prevented at 11.9 per OPTA, which is a stat that subtracts the number of goals a GK has conceded from the number of goals a GK would be expected to concede based on the quality of the shots they faced. The former Borussia Dortmund keeper’s
17 wins is the most of any goalkeeper in their first MLS season during the post-shootout era and is tied with Mark Dodd and Mark Dougherty (both in 1996) for the most wins including the shootout era. He is the first goalkeeper to produce at least 120 saves and eight clean sheets in a season since Vito Mannone in 2019, and he has the second highest save percentage of all goalkeepers to keep at least eight clean sheets this season.
Parker, in his ninth MLS season, saw his best offensive statistical season with four goals in 29 regular-season matches. Prior to 2023, the Hicksville, New York, native tallied just two goals 217 regular-season matches. He anchored a CITY SC backline to seven clean sheets. Alongside a Best XI nod, Parker also was named an MLS All-Star for the first time in his career back in August.
