Major League Soccer suspended two players for a ‘potential violation of league rules’ before their opening matches in the MLS Cup Playoffs this week.
Los Angeles FC’s Yaw Yeboah and Columbus Crew’s Derrick Jones were placed on administrative leave pending review, the league said in a Saturday, Oct. 25 statement.
MLS declined comment when contact by USA TODAY Sports about why the players were suspended.
Yeboah, 28, has played in 23 games across all competitions with a goal for LAFC in 2025. He signed a two-year deal in January 2025, making $550,000 in guaranteed compensation.
LAFC acquired Yeboah from San Diego FC, which selected him in the 2024 MLS Re-Entry draft after Columbus did not re-sign him. He played 93 total games with Columbus from 2022-24.
Yeboah started his career in Europe with England’s Manchester City in 2014, but did not play with the club. He made stops at French club Lille (2015-16), Dutch club Twente (2016-17), and Spanish clubs Real Oviedo (2017-18), Numancia (2018-2020) and Celta Fortuna (2019-2020). He also played Wisła Kraków in Poland (2020-22) before joining MLS. Yeboah played with Ghana’s Under-20, Under-23 and Senior Team during his career.
Jones, 28, has only played three matches for Columbus in 2025, making $387,500 in guaranteed compensation.
Jones has played with five different MLS clubs in his career, including the Philadelphia Union’s first and second team (2016-19), Nashville SC (2019-20), Houston Dynamo (2021-22), Charlotte FC (2022-23) and Columbus since 2024. He also played with United States Under-20 team in 2017, and the Under-23 team in 2019.
Columbus Crew will face FC Cincinnati in Game 1 of their first-round, best-of-three series on Monday, Oct. 27, while LAFC hosts Austin FC in Game 1 on Wednesday.