The indoor soccer wars were starting to take their toll by now. The MISL was increasingly challenged by a growing AISA and to ward off further losses of star players, raised salaries significantly. Although this helped them keep most of the better players, it took a big hit at the bottom line, despite their unprecedented success on the field.

The league was hugely popular, with good television contracts, players on the national team, and frequent crowds of more than 10,000. The St. Louis Steamer, in particular was a major success story, with sold out crowds, fan promotions, spectacular multimedia displays and the like. They succeeded through creating an EVENT, not just playing a match. Their tactics were a precursor to those for indoor soccer in general, and more significantly, for many of the types of successful promotions in other established US sports, particularly baseball, with the elaborate new stadiums full of family-friendly events, promotions and activities that provide an entire day's worth of entertainment for the budget-conscious families of the 1980's.

The AISA, although lacking the major stars, was a more viable institution, through aggressive cost cutting and careful financial controls. Despite their generally lower profile, (attendance averaged less than 4,000 into the early 1990's), they avoided the financial pitfalls that eventually consumed the MISL. By 1988, the MISL was in severe financial straits, and nearly folded. The league did survive, but lost many of its strongest franchises, including Chicago Sting (a veteran of the NASL), Cleveland Force (an original franchise), the St. Louis Steamer (their greatest success story), Tacoma, and Minnesota (another NASL survivor). They did continue with seven teams and a shortened season, but were never the same after that, and finally the MISL folded in 1992.

The NPSL, by contrast, despite having lost four teams from a premature expansion two years back, continued their slow, incremental growth, signing some of the stars from the MISL teams who folded, and for the first time started expanding out of their Midwestern stronghold, and re-establishing themselves in Chicago, their major TV market.