Week 27 in Major League Soccer proved to be a good one for a couple clubs and another tough one for some others. One thing that is clear is the playoff race is still as tight as it was for the past few weeks.

One club that cashed in on a good weekend by not even playing was DC United. The Black-and-Red were off this weekend but cashed in well on results of others. With New England giving up a late goal to New York on Friday to get a draw and RSL dropping a game on the road to Houston, United saw their playoff chances increase pretty well. Throw in the fact that Colorado also tied a game on the road and DC not sees a possible wild card birth with their name on it.

One other club that is making it interesting is Kansas City. We thought they were dead in the water and in a way they still need to win out to get to the playoffs this year. But with three straight wins under their belt, Peter Vermes’ club is inching their way up the standings and are now just two wins away from a playoff spot. Lucky for some around the playoff zone KC still has matches at Houston and Chivas along with hosting DC, Colorado and Seattle. Not gonna be easy to get those two wins if you ask me.

Two clubs that saw their playoff chances take a nose dive were Toronto and Salt Lake this weekend. Both saw tough losses on the road which means they both need to win three of their last four games in order to reach the post season. Not an easy task for either side with both playing terrible on the road this year and both having a couple road games left. Toronto at least does having a visit from RSL and San Jose along with a trip to New York left. You could say their schedule sets them up nicely but based on recent play we can’t say it will get them in the playoffs for the first time or not. Continue Reading…

One thing I like to do before I go on any trip is make sure my place is decently clean for my return. Well in the case of this past week for my wedding/honeymoon I was all prepared on that level except for when it came to getting back in the swing of things for soccer stuff. I came back into town this past weekend and saw a slew of random scores in Major League Soccer. Some were more predictable than others but some were just crazy.

Yes, the main score I am talking about is that wild 6-3 game at the Home Depot Center between FC Dallas and the LA Galaxy. I think I predicted something like 3-1 for LA on Saturday morning. Yeah apparently I was way off and that doesn’t even begin to tell that story.

While I was gone I missed out on a few things. Where I was on my honeymoon the only access to the internet was through my iPhone and even the service there in Maui wasn’t good enough to want to read up on things. So when I came back I had hundreds of messages and notes about different deals that had gone down. From Heath Pearce to Dallas (no shocker there in my opinion), to Julian de Guzman to Toronto (kind of shocking but in  a way not really).

Then I saw some fun deals like Jon Conway getting sent by New York to Chivas for a draft pick in the 2011 draft. I think I chuckled at that one for some reason. Same with the signing of Daniel Hernandez by FC Dallas. I guess Schellas Hyndman really wants FC Dallas to just be a bunch of his old SMU kids. They never won a national title there so I wouldn’t expect anything great out of them in MLS.

So now after a week and a half of being out of things the league’s playoff race looks a little different than when I left. The way I look at the standings here, the first tiebreaker goes to the club that has played the fewest matches. Next is head-to-head and then goal differential. Number of games played is presented before the clubs’ record. Continue Reading…

It’s just what we expected, a very tight playoff race this year is happening. Out of the 15 clubs in the league, 11 are in playoff contention. Sorry San Jose, Dallas and KC fans…we’re pretty much writing you all off for the playoff race this year along with the Red Bulls who have been out of contention for months now despite the two straight wins.

Just how tight is the race? Let’s have a look. For our purposes in tiebreakers we will use the teams with the most remaining games as the higher team.

—SUPPORTER’S SHIELD RACE—-
Houston 11-7-7, 40 points
Columbus 10-4-9, 39 points
Chicago 10-6-8, 38
Los Angeles 9-4-11, 38
—AT LARGE BIRTHS—-
Seattle 8-6-10, 34 points
New England 9-6-6, 33
Colorado 9-7-6, 33
Chivas USA 10-9-3, 33
——-NEXT IN LINE——–
Real Salt Lake 9-9-6, 33
D.C. United 7-5-11, 32
Toronto 8-8-7, 31
—–ALL BUT ELIMINATED—–
Dallas 6-11-5, 23
Kansas City 5-10-6, 21
San Jose 5-12-5, 20
New York 4-16-4, 16

Right now it is a true dead heat for the Supporter’s Shield crown as LA inches closer to the top with a win over their rivals Chivas USA. Houston, Columbus and Chicago all dropped games this weekend. I still feel that LA has the best shot out of the four to win the Supporter’s Shield crown this season. Chicago doesn’t look like they have the right mix of things to do it and Columbus’ and Houston’s schedules are too packed in the final months of the season. LA has plenty of win-able games left and it makes sense to see them continue on their current form. Continue Reading…

In a loaded week that was week 23, the MLS playoff race has heated up like never before. Before the weekend a couple team sat outside the playoffs, but once everything was said and done our playoff race looked a little different this morning.

EASTERN AUTOMATIC BERTHS
Columbus 10-3-9, 39 points
Chicago 10-5-8, 38
WESTERN AUTOMATIC BERTHS
Houston 11-6-7, 40 points
Los Angeles 8-4-11, 35
NEXT FOUR IN
Chivas USA 10-7-3, 33 points
Seattle 8-6-9, 33
New England 8-6-6, 30
Colorado 8-7-6, 30
BOTTOM SEVEN OUT
Toronto 8-8-6, 30 points
D.C. United 6-5-11, 29
Real Salt Lake 7-9-6, 27
Dallas 6-11-5, 23
Kansas City 5-9-6, 21
San Jose 5-11-5, 20
New York 3-16-4, 13

Note: tiebreakers here go to teams with the fewest games played

Furthermore this weekend say the bottom two clubs (San Jose and New York) win games. For New York it snapped a 13-game winless streak.

This year’s race continues to prove to be one of the tightest races in recent memories. The 40 point mark, which is usually the magic number for reaching the playoffs. This year it may go up to 42 or 43 with the way things are going. Continue Reading…

Chris Rolfe and Chicago are inching their way up the league standings. (Brian Stevens, WVH Photo Correspondent)

Week 22 in Major League Soccer had two things, results with 2-0 scorelines and red cards. Nealy just as many red cards as there were goals this weekend. Big names saw red while big names scored big goals. The standings are a little different this Monday morning as well which make this year’s playoff race one of the best we’ve ever seen.

While the 2-0 scorelines and red cards were all over the league some things remain the same. Columbus continues to dominate, Kansas City continues to show they aren’t a playoff team, and New York continues to be one of the worst, if not the worst club in league history. Continue Reading…

I guess this was a week that some clubs decided to wake up and actually play for once. Sure they may have been home games for these two clubs but when one scores six in a game and another blanks someone with four goals people will take notice.

Yup, FC Dallas and San Jose decided to play in week 20. I don’t think anyone saw these results coming. Sure some like called for a Dallas home win but I doubt they expected a six goal outburst. I had Seattle downing San Jose but was terrible wrong when the Sounders decided not to show up and have their worst performance of the season.

Are these two clubs on the way up here? I wouldn’t hold my breath on it though. Both still have way too much work to do to even think of making the playoffs this season. Hell, even with the win San Jose still has a very small chance. Dallas isn’t that much better when we look at it. But they both did prove that anything can happen in a given weekend. Continue Reading…

Freddie Ljungberg and Seattle are inching their way to the top. (Photo via Prost Amerika Soccer/Point Taken Photos)

Ah it was good to have a full day of soccer on Saturday (and parts of Sunday). Plenty of items to discuss today with the All-Star roster being anounced this afternoon. Until then it is time to wade through the week that was week 17 in Major League Soccer.

This was certainly a moving week for a lot of clubs. The eastern conference got just a little tighter with Chicago and Toronto inching up to the top while DC United was off this past week. Columbus isn’t too far behind either making the four team race a very interesting thing to watch as we move on towards the ladder part of the summer. Can we already say that it will be these four clubs from the east in the playoffs? I know KC and New England would love to have something to say about that but it is starting to look more and more like those two will be on the outside looking in this time around.

Out west things are even tighter with Seattle’s win over top dog Hosuton on Saturday and with LA’s win over HDC rival Chivas USA. Right now we are seeing as many as five clubs in the race out west with clubs like RSL starting to come around a little more here. Thing is I am wondering if RSL has enough to get back into the mix with the way LA has been playing recently. Continue Reading…