If the Portland Timbers continue at their current pace they will finish the season with a perfect record. They will also likely break season scoring records, but they’ll be tied with Real Salt Lake in both departments.
What a season this is going to be! The West looks to likely be dominant over the East again. Six West teams got W’s and the defending MLS Cup Champions aren’t even in the win column yet. Only KC and Houston, last year’s Eastern Conference championship game participants, got victories. The Sounders, who should be one of the strongest teams in the league, have not had a regular season game yet.
Watching MLS on TV got a whole lot better this year with the addition of NBC Sports picking up a bunch of games!
In honor of NBC Sports showing games, I’d like to start a little friendly prediction competition. Predict the outcome (win, lose, or draw) of each game on the NBC Sports TV schedule. Post it to Twitter with #MLSPredictions. I’ll start:
The Galaxy have had the top spot wrapped up for a while. The Sounders and Real Salt Lake have also had their playoffs spot for a few weeks. Now there is one position remaining that 4 teams have a shot at with New York in the best position to take it.
The East side is kinda crazy right now. Sporting KC and Philadelphia Union are tied on points with Columbus Crew and Houston Dynamo 1 and 2 points back. Any of those teams could take 1st and any one could fall to the 3rd wildcard position. There are a ton of scenarios for those teams in the East. An article on Down The Byline makes it clear as mud what Sporting KC have to do.
I do hope Sporting KC end up on top, because when everyone else was saying NY was going to win the east, I was probably the only guy that was even thinking about KC as a playoff contender. It could be that KC finish only 2 points up on NY, so that isn’t such a big win, and you can’t blame anyone for thinking NY should have been up there, they have the team do it.
No matter what happens, it will be an exciting weekend for a bunch of teams starting with Portland Timbers and DC United. Likely one team will be eliminated and one team will still have hope after that game. Then Thursday night New York and Philadelphia will have big impact on several teams. Then the season is ended on Sunday with the LA Galaxy visiting the Houston Dynamo.
I see KC winning the East, with New York holding on to that last playoff spot. How do you see it all ending? Who gets in and who wins the East?
I put together a Twitter list that is each of the MLS teams’ official Twitter account. You can follow the list here: http://twitter.com/#!/mlsfanblog/mls-teams
In the process of putting this list together I started noting the other social network-y type sites some of these teams had accounts with and thought it might be interesting to share here. Almost every team had Twitter, Facebook, and YouTube covered. A few teams had some extra links in addition to those standard three.
Chicago Fire only seems to have an account at Facebook.
Chivas USA also had Facebook and YouTube.
Colorado Rapids on Facebook and YouTube.
Columbus Crew on Facebook and YouTube.
DC United on Facebook, YouTube, and Flickr.
FC Dallas on Facebook and YouTube.
Houston Dynamo on Facebook and YouTube.
LA Galaxy on Facebook, YouTube, and LinkedIn.
New England Revolution on Facebook and YouTube.
New York Red Bulls on Facebook and YouTube.
Philadelphia Union on Facebook, and YouTube.
Portland Timbers on Facebook and YouTube.
Real Salt Lake on Facebook and YouTube.
San Jose EarthQuakes on Facebook and YouTube (a little bit out of date).
Seattle Sounders on Facebook. Apparently they do videos on their own website - and might not have a YouTube channel.
Sporting Kansas City on Facebook, YouTube, and Flickr. Sporting KC even have a page with links to many Twitter accounts of players and staff. You can see that at http://www.sportingkc.com/social-media
Toronto FC on Facebook and YouTube.
Vancouver Whitecaps on Facebook and YouTube.
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The Houston Dynamo at Portland Timbers game on Friday night could determine the playoff fate of both teams.
pts (games played)
43 (32) Houston Dynamo -
[in the playoffs]
—————————————-
40 (31) Portland Timbers -
[out of the playoffs]
After this game Houston goes to play at LA Galaxy to end their season. The Timbers get DC United and Real Salt Lake to end their season.
Since Houston won the last game between these two team at home, I’m going to pick the home team again and say the Timbers get a 2-1 victory and go on to play in the post-season.
With just over a month of the MLS regular season remaining the LA Galaxy are the only team to have secured a playoff spot. Seattle Sounders FC and Real Salt Lake are looking to wrap up their playoff spots this weekend.
58 LA Galaxy *
51 Seattle Sounders FC
48 Real Salt Lake
46 FC Dallas
41 Colorado Rapids
41 Columbus Crew
40 Sporting Kansas City
39 Philadelphia Union
39 Houston Dynamo
36 New York Red Bulls
—————————————
36 Portland Timbers
34 D.C. United
31 Chivas USA
30 Chicago Fire
30 Toronto FC
29 San Jose Earthquakes
27 New England Revolution
22 Vancouver Whitecaps FC
With the current standings the way they are right now, the match in New York on Saturday evening will have huge playoff implications.
Portland Timbers @ New York Red Bulls
Saturday, September 24, 2011 7:30pm EST
Red Bull Arena
The teams are currently even on points with 36 which has New York in the last wildcard playoff spot and the Timbers on the outside looking in. My prediction is a 2-1 victory for the visitors which will leave NYRB on the outside. What is your prediction?
Recently the owner of One Match Ban emailed and asked a few quick questions about what I’d predict for the upcoming MLS season. I decided to write them down and make a post of it right here.
1. Tip for the MLS Cup?
Los Angeles Galaxy. The best team through the regular season last year has added Juan Pablo Angel and Frankie Hejduk. At 35 and 36 years old they aren’t building a team for the future, they want something right now. There were good to start with and now they’ve got a lot of experience and one of the best goal scorers the league has seen in a long time.
2. Eastern Conference Winners?
Sporting KC (formerly Kansas City Wizards). The Wizards Sporting KC will start the season with a new name, eventually they will open a new stadium called Sporting Park, and they’ve got some new blood on the team that has been performing fairly well so far this pre-season. According to their website, Sporting Park will be the first MLS stadium to be fully lighted for HDTV. How can they not win the Eastern Conference?
3. Western Conference Winners?
Los Angeles Galaxy have been a very good team the past couple of years and been close to the MLS Cup, but this is the year they finally get it again.
4. Player to watch?
Charlie Davies is on loan with DC United. After missing the World Cup due to a terrible auto accident he is back. It was uncertain if he’d ever play again but here he is with DC United. Hopefully Davies can get back to the level he was at before his accident.
5. Rookie to watch?
The first pick in the draft was US U-20 national team member Omar Salgado. He has been getting playing time and scoring goals for the Vancouver Whitecaps. He could be an important player in Vancouver.
6. Match to watch?
Seattle Sounders vs Portland Timbers. Nothing beats a good rivalry and these guys will have it. I wish I was able to get to one of these games.
7. Top Scorer?
Juan Pablo Angel in his new home at the Galaxy.
So what do you think? Where have I gone horribly wrong and where have I come close to making some reasonable sense of anything?
Several MLS teams took place in the 3rd round of the US Open Cup today. A few of those teams will play again in the 4th round - several will not.
Defending MLS Champions Columbus Crew went to OT and then to PKs against the always dangerous Rochester Rhinos. The Rhinos came out on top in PKs at 5-3 to move on.
The Chicago Fire have been hot in MLS play - but they couldn’t keep it up against Wilmington Hammerheads. The only goal of the game went to the Hammerheads in the first half. Four time US Open Cup champions Chicago Fire can now focus on the MLS regular season.
Chivas USA was the third MLS side to fall to a lower division opponent. They ran into the Charleston Battery and went home 3-1 losers.
Some MLS teams did advance out of this round. DC United beat the Ocean City Barons 2-0 and The Kansas City Wizards snuck out of Minnesota with after winning 4-2 on PKs after a 3-3 draw.
A couple teams will still be in action on July 1st. The Houston Dynamo will be playing at the Austin Aztecs while Seattle Sounders FC will be playing at their old USL rivals Portland Timbers.
