I'm fairly amazed. This board has criticised MLS so harshly, and rightfully so, whenever MLS departs from the worldwide traditions of the game. Yet now, the longstanding soccer tradition of using two-legs aggregate scoring to settle cup ties is some sort of MLS travesty. All because you don't like the results that are possible and that we are getting this year. Wanting the league results to be more determinative seems to drive many comments. If the league went to a single table and crowned the SS winner the Champion I'd be fine with that. If the league used single-game knockouts at the home of the higher seed I'd be fine with that. I'd hate to see MLS go back to the 3-game, each game discreet, format because I don't view that as part of our soccer tradition. It is not how we do it and the two-leg cup tie does a great job of identifying the best team. All talk about winning "games" in 2-leg cup ties is meaningless. There are not two games. There is one game that is 180-minutes long. If it is tied then the higher seed hosts the AET and penalties. I agree it is not much of a HFA to which I am fine. Others are not. Difference of preference and every has a right to their preference. No one wants to admit it -- but this whole thread is because folks don't like the results this year. But the results are not a fluke.
First things first: It's NOT about the outcome. It's NOT about the outcome. It's NOT about the outcome. It's NOT about the outcome. It's NOT about the outcome. It's NOT about the outcome. It's NOT about the outcome. It's NOT about the outcome. Once this is clear, let's move on. As you said, there is a "tradition of using two-legs aggregate scoring to settle cup ties". Well, you said it all: CUP TIES! That is the key. This soccer tradition do not take on account a 34-game regular season prior to the series. Usually, the teams facing each other do not have anything to differentiate them, so HFA must be equally distributed. (I have some complaining to make on UCL and Europe League knockout stages, but here is not the place for that) In MLS, the situation is completely different.
Not for me. I'm loving the results. And I agree with you that Aggregate is better than "best-of-3" series. And I wouldn't really like a single table format, because I love playoffs. I would just lean on making the playoffs a little longer in some way to lessen the potential for a flukey result. I don't think that the teams in the final this year are flukey at all. But playoffs are extremely short in comparison to the league format. That could be altered somehow.
Every damn year I get this statement thrown at me. I guess I hate every team in the league. That must be it. Quit trying to psychoanalyze. I've been making the same argument for years. What's interesting is that it's always different ppl who oppose me. One year it was Rapids fans. What a coincidence, Colorado won that year. Now it's a Dynamo fan,... and what a coincidence, the Dynamo are in the final. I will admit, it seems DC fans are up in arms about it this year. I don't give damn who's playing. If the system stinks, I'm going to call it. I've been doing it every year. Last season I was semi-satisfied since the Conference finals were still single games and only the Conference semis were home and home series. But I was pissed as soon as I heard the setup for this season, WHEN IT CAME OUT. It's documented on this forum. I've been posting on this topic for too long to have that bogus charge thrown at me. I liken this to the Electoral College. It's always a bad system. But it's amazing how Dems were pissed about it in 2000 and Repubs were like "it's okay". But this year when (briefly) Repubs thought they would get bitten by it, they were pissed,... or at least were going to be. People need to stop taking these things personally and look at the system dispassionately. So back to your highlighted statement. What is soccer tradition? The only reason that you call the aggregate home and home "traditional" is because it's used in the Champions League. You have to understand that the Champions League is not a playoff. They're two different animals. This isn't about being traditional, this is about being fair. I didn't start talking about this this season. I started talking about it years ago. It's not about the results, although they do play out the fallacy of the system. It's about the way it's set up. The purpose of the home and home was to mitigate the advantage in tournaments where there is little to no previous head to head competition. Playoffs are a different thing entirely. Unlike CL teams, playoff teams have had 34 games of previous action that they deserve to be rewarded for. It's about fairness. If we're going to have playoffs then we need to treat them like playoffs, not a tournament.
Or any team in the playoffs. Only LA won as the home team (and that was against the weakest team and most out of form team by far in the playoffs). Only LA and DC won as the higher seeds. I think this says a lot about the parity in the league actually.
MOST (not all) of the rest of the world uses the 2-leg system for CUP ties, not for playoffs after the end of a long regular season. Most (not all) also use away goals as the tiebreaker. On those two things MLS is pretty different. I'd be fine with a 2-leg system for the Open Cup since that's what you are comparing this to. At the end of the playoffs it'd be nice if home field advantage at least gave some sort of advantage. The travel schedule also has to come into it. It absolutely brutalized DC United for example. In other years there has been a 1-game conference final. I don't see a real problem with going back to that. That would actually give the higher seed an advantage. For example, rather than traveling to NY on Wed, having the game cancelled, staying there and then traveling TO Houston on a short turnaround to play a lower seeded team that had one extra day of rest. Given the number of injuries the team was already dealing with this was really tough to overcome and they couldn't in the end. Not to take anything away from Houston, they are a very good team and playoff tested and probably would have beaten DC in a 2-game series more than half the time. But if it had been 1 game at RFK with a week's rest I think DC would have been able to mount a better challenge and would have gotten a real advantage from being the higher seed. I don't know as much of the specifics of the Sounders team and injuries and travel, but you can bet they would have been better too with more rest and only a home game to worry about vs. LA.
The outcomes were fine. I just don't like that the outcomes of yesterday's games were a forgone conclusion after the first leg. 2-game aggregate serieses produce that possibility, and that's what I have a problem with. I have no problem with Houston making the final. They were much better than DC. I even predicted Houston would make it to the final in the prediction thread before the playoffs started.
I actually really like the current format, but do not like the spacing between games. I also don't think the problem is home field advantage at all. I think one problem is that people perceive the regular season as determining the best team instead of the healthiest team, the team with the least internationals, or the team whose opponents had the most injuries/suspensions. The other problem is that American teams tend to travel poorly. That cannot be understated. I like this league. Of course I enjoyed it in 96 too.
We should just have all the playoffs in two weeks. Wildcard Wednesday, semifinals Friday, conference final Wednesday and the MLS Cup Friday. Who will survive!
I hate having to refute the same points over and over again. Noone is saying this. Otherwise we'd be against the playoffs altogether. Just go back and read over the posts. Who the f is saying this? Really read them without reading intent into them that isn't being written. It's frustrating as hell to debate a topic against someone who's in turn debating a ghost that doesn't exist. I'm sorry if I want teams to have to earn whatever advantages they have in the playoffs. That's what playoffs should be. Merit-based. It's not right that a lower seeded team isn't punished appropriately for not performing in the regular season. And if you don't do that it devalues the regular season. If I was saying anything more then I'd be saying "no playoffs at all." Quit twisting the point. I don't expect everyone to agree with me, but I at least expect ppl to listen to what I'm actually saying without imagining that I'm saying something else. And annoyingly enough, this argument is predictably breaking down along team lines. Whatever,... I'm done for this season. F*ck it. This is Hopefully MLS fixes this someday and sets up a real playoff system instead of a cup tournament disguised as a playoffs. Peace.
This year's final is between the overall 8th seed and the 9th seed. To reach the final, they each won only one road game in the playoffs. That is a problem. That two of the lowest seeded teams in the playoffs can reach the final with only one road win is absurd. Every other league forces lower seeds to perform on the road if they are to reach the final. When the Green Bay Packers won the Super Bowl couple years ago, they had to win every game on the road, because they were the lowest seed in the NFC. In MLS, a future 4th seed can potentially reach the final without ever having to win a road game.
Which is precisely the adjustment that I advocate for MLS--look at results (points), not aggregate (goals). Sounds good, but I would make two adjustments: a tie in aggregate goals should still prolong things, so that the higher seed has incentive to win at least one of the two games rather than settling for draws in both; and instead of a third game, just go straight to ET and then (if necessary) PKs. Great point. In fact, currently the lower seed is not even required to draw at the home of the higher seed. Houston (vs. SKC) and LA (vs. Seattle) both advanced while losing the second match of the series. Not for those of us who have been watching them play like that all season.
I’m not really sure I’m truing to prove a point here, just interested in the bigger picture. As a Galaxy fan from day one I’ve pretty much run the gamut of “home field” advantage: having it and losing; having it and winning; not having it an losing; not having it and winning. Anecdotally it would seem there is no clear advantage, but here are the Cup Finals since MLS went to the two-legged format. Code: 2012: 8-9 (of 10) 2011: 1*-6 (of 10) 2010: 4-7* (of 8) 2009: 2-8* (of 8) 2008: 1*-8 (of 8) 2007: 3*-4 (of 8) 2006: 3-5* (of 8) 2005: 2-8* (of 8) 2004: 2-4* (of 8) 2003: 1-2* (of 8) 2002: 1*-5 (of 6) * = winner 54% of the time teams that finished in the “top half” of the table went on to the final 36% of the time one of the top 2 seeds make it to the final 22% of the time one of the bottom 2 seed make it to the final 42% of the time seeds 3-7 make it to the final 30% of the time the Supporters’ Shield winner wins the cup, 8th seed is 20%, 2, 3, 4, 5, 7 all are tied at 10% 60% of the time the lower seed in the final wins the Cup, though it will be interesting to see if this stat changes with the new higher seed hosting the final Then there’s this interesting tidbit: Code: DCU 4 Shields; 4 MLS Cups (2 Doubles) LAG 4 Shields; 3 MLS Cups (2 Doubles) CLB 3 Shields; 1 MLS Cup (Double) SJE 2 Shields; 2 MLS Cups KCW 1 Shield; 1 MLS Cup (Double) MIF 1 Shield; 1 MLS Cup CHI 1 Shield; 1 MLS Cup COL 0 Shields; 1 MLS Cup RSL 0 Shields; 1 MLS Cup TBM 1 Shield; 0 MLS Cups Columbus is really the only outlier there with 3 Shields, but only 1 Cup, but there does appear to be a corollary between being the best team in the league and the number of MLS Cups a team has. Again I’m not really trying to draw any conclusions about the fairness of the MLS post-season, just making some observations.
A 4 seed in the NFL could do it. Beat the 5 seed at home while the 6 seed beats the 3 seed on the road. Beat the 2 seed on the road, while the 1 seed is upset by the 6 seed. Beat the 6 seed at home to claim a Super Bowl spot. Essentially the same type of road the Rapids took in 2010. Won as the lower seed in the first round (in the process coming from a goal down on the road to force overtime and win in PKs), then hosted an even lower seed at home in the Conference Championship game.
True. But even then, a 4 seed in the NFL playoffs isn't the same as a 4 seed in MLS. The 4th seed in the NFL playoffs is a team that won its division, and the NFL playoffs are set up to give advantages to a division winner over a non-division winner. And in your example, the 4th seed still had to beat the 2 seed on the road. In MLS, they could win the first leg at home 2-0, lose the second leg on the road 1-0, and advance. In fact, they'd never have to win a road game at all if they win their home games by a good enough margin to hang on to on the road.
I don't know about those other teams, but the two years San Jose won MLS Cup, they did not win the Supporters Shield. The two years they won the SS, they were eliminated in the Conference Semifinals. So no relationship there between winning the SS and going on to win the Cup that same year.
That was not the observation, if you’ll notice I specifically mentioned those teams that did the “double” i.e., won both MLS Cup and The Supporters’ Shield in the same year. To be more plain spoken, regardless of “doing the double” there seems to be a correlation between being the best team in the league and the number of MLS Cups won.
People People , !!!!! this is about HOME FIELD ADVANTAGE TO THE HIGHER SEEDED TEAM Blame MLS by implementing Home and Away Series and pushing the idea that there is an advantage if you play away FIRST then HOST the last game. This was more like a punishment then an advantage. ( Both Seattle and DC had to play 2 away games back to back.) So you play the entire season to be a HIGH seed , then this is the REWARD. Please take it and shove it . The ONLY FAIR is to play one game at the of the higher seeded team. I don't have a problem with Home and Away series, but please stop calling it an advantage. With the One game format the outcome would have been to reward teams that deserved it during the regular season,something like Sporting vs Seattle for MLS Cup
Some more ideas to keep things interesting... Play a game at the home of the higher seed. If the higher seed wins, they advance. If the lower seed wins, they play a second match at the home of the lower seed. The winner of that game advances. Or, if you wanna get insane.. keep the two-legged series, but give the higher seed a one-goal lead in the aggregate count at the start of the series. This means the lower seed will have to win the aggregate score by a goal to send it into extra-time, by 2 goals to win the series. In this format, all four conference semi-final series would have continued into extra-time.
I'm not that sure the two-leg series are as broken as the results are making them look. Last night, Taylor Twellman's critique of the system was not about Seattle play away first, but about making Seattle play on one fewer day of rest when teams were playing two games a week. If there's more time between games, playing the second game at home may be an advantage. Perhaps the playoffs need to be spread out over a slightly longer time, especially seeing as there's an open weekend between now and the final. That said, I do think higher seeds need more of an advantage. There are plenty of ways to do it. The Mexican system (ties after 2 legs go to the higher seed) is one of them. Another possibility is to go with McIntyre System playoffs, which Australian leagues have long used in almost all sports, for the last part of the playoffs. It's designed to give the top seeds the advantage of double-elimination while the lower seeds have to win to stay alive.
This works really well in other "sports" and "games". I mean Chess likes to use the swiss system and that works as well, but I think it would actually be nice to see MLS use (and get rid of "conference champions") the winners and losers bracket model where the top 4 seeds are in the winners bracket and once they lose go down to the losers, but the rest of the playoff fields starts in the losers bracket and a loss eliminates them. However, this works great for other events, but I doubt we'll see it in a 10 team playoff field or a major soccer league. My other passion uses this format and it is always cool to watch.
Unak, you are the only person having that argument and you are having it with yourself. I stated specifically that people make a value judgment that is wrong. Having a wrong value judgment leads to other wrong value judgments. In fact, it may be true that the post season set up gives the higher seed a 80% win rate vs worse teams, 55% win rate vs even teams, but only a 40% win rate against better teams. But because people are making poor judgments on what determines which team is better it is totally confusing whether there is a higher seed advantage or not. I believe that LA has been the best team in MLS over the past 3 years and that injuries, international call ups, and loans contributed to a slow start this year, but as the best team they were able to go out and play with a homefield disadvantage and win. Only because they are simply the best team. Similarly, some teams are just tough matchups for other teams or come into series with injuries and suspensions. I believe that Houston advanced vs KC because Houston is a better team than KC head to head. I believe Houston advanced over DC because DC had too many injuries and suspensions. Again...I would have expected Houston to knock off both of those teams...confident it would happen. This goes back to weeding out the natural value judgment when determining who the better team is. San Jose was having a great season, but LA is simply the better side. Does the better side always win? Of course not...I think KC may be the better team, but Houston is a tough matchup for them. Again...people are making bad value judgments and obviously you are at the heart of it because you can't let it go.
That's sort of what they do in the FA Cup. (but on a random basic, i.e., without the seeding) Well, of course, they have been. They have the highest payroll and, since the next best paying team NYRB blew their DP's on mediocre players, the best talent. But I have already addressed that point.