Alert: Commissioner Don Garber to Discuss MLS Playoffs and League's Future on Fox Football Fone-In‎

I cant see how a team be competitive and be taken seriously if all they strive for is the supporters sheild.. makes you assume that the MLS CuP (the Championship Game) is nothing to them, they are backwards....

 

Actually, the geographic size of the US is something I hear brought up all the time in this context.

 

Since Vancouver and Portland are coming in at the same time, I would think they would add 4 more games to the schedule...but that cannot be answered for another year...

As for the geographic argument, since every team plays each other twice next year, the "more home games against local teams" argument is out...

All I want is to be able to look at the standings and know if a team is in or out of the playoffs easily...the current set up with only 2 guaranteed spots, then having to compare points up and down 2 conferences is a pain in the backside... Sometimes simplicity is the hardest thing to achieve...

 

Yes, but that rationale goes out the window when we move to a balanced schedule, with each team playing the others twice - home and away.

I don't think it's asking a lot to go to a single table with the top 8 teams making the playoffs. American sports fans already understand that concept with the NBA and NHL conference systems. All you would be doing is eliminating that additional round between the two conference winners. It ain't rocket science.

It annoys me that Garber continues to claim that single table = no playoffs when that is not the argument being made by most of its proponents.

 

Maybe, but the slightest bit of anoraking will still lead a reasonable person to the conclusion that a subpar team is a playoff contender. Besides, what benefit does a team derive from rationalizing their poor position in the league table with their conference standing? I wouldn't be too proud of being the 4th or 5th best team in a 6-team conference.

 

I think he answered it, and it's been touched on here too -- conferences started as a means to "shrink" a league geographically, which means they typically go hand in glove with unbalanced schedules. It's possible to build rivalries from scratch with two teams a country apart, as Seattle and DC United seem to be doing, but it's a lot easier with some geographic proximity. Not only does it allow for some fans to more easily travel with the team, it also allows the league to "piggy back" on rivalries that exist in other sports or commerce.

I'm not even sure awarding the bottom four playoff spots regardless of conference is a good idea because it effectively undoes what conferences are intended to do -- provide a champion from a group of teams in the same geographic area who, ideally, are playing similar regular season schedules even if the league schedule is unbalanced. Nothing against RSL, but as a neutral I think DC United and Columbus would be a better series because they have some history and a conference rivalry.

 

Yep. I can appreciate the desire to seed 1-8 and wouldn't have any real objection to it, but which scenario has the greater potential to get people interested?

A first round with Chivas vs LA and Chicago vs. New England or a first round with LA-New England and Chivas-Houston?

 

I wish we soon go to club #21, so that hope for the single table is crushed once and for all. Once we reach #21, balanced single table is not possible anymore.

In fact starting #19 makes it impossible since #19 means soon #20, and #20 practically makes it impossible, but some people still argues that 38 games + playoffs is still possible.

Anyways, here' my suggestion:

- East and West Two Tables.
Look at the map. US+Canada is bigger than entire Europe. It makes sense to divide it up considering the size and travel.

- 12 clubs in each table, 24 total in the top flight MLS.
Montreal is #19, soon will have #20 to make it even. I think we can add a few more.
Some talk about 30 like NHL NBA, but I say stay at elite 24 for the top flight league.
Rest of the decent markets go to lower division.

- Home/Away in table and 1 game against the other table = 34 games.
(for example, DCU visiting LAG one year, LAG visiting DCU next year)
We have pretty much balanced schedule within a table. Regular season top performers in each table = conference champions. It's a big accomplishment and very legitimate title(since balanced schedule). They get CCL Berth. It basically replaces the SS.

- 4 top clubs from each table go to MLS Cup playoffs.
It's natural to have playoff system since we have more than one tables just like Champions League. One third makes the playoffs which is good ratio.
Inter-conference first round = E1 vs W4, E2 vs W3, W1 vs E4, W2 vs E3 at home of higher seed. Home/Away semi-final. One game Final at home of higher seed.

Think about it this way: In Europe, they basically have 5 major tables = EPL, LaLiga, Serie A, BundesLiga, League 1, then the Champions League. We'll have 3 major tables in North America = MLS East, MLS West, and the Mexican league. Think about The MLS Cup as another Champions League. Yes it's like we have two champions League!!

However, I still don't like totally separating MLS East and West, thus the hybrid schedule.
I think this gives best of all the worlds, and very unique system that only MLS gets.

 

For one thing, a hell of alot of posters and bloggers mean precisely that when they say "single table." They mean a system like England, France, Spain, etc.

For another thing, I really question the value of single table when teams don't play the same schedule.

2011 and beyond, teams will play home and home within their division, but only play one game against some of the teams in the opposite division.

 

Go back and look at the attendance threads from the first few weeks. Garber can't conjure up an additional 4 weeks of warm weather! And with MLS fans clamoring for fewer MLS games on international dates (which the league is actually acting on) that takes away a couple more weekends.

Oh well, at least when MLS has to cut the cap $200K per team because attendance sucks, people will have something new to bitch about.

I see what you're getting at, but it's only gonna be one season. To me, it's smarter to stick to the tradition, rather than make a change for ONE season, then un-make the change the very next season.

 

has there been any indication from the league as to how many league games each team will play in 2011?

30?

34?

other?

to my knowledge, I don't think anything has been mentioned, confirmed, or ruled out.

 

did anyone see the thing that happened at the end of the show. the chivas coach called out the houston guy out for criticizing everything the brit said. it was hilarious.....

 

First off 21 or more clubs to a league does not negate single table. Over here in England the Coke leagues have 24 clubs with single table. Secondly to those who feel that single table is simply too difficult to implement because of the size of U.S. and Canada, I would like to point out that Russia cover's more than what the U.S. and Canada cover combined yet they work with a single table.

Cheers.

 

What I hope is that when we get to 16 teams, we stay with two conferences of eight. And when we get to 18 teams, two conferences of nine, etc. That is at least sort of "single table-ish". My problem will be if they go to some NFL or NBA style divisions of four teams each. I think a lot of folks (including myself) were necessarily soured on this issue back when MLS went to three divisions (EAST-WEST-CENTRAL, IIRC) back when the league had only 12 teams. THAT was annoying. You could have easily just had two tables of 6 teams.


I'm skeptical though. Especially if we've got designs on 24 teams being the ultimate size for MLS. I can't see Garber having the nad to enforce two tables (divisions) of 12 teams. I don't know if people like Kraft and Kroenke would let that happen. They like failing, and they like mediocrity. And people who swing for the middle rung in life much prefer the sound of finishing 4th in your division to finishing 12th.


My issue is, I think the 4 divisions of 4 teams (32 total) works for the NFL. But I think it is very un-soccer-like. Unless we're talking a cup competition, which we're not. In the game of soccer you really need a large pallette in which you can analyse a team's empirical data over time against a large sample section. Single table accomplishes that. Two divisions of 10 or 12 accomplishes that. But bring out a bunch of 4-team or 5-team divisions does not. And frankly it would make the league unfollowable to a world audience.***



***I know, here is where you chide me for giving a toss about what the "world thinks." I know, we're Americans, dammit and we don't care.

 

You're right that college football is an exception -- but I'd take exception to the idea that Americans "accept" it, at least happily. At best, the BCS is tolerated when it isn't being absolutely loathed. People actually like the idea of a more pure college-football playoff system, if only in theory.

But college basketball, on the national scale anyway, actually supports my point: a bunch of different "best" teams get together for one big playoffs in March. (You are right that conferences, which are single table, do hold tournaments. I'll note, however, that triumph in those conference tournaments isn't always considered the end-all-be-all, because of the single table. When it comes to "ACC champion," fans and pundits are just as apt to think of the regular-season winner.)

(And back in the days when NCAA berths were limited to conference-tournament winners, this was often a sore point. So there we go: single table + playoffs = ripe for gray area.)

 

Do teams in the Coke leagues play Playoffs or Champions League or Europa League?

21 or more clubs will surely negate the balanced single table hope in MLS.

We don't need to follow that because the Coke leagues or Russia league do it, when we have better solution.

Besidses, Russia has 16 teams and close to 50% of the team are in Moscow region.
In MLS, teams are scattered all over, hence makes more sense to evenly divide.

 

I'm not sure what you mean by this. NBA and NHL teams do not play balanced schedules. A team's season is weighted toward conference play.

The reason he says this is that he intuitively understands what I've outlined: a single table undermines the rationale for playoffs. It effectively eliminates the need for it.

A balanced-schedule single table would already produce a champion. It would already tell us who's "best." And it would do so more thoroughly, more comprehensively, than any three-week tournament could do. Now, that might be a great argument in favor of single table. But, once again, the realpolitik comes into play: This is America, and MLS sees a compelling need for playoffs.

And as long as they see this need for playoffs, they'll do their best to sustain the underlying rationale for playoffs: i.e., no single table.

 

I wasn't really referring to the balanced schedule concept there, just the fact that American sports fans understand the idea that the top eight teams make the playoffs.

 

How is that any worse than the Pistons making it into the NBA Playoffs last season with a 39-43 record? I didn't hear much teeth gnashing over that.

 

???

But that's not what actually happens. Both leagues' playoff systems are structured around conferences/divisions.

 

Good point. I think we better keep the tradition of two tables. Stick with it and build upon it. Make it unique MLS system.

Further division to 4 or 6 or something will be really a bad idea.
It'll be really a huge turn off for many football fans.

 

I agree with triplet1 on this. They're trying to serve too many masters. Go one way or the other, but don't combine the two like you have now or you get both sides riled up (as we're proving now ).

MLS wants conferences for #1 and #2 seeds in each, then single table standings for 4-8 (it was Top 3 in each conference and last two in ST in 2007.) Then you have Supporters Shield which is based on ST, qualification for outside tourneys are based on ST (Superliga, USOC, CCL if the SS winner also wins MLS Cup) and you can see how it stokes the fires of MLS fans.

 

Yes. Each team will play each other team twice, home and away. Press release.

Not actually true, at least in soccer terms. The Russian Premier League has seven of their sixteen teams in Moscow and every other team but one is located in southwestern Russia. Except for one team from Novosibirsk, all of the RPL is located in an area about half the size of the United States.