JP Angel on the Playoffs: It’s a strange situation...

Don Garber has got to love that quote. Of course Mr. Angel is completely right.

 

Yeah, it's just uneard of in The Rest of the World for the league's champion to be decided by something other than the final standings in the overall table.

Maybe he should refresh himself about the cuadrangulares and the gran final in Colombia.

 

I guess he also missed that because his team didn't do well in the regular season his team will not be one of the top four MLS teams that will be playing in the Superliga, didn't win the Open Cup or the Supporters Shield. That was the regular season.

He may have also missed that there is a nice big Cup and a place in the CCC for the teams that wins the second season with teams that finished higher than his team in the regular season having home field advantage.

The regular season does matter---a LOT.

 

I was really missing these anti-playoff threads. It's been 4 months, I think.

 

angel doesnt understand sport just soccer tell him stick to his day job.. NY didnt win the shield and thy wont win the Cup ......

 

No anti playoff threads because:

1) There is nothing that can be done.
2) Galaxy didn't make the playoffs

 

i agree, i also think the single table format is meaniningless. look at the NFL and MLB they are divided fractionally and all the teams dont play each other if they do its not evenly (except division games) and you stil have heated races... MLS is fixing som kinks to the playoffs structure and the bi conference format is the best for this league, cause the teams are regional stuctured, also the league is 12 yrs old and taking time on expansion. also remeber this is a american (north american) league really dont need the european advising on how champions are determined.

 

Well... if you forget about all the cups you can qualify for... the regular season seems silly when the playoffs start. MLS needs to do a better job of the overall education of what all the things MLS teams can qualify for during the REGULAR season and not the playoffs. Many people who are new to MLS obviously will think the regular season is a joke if they don't know everything they can qualify for.

 

Playoffs make a heck of a lot of sense when you have teams that potentially never or rarely play each other, such as in the NFL or MLB. You need some way of determining who is actually the best team in those leagues, because there's no way for every team to play every other team.

With MLS, it makes less sense, because every team plays every other team. I don't really have a problem with it, though. With the addition of the extra tournaments during the year, it would be great to turn the playoffs into almost a separate mini-season/tournament that gets a team entrance into something prestigious. Give different rewards for both Supporter's Shield and MLS Cup so they are both extremely meaningful to the team that wins them.

 

I agree. Qualification for any tournament should be based solely on how you performed last year.

 

right and wrong,,,,, depends on the time of the yr.... two euro leagues and thier format never really determine a real Champion because the way thier regular season ends(no playoffs afterwards to detrmine champion) the rgular season ends and thats it no playoffs they start a news season.... and those teams that "qualified" from "last yr" are not always gonna have the same players going into the tournement, cause the tornement is based on last yrs results.... that will never work here because its already confusing and there is no connection between the league season andthe next step...

 

1. Why would Garber expect lockstep agreement on a topic where this same comment has been thrown out pretty much every year by people of all sorts?

b. How is someone's personal opinion right? I disagree with Angel, but that doesn't make me right.

 

Inviting two thirds of the teams to the 'big dance' is wrong on its face

 

While I agree in principle on that, games until the final day made a difference with eight teams. A six-team playoff would have rendered the last 2-3 weeks as moot. The SuperLiga slots were pretty much sewn up a month ago. The Shield was done before the final week.

There are tradeoffs to each system. There is no right and wrong.

 

exactly. any system (that MLS uses) could be considered "strange."

especially for a guy who played seven seasons in England where "playoffs" are reserved for the lower leagues.

i don't think JP Angel will care that the MLS playoffs seem "strange" now, if his team somehow manages to win games on 11/8 and 11/18.

 

Of course, the rest of us would think that strange.

 

And it would also be strange if the regular season only counted for qualification for two tournaments that only rewarded teams with between five and six games maximum and were dubious in some regard because not everyone was in season when they took place and they don't guarantee all that much money to the teams.

Plus, he comes from a country with an interesting playoff setup.

 

of course.

very strange.

although, i'm guessing NY has one of the most experienced (if not best) playoff coaches in league history.

I sure someone has the numbers handy, but but it would be interesting to see how the MLS playoff records for the eight coaches stack up.

 

Preki, Tom Soehn, Juan Carlos Osorio, and Curt Onalfo are undefeated in the playoffs.

 

Clearly just another example of Wikipedia's unreliability. This has got to be wrong. Everyone knows that single-table/balanced-schedule/no-playoffs is the SUBLIME UNIVERSAL STANDARD. MLS - and only MLS - is a perversion of this perfected model, intended to please the ignorant and generic American sports fan.

 

as coaches, yes.

but they're also winless (as coaches) in MLS playoff games.

if anyone has the MLS playoff coaching records for Arena, Nicol, Morrow and Kinnear, it could be an interesting comparison.
(actually, Morrow has no playoff games coached, as he took over at FCD when Clarke was fired on November 7, 2006 -- according to wikipedia).

either way, the "conference" finals are going to have (at least) two "rookie" coaches featured. experience on the sidelines could be a significant factor in the Cup semifinals.

 

I'm not sure how relevant a coach's record in the best of 3 format is to success in a 180 minute, home and home aggregate match up.

 

relevant or not, it would be interesting.