MLS Week 12 Previews

Though it may seem laughable there are, in fact, MLS games this weekend. 5 of them exactly, 4 of which are on TV. I know very few may care but by golly I do so here are the previews.

Saturday

DC United at NE Revolution

6pm ET, Direct Kick, MLSLive.tv

The Revs spoiled Chicago's home opener by waltzing out of Bridgeview with a draw. DCU found themselves with a draw last weekend also but are still on top of the league. Look to see a more tightly contested match than it would have been earlier in the season as the Revs rediscover their rhythm.

My Prediction: DCU 2 - 2 NE


LA Galaxy at NY Red Bulls

7:30pm ET, HDNet, Direct Kick, MLSLive.tv

Battle of the league's bottom dwellers. Both are trying claw their way out of their respective holes and both definitely have the talent to do it. Unfortunately, both have up to this point opted to wallow in ineptness. The Galaxy have the edge in this game, though, because when God slammed the door shut on them with Steve Sampson he's now opened up a huge window with Frank Yallop. The Red Bulls... not so much.

My Prediction: LA 2 - 0 RBNY

Real Salt Lake at Houston Dynamo

8:30pm ET, Direct Kick, MLSLive.tv

Houston is one of only a few teams that truly thrive at home this season. They've only dropped one match at Robertson Stadium in the hot, muggy Houston summer. Real Salt Lake, in spite of their recent improvements, are not going to change that. Houston could make this ugly.

My Prediction: Houston 4 - 1 RSL

Chicago Fire at KC Wizards

8:30pm ET, No TV

If you're a fan of either of these teams, you're sad it's not on TV. If you a fan of good soccer, be happy no one will see this game. Well, that's not really fair to Chicago. Not to sound like a broken record, but KC will still only get their 1 goal. Chicago, however, knows how to score more than that. We've been missing Chris Rolfe lately. I wonder if he'll reappear or maybe we'll get to see the Nate Jaqua that we saw last weekend?

My prediction: Chicago 2 - 1 KC


Sunday

Columbus Crew at Chivas USA

10pm ET, Direct Kick, MLSLive.tv

Chivas stumbled a little last weekend but the Crew is just the team to get back into winning form. With the explosiveness their offense has shown several times this season as well as playing at home in the HDC, the Goats are going to beat up on the poor Crew.

My Prediction: Chivas USA 3 - 0 Columbus

Let's give them a reason to watch

The US's 0-3 loss to the Czech Republic was the most-watched program on ESPN2 this year. Not bad for an afternoon game on a Monday. The question now though is, "Will these people come back to watch the team again on Saturday and then on next Thurday?"

With the game being on ABC it will be a lot more accessible to potential viewers. While most people who care about the USMNT already have cable, the casual fan who's interest is only peaked once every four years might also pop in to take a look just because they can.

My prediction is if the US can get a win against Italy or manage a tie and find themselves in a realistic scenario for advancement, expect the US-Ghana match on June 22nd to beat the 2.4 cable rating the Czech game got. If it goes the other way however, the opposite could happen.

Aside from the obvious good reasons to have such high ratings for soccer, a large dividend that might be realized could be done so by MLS. Soccer United Marketing (SUM) which is the marketing arm of MLS as well as other soccer ventures (which also happened to own the rights to the WC games and sold them to ABC), is currently in negotiations to seal a deal with the ABC family of networks (ABC, ESPN, ESPN2) for the first ever paying broadcast contract. To have the network pay MLS to show their games instead of MLS having to pay to get their games on the air, as has been the normal since the league's inception, would be a welcomed windfall for MLS. High ratings for the WC games can only help get this deal through quicker and with better terms.

MLS Power Rankings: Week 11

Now that the US has already played a game in the World Cup, most everyone's attention is focused on that with little left to fall on MLS. For better or worse MLS is still playing some games and we would be remiss if we didn't give it some love by way of our renowned power rankings.

12 - LA Galaxy (2-9-2)

The goals are coming fast and furious now (yes, that's sarcasm). Two games at home last week and they could only manage a point. That's not enough to move the about of the cellar but the future is look a lot brighter with Frank Yallop at the helm. I mean, Galaxy players are actually being put at positions that they should be. It's a start.

11 - New York Red Bulls (1-2-7)

Seriously. Winning is a pretty cool thing to do. They should try it every once in a while. Yeah, they're not losing but drawing every game isn't going to get them much higher than the second to last spot in the league that they are now.

10 - Real Salt Lake (3-6-2)

They need to find their spark again. Losing to the Rapids, even if it was in Denver, just won't do it.

9 - Chicago Fire (2-3-5)

They had the win for their home opener right there in front of them then had to settle for a tie. Pity. There are no more excuses not to start winning now that they're finally at home.

8 - Chivas USA (4-5-1)

An awesome goal from Ante Razov isn't enough to keep the Goats from (temporarily I'm sure) dropping a spot this week. The Rapids got a win. It's just the way it goes but I'm not concerned for Chivas USA.

7 - Colorado Rapids (5-4-2)

They beat RSL. Whoo-hoo. Now they have a week off. And yes, I do realize they have more points then a couple of teams ahead of them in the rankings. They keep winning it'll sort out. Patience.

6 - Columbus Crew (4-5-2)

They already knew KC was just going to score 1 goal. Where was the gusto? Go for 2 and you win. Tsk, tsk. It cost them a spot.

5- New England Revolution (3-4-3)

Spoiled the Fire's home opener by sticking them with the tie. Getting 1 point is better than the 0 points they've been getting lately.

4 - Kansas City Wizards (5-4-2)

Only 1 goal. Again. At least they got their first win in what seems like ages.

3 - Houston Dynamo (5-3-3)

They should have done better against the Red Bulls but it was enough to remain 3rd in the rankings.

2 - FC Dallas (7-2-3)

Got the win wearing those awful blue and yellow uniforms they wore to show their connection with their partners from the south. Still trail DCU in the league though.

1 - DC United (7-1-4)

A gorgeous goal by Christian Gomez wasn't enough to get the win. A flat performance but got the point on the road and remain at the top of the league and the power rankings.

I sense a disturbance in the force

Apparently DaMarcus Beasley didn't take kindly to Bruce Arena (rightfully) calling him out, popping off sound bites like, "I was back there defending the whole time, I don't know what [Arena] wants me to do" and "I was always defending the whole time. That's how the game went. Next time I will leave the guy and play as a striker instead of a midfielder and then we'll see what happens."

Unfortunately DMB's job wasn't to solely play defense. His job was to go at people, get up the wing and send in some service to Brian McBride. Never mind the fact that, natural position or not, he had a horrible first touch and consistently played the ball back.

Arena had some words of is own when responding to a question about his DMB remarks: ""If he's any kind of a player or man, he understands it. If he doesn't, he's not going to be able to help us in Games 2 or 3 either."

Arena did this same kind of thing with Eddie Johnson and EJ took it and stepped up. He was one of the very few players going at the Czechs. One thing this team has always seemed to have going for it was that they were tight and could rely on each other, thick or thin.

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Expect some changes against Italy. From the same interview with Arena: "We're not going to go with the 3-0 loss game plan. We threw that page away after the game and we'll try to come up with a new one."

Look for EJ and Clint Dempsey to making the starting XI and hopefully infuse some creativity and spirit into the team.

Well that sucked.

I'm sure that every soccer blog in the universe has already talked about, picked apart, and anyalized the 3-0 thrashing the US suffered today to death. There's probably been talk of drinking the bad Kool-Aid, calls for Arena's head, people drinking the sadness away with various spirits, and everything in between.

I will admit that while I quickly dismissed the idea of sticking my head into the oven after the game I did idle on the thought a beat longer than I should have.

All is not lost though! Will it be hard as hell from this point on? Yep. Can we do it? Of course. Will we? That depends on the guys wearing the uniform.

I think the thing that hurt more than losing the game is the way in which we lost it. Without heart or urgency. We suffered from a complete and utter lack of creativity, imagination, passion, commitment, pluck or any other suitable nouns and adjectives. We played this game not to lose instead of to win and I have to tell ya, that's just not our style. If we're going down we need to be going down swinging.

I'm not going to go into any sort of analysis; I'm sure everyone reading this has already read such things a lot of other places. I can empathize with those out there that are asking themselves, "I've been waiting 4 years for this?" But it's far from over. We'll regroup, take on Italy and then Ghana.

Hope is slowly returning and by the Italy game arrives will have firmly taken root again.