Despite rumblings from the West, it's DC United that remains the class of Major League Soccer. Well, sort of.
By Andrew Dixon
MIAMI, FL (Apr 17, 2008) USSoccerPlayers -- Dynasty is a word that doesn’t get thrown around very often in American sports. Championship results brought about by shrewd personnel moves, a vision for the future and the ability to sustain success from year to year elevates good teams to legendary status. In the leagues that have been around for decades, you have clubs that rack up double-digit titles or factor for a decade.
In its relative short existence on the American sports scene, Major League Soccer has had two teams make a case. The San Jose Earthquakes/Houston Dynamo, winners of the last two MLS Cups and four out of the last seven.
The other, of course, is DC United. The Black and Red captured three out of the first four MLS titles, a couple of international titles and became the first real MLS club in the full meaning of the term. Their early dominance helped legitimize a League that supposedly wasn't interested in dynasties.
Though DC remains strong, this Grown Man couldn’t help but remember the old days while watching United crash out of the CONCACAF Champions Cup and then drop a 4-0 decision to Real Salt Lake (Real Salt Lake?!?!???) last week.
A time once existed when DC was above such petty things as fixture congestion, when they treated every 90 minutes like a trophy they wanted was on the line. It was a system that proved itself over and over. The DC United of those years were so good that the one team that DIDN’T win an MLS Cup (1998) is considered one of the best in MLS history.
Eddie Pope once told me that what made DC so good when they were at the height of their powers was that the side had so many players with international experience playing at the top of their game. Pope, Jeff Agoos, Carlos Llamosa, John Harkes, Tony Sanneh, Richie Williams, Jaime Moreno, Ben Olsen Raul Diaz Arce, Roy Lassiter, and Marco Etcheverry. They brought experienced players like Ben Iroha (1994 World Cup) and Roy Wegerle off the bench.
Those days are gone, with DC opting for South American talent that wouldn't be playing in MLS if they factored for Brazil or Argentina, along with players no longer regulars for their National Teams.
Maybe parity of the league is the reason why you don’t see squads like DC's in the 90's anymore. Then again, Houston and New England haven’t seem to be hurting for players competing for National Team spots.
DC has always been about personnel moves. Whether it was the draft or through signings, they almost always got it right Bringing in Moreno midway through the first season, drafting Pope, finding Llamosa, bringing in a hungry Roy Lassiter after losing Diaz Arce, getting the proper role players like Williams and the underrated David Vaudreil.
Many of these players also brought fans to the stadium. The Latino community was solidly behind players like Diaz Arce, Etcheverry and Moreno. US National Team fans had Pope, Agoos and Harkes to watch. This translated to attendance home and away.
While the tradition and passion of the fans remains high, DC’s team building doesn’t seem to have that same Midas touch as it did on the other side of 2000.
Draft picks are always going to be hit or miss. In the dynasty years , DC drafted Pope and Ben Olsen. This decade, they challenged that with five exceptional picks: Bobby Convey, Ryan Nelsen, Santino Quaranta, and first overalls Aleck Eskandarian and Freddy Adu.
Of that group, Ryan Nelsen played out his contract as the best defender in MLS before moving to the English Premier League and Convey eventually joined him after winning promotion with Reading. Eskandarian, Quaranta, and the lock for the future of elite US field players ended up being surplus to DC requirements. Aside from Nelsen and to a lesser extent Convey, those three players tell the story of a club that fundamentally lost its way quicker than anyone should've expected.
On the surface, United's picks improved year by year, but it was only the classes of 2000 and 2001 - Nelsen and Convey - that really factored in United's setup. As working critiques go, not being able to motivate and integrate top draft picks has to say something.
Instead, it was those draft picks doing the talking, and opening themselves up the criticism that should have been directed squarely at the club.
The one year where it all came together had as much to do with Ryan Nelsen's last year in the League and Earnie Stewart's only year. A team that held for a single season looked oddly like vintage United.
Since the Earnie Stewart-Ryan Nelsen days of 2004, United’s first eleven has been good enough to beat anyone in the league, thanks to the addition of players like former MVP Christian Gomez and now Marcelo Gallardo and Fred. Yet United’s front office still has not addressed the team’s lack of depth, and that has absolutely killed them down the stretch of the past few seasons.
Luciano Emilio was brought in to help relieve an aging Moreno in the latter stages of the season and turned an MVP season. United had no cover for his injury and was gone after the first round. Ben Olsen, a long time stabilizing force in DC’s midfield who aside from injuries would have established himself in england long ago, is always missed when he goes down. His injury issues are well known, and DC has yet to find sufficient cover. To put it simply, United seems uninterested in a Plan B.
Now let’s not get it twisted: most teams in the league would kill for the overall success DC has enjoyed over the past few seasons. However, while salary cap issues, player poaching, and league parity may all be playing a role in DC’s failure to match its early success, everyone else is operating under the same constraints.
In DC, they're doing it across multiple competitions with the very real feeling that as DC goes, so does Major League Soccer.
Then again, this is just One Grown Man’s Opinion….
Andrew Dixon is a soccer writer based in Miami, a weekly columnist for USSoccerPlayers, and host of ‘Back of the Net,’ which you can hear Saturday nights on the Black Athlete Sports Network. Contact him at: golnoir@golnoir.net
