WASHINGTON, DC (Aug 25, 2008) USSoccerPlayers -- The Western Conference asks an all-too-familiar question, the Red Bulls pick up, and the lack of Monday press release material is disappointing.
Fourth Place
That's where we would find our Western Conference leading Houston Dynamo in a single-table, with the Eastern Conference taking slots five and six. As it stands, FC Dallas would make the playoffs with the same points total as the worst team in the Eastern Conference.
Houston had no answer for the 5th place New Red Bulls on Saturday, stressing a quality control issue that's been dogging the West all season.
In 2007, Chivas USA won the West with the second-best record in the League. Eventual champions Houston finished third overall. In 2006, FC Dallas won the West and finished second overall. In 2005, San Jose won the West and the League.
We have to go back to 2002 to find a season that finished the way 2008 seems to be playing out, only that time around it was the East in trouble. LA won the Supporters Shield 13 points better than the Eastern Conference champion Revolution. Four teams in the five-team West had better records than New England that season, and the entire Western Conference made the playoffs.
Expansion and restructuring make it impossible for one Conference to put every team in the playoffs, and the '08 edition of the Western Conference won't end up replacing the '02 East as our working definition of inadequacy. Not even close.
The two available wild-card slots seem well out of reach even if the Western contenders are only two points out. For that matter, Houston is five back of the Eastern Conference leaders, hardly an insurmountable disaster in the making.
It seems worse than it is for the West right now.
