For the casual soccer fan, or even the casual sports fan who wasn't too familiar with Major League Soccer's playoff system, there had to be some head scratching last week.
The Eastern Conference playoffs were held in Colorado and California, about as far away from the east as you could get. The head-scratching by the uninitiated was nothing compared to the frustration from many familiar with MLS, and not because of the strange geography, but the league's continued insistence of holding on to a two-conference playoff format that led to a seriously uneven playoff bracket.
Not familiar with the MLS playoff format?
Here it goes. The top two teams in each conference qualify automatically for the playoffs, with the next four-best teams (wild cards) qualifying regardless of conference. The best wild card teams line up in their natural conference, with the worst wild card team moving to the opposite conference it its conference has more than four playoff qualifiers.
Complicated enough for you?
This season, the Western Conference dominated the East, sending six teams to the postseason. Unfortunately for the West, the playoff structure kept the four toughest teams in the West and sent San Jose and Colorado into the Eastern Conference playoffs. The result was Los Angeles and Real Salt Lake, the top two teams in MLS this year, are facing much tougher opponents than the New York Red Bulls and Columbus Crew.
Things weren't always this convoluted. Just a few short years ago, each conference had its own unique set-up, a format that worked well and helped cultivate some great rivalries. MLS began tinkering three years ago, allowing for a stronger conference to have one extra playoff spot if a fifth place team in one conference had a better record than the fourth-place team in the weaker conference. That tweak led to the New York Red Bulls winning the Western Conference title in 2008, and gave us a New York-Columbus MLS Cup final (played in California).
Things only got worse in 2009, when Real Salt Lake backed into the playoffs as an Eastern Conference team and proceeded to win the East and score an MLS Cup Final victory against Los Angeles. Rather than revert back to the old system of natural conference playoffs, MLS went the other way, reducing the number of automatic playoff spots for each conference to two.
The result this year was a lop-sided playoff field and fewer real rivalries being played out in the postseason. Another consequence has been an increasing call for an eight-team playoff bracket that does away with conferences and creates a more balanced schedule, with the top team playing the eighth-best playoff team. It's tough to disagree with that sentiment considering the current format, which makes a mockery of the notion of conference.
Here's the thing though. What MLS has given away by changing its playoff format so dramatically, and what it would lose if it continues to head in that direction, is the idea of regional playoff rivalries and the type of series that can see fans traveling for playoff games and creating memorable atmospheres and series.
At a time when expansion is giving us tremendous rivalry potential (with Philadelphia in range of New York and D.C. and Portland and Vancouver joining Seattle in 2012) MLS stands poised to miss out on the chance for some truly unforgettable playoff series, boosted by the added passion that comes with natural rivalries.
Instead of entertaining the idea of going to one eight-team bracket, with no conferences, MLS should revert to natural conferences. Some may object to that idea given how much stronger the west is than the east right now, but if we've learned anything in MLS, and pro sports in general, is that conference strength is cyclical and you don't have to go too far back to a time when the east was the dominant conference.
The west is riding a wave thanks to the rise of Seattle and Dallas, as well as the demise of traditional east powers D.C., New England and Chicago, but you can't help but wonder if west proponents would have been lobbying for the elimination of conferences when the east was dominating.
Would there be years when good teams miss out on the playoffs while teams with worse records make it? That is possible, but that happens in other sports and has happened in MLS in the past, and the value of having more potential matchups involving natural rivals is worth that possibility.
The reality is that as MLS continues to increase in size, the strength of the top four teams in each conference will be greater than we saw this year, when the Kansas City Wizards and Chicago Fire finished third and fourth in the East despite losing records.
Either way, one thing is clear. The current MLS playoff format is flawed, confusing and isn't really serving the best interests of MLS in any way. it isn't producing fair matchups or even juicy rivalries.
Whether MLS eliminates conferences altogether in the playoffs, or returns to natural conference brackets, MLS has to change, because the current format is squandering a great opportunity for a growing and improving league.
Ives Galarcep is a senior writer for FoxSoccer.com covering Major League Soccer and the U.S. national team.
