Power Rankings, 1-30 | Matchday 1

Unveiling my weekly vote for the MLSsoccer.com Power Rankings, plus a chat with Gass

The first Power Rankings of the year are up on MLSsoccer.

Those, of course, are voted on by a panel of about 20 folks at the home office, from talent to editorial to social media to production. Sickos only.

I, obviously, am one of those sickos. The ballot I submitted this week is below, with reasoning for where I put each team:

1. FC Cincinnati: Good performance, good result against a good team despite missing pieces and playing on short rest. Miles Robinson was excellent not just with his defense, but with his passing. And Kévin Denkey’s clearly more than just a poacher.

2. Inter Miami: Thought they were really good for the first 20 minutes until Toto Aviles shot his own dick off. Gonna need to bench him in order to become they team they should be.

3. Seattle Sounders: That’ll probably be the central defense’s worst moment of the season. I’m entirely unconcerned by the end result¹.

4. Columbus Crew: Uhhhh I might’ve badly underrated this team. And with Vitor Roque about to head to Palmeiras, the table is set for Flaco López to head to Ohio.

5. LAFC: They’ll be tough defensively and they seemed to find some midfield balance in the second half. Plus David Martinez looks primed to break out².

6. Atlanta United: Not a convincing performance but they’ve got a pretty overwhelming amount of talent, don’t they?

7. San Diego FC: Rock-solid structurally, and a pair of match-winning DPs while Jeppe Tverskov was doing his best Kyle Beckerman impression at the 6. This team needs a nickname, by the way.

8. Philadelphia Union: I wrote last week I was afraid that I’d been underrating this team, and 90 minutes later I’m really feeling it. That said… pretty poor defensively, weren’t they? Next week vs. Cincy should be interesting.

9. Minnesota United: A very credible performance³ given the venue and the missing pieces.

10. Vancouver Whitecaps: I’m not sure how much of the whole thing was real, but I was really encouraged by Jesper Sørensen’s willingness to play the kids.

11. Charlotte FC: Credit to Dean Smith for saying straight-up that Seattle deserved all three. Credit to the Crown for walking away with one anyway.

12. RBNY: Had some good moments, but felt more like this would end 2-0 than 1-1. Formation surprised me a bit.

13. Colorado Rapids: A good point given all the missing pieces. Big fish to fry midweek in CCL play.

14. St. Louis City: Very good all-around defensive performance. For a more in-depth breakdown, check out ChatCityTactics.

15. LA Galaxy: I might be overreacting by dropping them this far (I had them 5th ahead of Matchday 1), but man they looked punchless.

16. Austin FC: Got the job done but not much more than that. Gonna need some time.

17. New York City FC: I know a point on the road is a good thing, and Alonso Martinez looked legit. But this performance left me feeling like this team’s in trouble. Maybe that changes if/when they get healthy and get some DPs on the field, but I don’t know.

18. San Jose Earthquakes: Loved that they played a 3-4-1-2 since that formation gives you the structure to protect two forwards who won’t play much defense.

19. Orlando City: They needed to spend some of their Facu Torres winnings on another starting center back. And what happened to Oscar Pareja’s developmental touch?

20. FC Dallas: Accepted their gifts with grace. I’m sure the attack will look more coherent in coming weeks, but I remain concerned about the defense.

21. Montreal Impact: Probably deserved a point. Liked a lot of what I saw from this team, even with the disappointing finish.

22. Chicago Fire: Clearly they will be a better team going forward than they have been at any point in recent memory. Need to get their first-choice midfielders healthy, though.

23. Nashville SC: The silver lining is that Sam Surridge found three really good chances. The issue is he couldn’t finish them, and so the ‘Yotes dropped home points to one of the worst Eastern Conference teams.

24. Houston Dynamo: The offseason talent drain proved to be too much, didn’t it?

25. New England Revolution: Good job hanging on for a point, but man, how has Noel Buck fallen so far in the past 18 months? Are the Revs open to selling or trading him within the league so he can get on the field?

26. Sporting KC: I’m liking their defense through two games more than I thought I would, but still, things don’t look great.

27. Real Salt Lake: Looked sub-mediocre the first hour, and then catastrophic the final 30. They’re in trouble in the short-term.

28. D.C. United: Clearly working towards building a Plan B with the ball, which is the right idea. But they’re short of quality everywhere.

29. Toronto FC: Looked, to me, like a team that’ll be in the Spoon race.

30. Portland Timbers: Not a ton of reason to think they’ll be as good as last year in attack, given the age of Felipe Mora, the injury to Jonathan Rodriguez, and the exit of Evander. And plenty of reason, after Week 1, to think they’ll be worse defensively.

---

And for fun, on Tuesday afternoon I filled in for Tommy Scoops on Soccerwise. Me & Gass did about an hour-twenty on most of the MLS weekend:

1. GEORGI MINOUNGOU IS A PROBLEM!!!

2. Olivier Giroud really, really doesn’t.

3. I just want to point out that Wil Trapp, who I’ve always been very meh on, was quite good in this one.