Power Rankings, 1-30 | Matchday 9
Some of the dregs are finding a bit of life
The 2025 season’s a quarter done. Weird how it always just kind of sneaks up on you. Anyway, here’s my Sunday column. Please click through!
• Austin's new look, New England find chemistry & more from Matchday 9
And now, here’s my vote for this week’s MLSsoccer.com Power Rankings:
Inter Miami: Did not play well. Got the win anyway. How long they can keep up their current, record-setting pace will be determined by whether or not they get more contributions from the likes of Benja Cremsachi.
Vancouver Whitecaps: First in total points, second in points per game. Missing Ryan Gauld a bit, though.1
Columbus Crew: Were the better team than Miami. Sometimes ball not go in.
Charlotte FC: Even before the red card that was a beating. The Crown keeps picking up points even as they’re sorting themselves out.
Minnesota United: The quality of the overall defense keeps the floor high, but they need more incisiveness with the ball to raise that ceiling.2
Philadelphia Union: Battered a bad Atlanta team, like they should’ve.
LAFC: The attack has shown some life in the past couple of weeks after a dormant start to the season. More David Martinez, please.
FC Cincinnati: Brute forcing some wins as they get healthy. Huge upside with this team, even if they’re not yet playing great.
San Diego FC: Is the bottom dropping out? They’ve now conceded six goals in their past two games, and have looked awful doing it. Five of the next six at home, though, and my guess is that Mikey Varas learned a valuable lesson about squad rotation this past week.3
Seattle Sounders: 180 minutes of really good soccer, just one loss in their past five, and overall they’re starting to look like the team the underlying numbers say they are. See what happens when your No. 9 remembers where the goal is?
Orlando City: They need their No. 9 to remember where the goal is.
Chicago Fire: “If they can cut out the catastrophic individual errors” is a massive, load-bearing “if.”
Portland Timbers: They remain devastating on the counter. They need more moments in possession like what they showed in drawing the PK for the opener.4
Austin FC: The best they looked all year. That said, if you don’t look great against LA at home, something’s probably gone wrong. Still, I liked the process.
Nashville SC: Got absolutely crushed. I hope they lack of defensive effort certain guys showed – just look at who was subbed at the half to see who I’m talking about – was a one-time thing, and not symptomatic of some greater malaise.
Colorado Rapids: Played well enough to come away with all three points. Should’ve, honestly.
FC Dallas: A stout and smart game plan executed effortfully.
New England Revolution: The Revs were fun! And they totally deserved that win.
St. Louis City: Starting to ease up on the reins and let these guys attack. Didn’t result in a goal, but that was a credible performance on both sides of the ball.
RBNY: That was not a credible performance on either side of the ball.5
NYCFC: Feels like they’re in some trouble here.
San Jose Earthquakes: They need to get Daniel back as soon as possible, and they need to think hard about a different No. 2.
Sporting KC: Been fun as hell the past three weeks. Part of it is the attack’s clicking, and part of it is they can’t really stop anyone.
Toronto FC: Make it four unbeaten for the Reds, who’ve allowed just one goal (and, to be fair, scored just two) in that time.6
Real Salt Lake: 1) Definitely not a red, and 2) definitely a bad performance regardless. Just one win in their last five.
Atlanta United: What can you say about this:
Houston Dynamo: A great moment from Ondrej Lingr to rescue a point for a team that’s pretty clearly going to spend the whole season in rebuilding mode.
D.C. United: The João Peglow game!
LA Galaxy: I can’t believe that Pec & Paintsil haven’t finished a few of these breakaway chances they’ve gotten in the past few games. Yeesh.
Montreal Impact: Two goals in their past eight games and it’s just not very clear where more would be coming from.
Just a heads-up that I’ll have transfer window grades coming later this week (the primary window closes Wednesday) on MLSsoccer, and might be putting together some video stuff as well.
I really hope he’s back for both legs of the CCL semis against Miami. I think… I think I might pick the ‘Caps?
I’m sorry to write the same thing week after week. I would suggest Minnesota stop playing the same game week after week.
That valuable lesson is “Do not play Andres Reyes.”
The frustrating thing about the Timbers is that they’ve long had the talent to play like this, but have mostly refused to.
SOFT
Theo Corbeanu’s “Siu” was the most cringe thing I’ve seen in MLS in a while.
this is a silly comment, but going to type it anyway. i think sometimes we forget the point of a game... to get more goals than the other team. I've never been a fan of the thought about a losing team, "this team was the better team on the day". because really, the better team is the team who actually put the ball in the net.
with that said, I'm also a big fan of watching Columbus play and as a neutral, generally tend to turn their game on each week. it's quite magical how they move around.