DC United and District Officials Announce Deal for $300 Million Stadium

Major League Soccer’s D.C. United spent its first 16 years at RFK Stadium, but that will soon change.    UPDATE: Thursday, July 25, at 11:10 a.m. ET by Brandon Galvin MLSsoccer.com's Charles Boehm has the latest on DC United's stadium: The day D.C. United and their fans have been dreaming about for years may finally have arrived. United and Washington, D.C. Mayor Vincent Gray announced on Thursday morning the signing of a $300 million public-private partnership to build a 20-25,000-seat soccer stadium in the Buzzard Point area of Southwest D.C., about a mile and a half south of the US Capitol near the confluence of the Potomac and Anacostia rivers. The new home of the four-time MLS Cup champions will be located adjacent to the Fort McNair Army base, bounded by Half Street and Second Street SW between R and T Streets a few blocks west of the Nationals Park baseball stadium, and is anticipated to be completed in time for the 2016 season. 'We are proud to say that D.C. United has achieved a major milestone towards establishing a permanent, state-of-the-art home in Washington, D.C.,' United managing partner Jason Levien said in a club statement. 'This is a significant step forward, and we are going to continue ...

Why MLS Should Adopt Table Format

As an American soccer enthusiast, it is refreshing to see Major League Soccer in such a stable position. Soccer's premier system in the United States is nearly two decades old and has expanded to 19 teams in 18 cities with the 20th, NYC FC, coming in 2015. MLS is responsible for producing several American stars on the international level such as Clint Dempsey and Michael Bradley. Still, there is one major flaw with the current structure of MLS—the playoff system. Make MLS On Par With Other Leagues Playoffs are the backbone of the American sporting body. The Super Bowl is considered the largest sporting event in America; the commercial benefits exemplify America's capitalistic environment. College Football has been criticized for NOT having a playoff system, leading to a change in policy where four teams will contest for the national championship. The mystique of March Madness is the "David versus Goliath" scenario which allows the underdogs one chance to upend their superior opponents. American soccer has a different feel though. The United States does not possess the highest level of talent in regards to soccer, unlike basketball, baseball, American football, etc. The Barclays Premier League is the most watched "football" league on the planet and even the ...

Week 21 MLS Power Rankings

Sporting Kansas City and Real Salt Lake battled for 97 minutes on Saturday night at Rio Tinto Stadium in a match between the MLS' two best teams. Sporting won the match in controversial fashion, but was it enough to boost them above RSL in the B/R MLS Power Rankings this week? Read on to see where those two clubs and the other 17 in the league landed this week.Begin Slideshow

Best and Worst from MLS Week 21: Chris Rolfe, Twitter Beef and More

Goals were at a premium in MLS Week 21, and so was decent officiating. Just ask Real Salt Lake. The Seattle Sounders and Colorado Rapids opened a mundane afternoon with a 1-1 draw at CenturyLink Field. The Portland Timbers and Philadelphia Union carried that momentum into the evening with a scoreless draw at PPL Park. It's not hard to imagine, but some tough competition kept all four clubs from making the list of best and worst from MLS Week 21. Read on to find out why.Begin Slideshow

MLS Expansion: The Top 3 Cities No One’s Talking About

When New York City FC were announced as an MLS expansion side in May, they became the 20th team in a constantly growing league. From that point on, the question switched to which team would become the 21st team. At the present moment, there are several cities where expansion talks are high. Orlando City SC has made it clear it wants to be in MLS, and that dream may become a reality should it land a stadium. Further south in the Sunshine State, Simon Evans of Reuters reports that Miami is where David Beckham wants to locate his MLS expansion franchise. Being the savvy businessman he is, when Beckham entered MLS and signed with the LA Galaxy in 2007, he made sure there was a clause in his contract that if he chose to start an MLS expansion side, the expansion fee would be highly reduced. So Beckham will start a franchise, and it seems Miami is the place where he will do so. However, beyond the buzz in the southeast corner of the United States, there are several cities that would be fantastic locations for MLS expansion franchises that are rarely talked about. (These are also prime candidates for places to relocate Chivas ...

MLS Weekend Wrap

On a night where goals came at a premium on the East Coast, the two matches on the West Coast produced six goals to bolster the lackluster output from the first six matches of the day. The lack of scoring league-wide was the last thing on the minds of Real Salt Lake after they fell to Sporting Kansas City because of some controversial officiating. Read on for comprehensive recaps of the controversial Real Salt Lake match and the seven others played in MLS on Saturday.Begin Slideshow

3 Dark-Horse MLS Teams That Could Make a Run for the Playoffs

With a little over half of the MLS regular season gone, it's time to start looking at the playoff picture. Both conferences are jam-packed near the top with only four points separating first-place Sporting Kansas City from fifth-place Houston Dynamo in the East and seven points between first-place Real Salt Lake and fifth-place L.A. Galaxy in the West. In the Eastern Conference, bottom-dwellers Toronto FC and DC United have almost no chance of making the postseason, which leaves New England, Columbus and Chicago among those who are currently on the outside looking in. The Western Conference is a bit more competitive. Chivas USA is the only team that hardly has any chance of making the playoffs. This means Colorado, Seattle and San Jose are the ones that need to climb their way back up the standings. The playoff hopes of many teams may look dim right now, but let's not forget the Galaxy's incredible run to make the postseason that started around the midway point of last season. Who has the potential to make a similar run? Keep on reading to find out.Begin Slideshow

5 Most Thrilling Moments from the MLS Season so Far

Is it just me or does MLS keep getting better and better? This season has given us plenty to talk about. Some unfamiliar teams are rising to the top of the league while some big names are struggling. But each game is made up of moments—match defining, momentum swinging, stadium-erupting moments. The following are five of the best. Goals, saves and spectacular plays, these are the moments that keep us coming back.Begin Slideshow

Analyzing the USMNT’s Roster Moves Before the 2013 Gold Cup Quarterfinals

As the U.S. men's national team moves on to the quarterfinals to play El Salvador, head coach Jurgen Klinsmann has decided to make several roster changes that seem to create a few new position battles and important decisions for him to make before Sunday's game. The four players that were dropped from the roster are as follows: Herculez Gomez, Oguchi Onyewu, Jack McInerney and Corey Ashe. The four players added are: Omar Gonzalez, Matt Besler, Alan Gordon and Eddie Johnson.  The additions are the main source of intrigue in this transaction due to the fact that three of the four players (Gonzalez, Besler and Johnson) are regarded as "A" team players. Gonzalez and Besler are considered to be the future of the center back position for the U.S. national team, which causes some pondering to be done about the center backs already on the roster for this tournament.  Michael Orozco Fiscal and Clarence Goodson were very efficient and consistent in group play, especially in a difficult match against Costa Rica on Tuesday. The question becomes whether Klinsmann will simply drop them in favor of his preferred pair of center backs, Besler and Gonzalez. These two additions have the potential to rock a boat ...

Real Salt Lake, L.A. Galaxy on Upset Alert in MLS This Weekend

Hope you all have been enjoying the Gold Cup so far. Personally, I was kind of rooting for Martinique to qualify for the knockout stage, if only because no one really expected them to get that far. If not for a 4-0 win for Cuba over a 10-man Belize, they would have made it. The matchups I've selected for this weekend have been affected by the Gold Cup in one way or another, on both sides in one case. Let's get to it, shall we?   Upset Alert No. 1: Real Salt Lake vs. Sporting Kansas City Real Salt Lake is on top of the table when it comes to the Supporters Shield race, but how long that lasts is now under threat. With Nick Rimando and Kyle Beckerman away with the U.S. national team, their depth was already a little thinner than they'd like. Last weekend, however, it got a little worse. Backup goalkeeper Josh Saunders tore his ACL and will be out indefinitely, while defender Carlos Salcedo will miss Saturday's match after having his gall bladder removed Sunday. RSL did make a move to shore up their defense by acquiring Brandon McDonald from DC United for a couple of draft picks. Sporting Kansas City, on the ...