I’m Dustin “El Jefe” Christmann, and I am an FC Dallas fanatic from Day One of the Dallas Burn. I’m also a hater. I used to yell mean, hateful things from the stands at the Cotton Bowl and Toyota Stadium, but now, I’m sharing my id with you to help guide you, my fellow FCD fans, in your enjoyment of Major Soccer on TV.
Musical accompaniment
Last week
So FCD’s Saturday-Wednesday combo in California only got them a single point, thanks to a 2-0 loss in LA and a 2-2 draw in San Jose. But that’s not what people want to talk about, is it?
Look, I’m not gonna make any grand proclamations on whether Lucho Acosta should continue to wear the FCD shirt or whether FCD would be better or worse without him. I will only present the following facts:
- He managed to wear out his welcome in DC in 2019 was sold to Atlas.
- He returned to MLS when he joined FC Cincinnati in 2021 and stayed with them until 2024.
- Roughly 10 minutes after Cincy’s playoff run ended in 2024, he publicly asked to go back to Argentina
- Instead, Cincy sold him to FCD for $5 million and bought Evander to replace him.
- His play in Frisco has often been the furthest thing from transcendent.
- He was left on the bench to start the game in LA Saturday night for… reasons… and came in as a second-half sub.
- Although he was one yellow away from suspension, he got himself a very quick yellow.
- With him out of the lineup, Petar Musa scores two goals and FCD breaks a four-game losing streak.
I don’t know what stage we’re at in the FC Dallas-Lucho Acosta divorce, but it’s hard for me to believe that we’re not witnessing a divorce. The only question is whether it costs Eric Quill his job before it happens.
EL SUPERCLÁSICO DEL SIGLO (de la semana)
San Diego FC vs. Vancouver Whitecaps (MLS Season Pass, 9:30)
To be honest, I almost missed this game when I went over the schedule: “The Third Wheel of Cascadia against an expansion team… Next!” Then I remembered that both of these teams are really good this year, so of course, this game is getting featured in this slot.
But the fact that these two teams are 1st and 2nd in the West at about the two-thirds mark of the season is what’s great about this league. While my favorite overseas league is the Bundesliga, and while I will trumpet that it can be very competitive and unpredictable, I will also admit that that competitiveness and unpredictability do not extend to the top spot, which is usually occupied by one Bayern Munich. And if they’re not at the top, they’re not far away, unless they’ve hired a noted incompetent like Jürgen Klinsmann as coach.
Not MLS, baby. The home team in this game only had a few players this time last year. They hired as their first head coach a guy who was best known for sitting on the bench next to Luchi Gonzalez during his time as FCD head coach. But the SDFC saw something in Mikey Varas that neither FCD nor too many other people saw. And combining him with some smart signings like Chucky Lozano and league MVP candidate Anders Dreyer has them topping the West.
And Vancouver? We’ve talked about them. It’s not often that you can fire the best coach in club history, not add much to the roster, and manage to improve. And yet, here they are, having already played in the CONCACAF Champions Cup final, and just a point off the top of the West with a game in hand.
And while SDFC had to spend a few bucks to build a roster from scratch, neither team has spent the GDP of a small Third World nation to get to where they are, unlike a certain fifth-place team in the East. I’m genuinely impressed with them.
You know who isn’t? The people at Major League Soccer Soccer dot com who are responsible for this:
Jefe the Hater’s rooting pick: Draw. I hope that both teams have fun and nobody gets hurt, even though the cow pasture masquerading as a professional soccer field at Snapdragon Stadium makes the latter item more difficult.
Little Brother Game of the Week
Houston Dynamo vs. Philadelphia Union (Apple TV+ free game, 7:30)
Since the subject of crummy seasons does come up occasionally in this column, it is worth noting that The Worst Season in 34 Games in MLS History featured a coach who is also a coach in this game. 2013 DC United collected 16 points in 34 games. (They barely missed out by a fraction of a percentage point from the worst season in league history to the 1999 MetroStars, who got 15 points in 32 games.) And since the universe has a sense of humor, DC United won the Open Cup that season.
The coach of that DC United team was Ben Olsen. And DC United management was so disgusted with the performance of the team that season that they made him coach another seven seasons. And while he did clear 50 points four times in those seven seasons, he also finished under 1 point per game twice. (For comparison, FC Dallas has finished under 1 PPG twice in its entire history, in 2003 and 2021.) During the second time he had them under that threshold, in 2020, DC United finally fired Olsen.
I point this out to compare him to his counterpart on the other end of the field on Saturday night. Bradley Carnell’s first coaching gig was about a half season as the Red Bulls’ interim coach in 2020. They got a respectable 6-5-3 record, but he wasn’t retained. He got his first full-time gig as St. Louis City’s first head coach in 2023, and they finished top of the West that season. He was gone midway through the next season when the Toasted Ravioli Boyz started extremely slowly. He was back in coaching less than a year later for Philly, and he’s got them top of the East right now.
For those of you keeping score:
| 2020 | Respectable half season as interim |
| 2023 | Finished top of the West |
| 2024 | Fired after crummy first half |
| 2025 | Currently top of the East |
Two and a half seasons that have been mostly good and three different clubs. Given that sort of record, he’ll probably get fired for parking in Ernst Tanner’s parking spot during a two-game winless streak.
Jefe the Hater’s rooting pick: Philly, not just because they’re playing a little brother, but because I believe in actual meritocracy.
“Let’s Pretend to Care About the Eastern Conference” Game of the Week
Columbus Crew vs. DC United (Apple TV+ free game, 6:30)
Since it’s gonna be ‘90s Night at Toyota Stadium Saturday night, I’ll talk about this game. You see, back in the earliest days of MLS, these two teams had a bit of a heated rivalry. Well, as much as “Wile E. Coyote vs. the Roadrunner” was a rivalry.
These two teams met in the Eastern Conference Finals three straight years from 1997 to 1999, and each time, DC United won:
| 1997 | DC United wins 2 games to 0 |
| 1998 | DC United wins 2 games to 1 |
| 1999 | DC United wins 2 games to 1 |
DC United won MLS Cup in 1997 and 1999, right after beating Columbus, so you can understand why Crew fans might be upset at the situation. Of course, their problem is that all three years, DC United finished on top of the East and had home-field advantage. They didn’t end up the gold standard of the early years of MLS through sheer luck, you know.
The rivalry was kind of broken up by MLS’ realignment in 2000 and putting Columbus in the Central Division and keeping DC United in the Eastern Division. And oh yeah, neither team made the playoffs that year. And oh yeah, DC United only won three trophies after that: MLS Cup in 2004, the Supporters Shield in 2007, and the Open Cup in 2013, while Columbus has won three MLS Cups, three Supporters Shields, and an Open Cup since then.
Today, with Columbus as one of the most competently run teams in the league and DC United a multi-decade dumpster fire, it’s hard to believe that Crew fans ever put a lot of heat into this matchup, but they did. Now their biggest rivals are Cincy, and DC United’s biggest rival is “acting like a competent Major League Soccer team.”
Jefe the Hater’s rooting pick: DC United. Make it ‘90s throwback night in Columbus, too.
Sickos Game of the Week LA Galaxy March Toward History Game of the Week
Los Angeles FC vs. LA Galaxy (Apple TV+ free game, 9:30)
This is normally not where you’d find EL TRÁFICO (cue up the G-Funk bass line), also known as the week in which a bunch of schmucks from Brentwood or Van Nuys or whatever talk crap about Carson, but this year is special for the LA Galaxy, and not the good kind of special, either.
I gotta give LAFC credit for one thing. Before they came into the league, I didn’t think that any fanbase could be any more insufferable than Galaxy fans. And to be fair, Galaxy fans have had a good reason to be a bit insufferable. They’ve won the most trophies. They’ve had some legitimately great stars play for them — David Beckham, Zlatan Ibrahimovic, Carlos Hermosillo, Andrew Shue, and many others. They’ve been the closest thing that MLS has had to a consistently “glamorous” team over the course of 30 years.
Hell, even this year, they’re on their way to making history for having the worst-ever season for a defending MLS Cup champion.
But LAFC? You cats came into the league with an undeserved superiority complex that I never would’ve believed possible. Seriously, you bozos have been running your mouths nonstop since Day One. And for what? Four trophies in eight years. That ain’t bad, but let’s not act like it’s anything that hasn’t been done before, or better.
And while we’re talking about “undeserved superiority,” let’s talk about your incessant reminders about the locations of your respective stadiums. Ain’t nobody outside of Southern California gives a good goddamn about the difference between Expo Park and Carson. Seriously, it’s just an unbroken urban area as you’re driving to Carson, just as it is when you’re driving to Expo Park. And while I’m not gonna speak for any Angelenos, I really wonder how many of them actually care about the difference. What an absolutely ridiculous thing to have any sort of superiority about.
I recognize Little Brother Energy when I see it, and I see it emanating in spades from BMO Stadium.
Jefe the Hater’s rooting pick: LAFC, because I also recognize a really funny bit when I see it, and the continued horribleness of your defending MLS Cup champion is a pretty funny bit.
Good Guys Game of the Week
FC Dallas vs. St. Louis City (MLS Season Pass, 7:30)
As mentioned previously, it’s gonna be ‘90s Night at Toyota Stadium on Saturday night, a concept that makes me personally feel a bit uncomfortable about the unceasing march of time. Still, it’s gonna be a great celebration, where FCD will honor Burn legends like Mark Dodd, Zarco Rodríguez, Richard Farrer (who after his Burn career became a lawyer and is now a federal judge in San Antonio), and of course, the one and only Jason Kreis, who still sits alone atop the club’s scoring charts 20 years after he left.
Of course, these days, the club more resembles the final couple years of the Burn than their heyday of the late ‘90s, but maybe for one night, Toyota Stadium can close off all but the most distant parking, make people walk half a mile to the stadium, and make the concessions stands serve inedible food, just like in the old days. Maybe if you squint and look at the tarps, you can imagine the tarped-off ends of the Cotton Bowl.
I joke, of course. That’s kind of the raison d’être of this column in the first place. But my point here is that while a lot of stuff feels kinda crappy with good ol’ FC Dallas these days — and by “these days,” I mean “ever since Óscar Pareja left for Tijuana” — as Billy Joel sang in one of his lesser songs, “The good ol’ days weren’t always good and tomorrow isn’t as bad as it seems.”
Yeah, we’ll be seeing the stylish throwback shirts, we’ll be seeing the greats of yore, but you know what we won’t be seeing? 4,000 of our closest friends at the game. We won’t have the worry that we’ll open up our favorite news outlet tomorrow and find out that the team’s gone out of business. What we do have is the knowledge that in three years, we’ll be watching the team play in the best stadium they’ve ever played in, and maybe, if the technical staff’s brains grow three sizes bigger, we’ll be watching a team worthy of it.
So while nostalgia might not be my bag, what is my bag is seeing the local XI collect another scalp at the friendly confines of whatever home stadium they might have. And I’m not too particular on whose scalp it is.
Burn, baby, burn.