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
The biggest instance of “addition through subtraction” in recent FCD history kept rolling on last weekend as the Good Guys beat their old (playoff) nemesis 3-1. Once upon a time, it was looking pretty unlikely that FCD was going to even sneak into the play-in game, but when you get three wins and three draws in six games, amazing things can happen and they now sit in ninth.
While that in and of itself isn’t a massive achievement, it’s an incredible improvement over where they were two months ago. And hey, teams have advanced out of the play-in game to make a deep run into the playoffs…
Oh no.
Well, enjoy watching soccer that doesn’t make your eyeballs bleed for the next month anyway.
EL SUPERCLÁSICO DEL SIGLO (de la semana)
Seattle Sounders vs. Vancouver Whitecaps (Apple TV+ free game, 9:30)
The real upset of last week’s Little Brother Green-Seattle game wasn’t that our pals from Austin’s “second downtown” got a second-half stoppage time goal to win the game; it was that Jesús Ferreira didn’t actually score on his favorite whipping boys. Sure, he didn’t come into the match until the 60th minute, but still, you’d almost expect him to add energy and inflict pain on the little brothers once again.
[sighs]
Thanks for nothing, Sounders. Your reward is to come back home and face the third wheel of Cascadia. And they’re currently 11 points ahead of you, while you sit only nine points ahead of the rabble below the playoff line. And they’ve only lost once since the middle of July.
Amazingly, they’re only fourth in the Supporters Shield standings, but they’re only four points behind the Union, who are at the top, and they’ve got a game in hand on everyone in front of them: Philly, Cincy, and San Diego. Boy, I’d hate to be the team that has to go to Vancouver on the last day of the season while the Whitecaps are potentially playing for that.
I’ve sacrificed plenty of electrons this season on these two teams — Vancouver because of the transition from “oh no, they fired my favorite coach” to “hot damn, these guys are good” and Seattle because of the big trades this past offseason that sent them Jesús Ferreira and Paul Arriola — but now we get to talk about how this game’s got a lot of juice because Vancouver wants to win silverware more prestigious than the Canadian Championship and Seattle because they’re trying not to tumble down the Western Conference standing into a crummy playoff spot.
Sadly for them, the more consequential game is happening at the same time, three hours south on I-5.
Jefe the Hater’s rooting pick: Vancouver because it’s just plain funny when Seattle loses.
Little Brother Game of the Week
Nashville SC vs. Houston Dynamo (MLS Season Pass, 7:30)
It feels like I’ve been talking a lot about the other little brother in this column lately. And to be honest, that’s mostly because Little Brother Orange thankfully stinks again this season.
“Hey, they won Copa Tejas this season!”
Let me let the laughter die down, and then I’ll continue.
Yes, they did, and in things that actually matter, they’re only a point behind FCD in the standings. But here’s the deal: Everyone around them in this part of the standings has been somehow interesting.
- Dallas – Sold a recent league MVP, lost their starting GK to injury, and somehow got much better.
- San Jose – Hired Bruce Arena, signed Josef Martínez and Chicho Arango, scored a ton of goals, and let in a ton of goals.
- Salt Lake – Managing to squander Diego Luna’s prime.
- St. Louis – Fired their coach halfway into his first season in charge.
- Kansas City – Fired their coach early in his 17th season in charge.
- LA Galaxy – LOL
But no, Little Brother Orange has been derping along in this range of the standing all season long without distinction. They’ve had a couple of four-game unbeaten runs, but also four different multi-game losing streaks. And nobody cares, outside of us and the other little brothers. They’re just a name on the schedule.
Fortunately for them, they get to visit a Nashville team that’s lost six out of its last seven. Those of us who were once saying, “Hey, you know, B.J. Callaghan won some stuff as the interim USMNT manager. Just sayin’,” have now moved on to other discussion topics, not that Mauricio Pochettino has quieted any sort of grumbling. (He’ll probably do something genius like continue to ignore Tanner Tessmann and turn him into 2026’s version of 1998 Landon Donovan or 2014 Landon Donovan.)
But who knows? Maybe a visit from Little Brother Orange is the perfect time to get a few things right.
Jefe the Hater’s rooting pick: Nashvegas
“Let’s Pretend to Care About the Eastern Conference Game of the Week”
New York Red Bulls vs. New York City FC (MLS Season Pass, 6:30)
NYCFC comes into this game, having played Miami midweek at (checks schedule) Citi Field. And since You-Know-Who came to town, over 40,000 were in the house. They even rolled out the good tifo:
They then lost 4-0. And although they’ve already clinched a playoff spot, this result didn’t help in their quest to have home-field advantage in the first round. They’re at #5 at 53 points, tied with #4 CLT FC. Before getting hamblasted by Miami, NYCFC had a game in hand over CLT FC, and were probably feeling a lot better about things than they do now. This is why you tell the children that games in hand aren’t worth anything unless you actually win them.
You know who isn’t in the playoffs yet? The Red Bulls. They’re currently in 10th at 43 points, two points behind 9th place Chicago. Why is that interesting? Because the Red Bulls currently own the record for the longest playoff streak in the league. The last time they weren’t in the playoffs? 2009.
The really impressive part of that streak is that it’s been produced this list of permanent head coaches:
- Hans Backe (2010-2012)
- Mike Petke (2013-2014)
- Jesse Marsch (2015-2018)
- Chris Armas (2018-2020)
- Gerhard Struber (2020-2023)
- Troy Lesesne (2023)
- Sandro Schwarz (2024-present)
By comparison, FCD, which missed the playoffs in 2012, 2013, 2017, 2021, and 2024, has had five permanent head coaches. Red Bull is gonna Red Bull, I guess.
Jefe the Hater’s rooting pick: Red Bulls, because their playoff streak is genuinely impressive at this point.
Sickos Game of the Week
LA Galaxy vs. Sporting Kansas City (Apple TV+ free game, 9:30)
It’s funny. The Gals currently sit at the bottom of the West and the bottom of the league, and nobody really, truly thinks of them as the worst team in the league. They have played 30 games and sit at 21 points. The Dallas Burn managed 23 points in the 30 games of the 2003 season, a low that this team has never come close to approaching in the 22 seasons since then. And yet, nobody really, truly thinks of them as the worst team in the league.
Don’t believe me? Look the various power rankings that folks put together, like ESPN’s
…or the league website’s…
…or Matt Doyle’s, albeit from two weeks ago:
18. LA Galaxy: I’ve crushed Greg Vanney in this space before for his lack of interest in developing his young(ish) players, but now over the past few weeks Chris Rindov, Elijah Wynder, Harbor Miller, Mauricio Cuevas and Tucker Lepley have entered the regular rotation – some of them as, it seems, starters.
This is the only way to keep the floor high in MLS year after year. You have to get real contributions from those down-roster players, and the Galaxy have not historically done that. If it’s suddenly changed, that’s the single best piece of news fans of this club could’ve asked for.
(For added fun, check out #17 and #19.)
Now, you might say, “Yeah, but they’ve been playing better lately, and the drop-off this season was due to losing so many players this season, most prominently Riqui Puig. Besides, they finished third in Leagues Cup.” To which I would respond with the words of the great Bill Parcells: “You are what your record says you are.”
Meanwhile, there’s zero doubt that firing Peter Vermes has fixed nothing and that the Sporks still stink.
Jefe the Hater’s rooting pick: The Gals, because I have a 30-year history of enjoying the suffering of Wiz fans.
Good Guys Game of the Week
Portland Timbers vs. FC Dallas (Apple TV+ free game, 9:30)
When FCD last played Portland at the beginning of August, I expressed gratitude that the Timbers have had this talent lately for running off talented players. I’m grateful, FC Cincinnati is grateful, and Fluminense is grateful.
But in addition to all that, I’d like to raise a glass to the Timbers for offering themselves as the sacrifice that helped kickstart FCD’s rebirth in the 2025 season.
Before the game against them, FCD was floundering. They couldn’t win at home, they didn’t look like a cohesive unit, they had just sold a rather $5 million player for somewhat less than $5 million a few short months after acquiring him, and it was an open question whether Eric Quill was going to be made to walk the plank. And then they walked into Toyota Stadium in fifth place in the West.
It was the first win in a six-game unbeaten run. Petar Musa has been pumping in goals like it’s going out of style, and FCD has now climbed back into the playoff places.
“Oh, but FCD had become a different team, and the improvement was on them.”
Sure, but they could’ve played better and still gotten their doors blown off, and what would that have done for the vibes? But no, Portland did their part, and since then, the vibes have been immaculate. Almost everyone has been pulling in the same direction and getting results. The infamous midseason signing that usually doesn’t do a damn thing was a midseason signing that is a big contributor this time around. Even the emergency goalkeeper signing has stepped up for a few heroics and some otherwise solid play.
The Portland Timbers didn’t make all this happen, to be clear. But the before and after are clear. And so I raise a glass to them, FCD’s 2025 slumpbuster. And as a toast, I wish them nothing but pain and suffering in front of the most self-important set of fans in all of Major League Soccer.