The Mane Land MLS Power Rankings: Week 10

Every time I write this column, there is a little soccer fan in the back of my head that represents the stereotypical soccer fan comment writer on a soccer website. Let's call him the Soccer Jiminy Cricket.

(After I put Team X over Team Y)

Soccer Jiminy Crickett: How could you do that? Team X is clearly better than Team Y?!

Milby: Dude, pipe down. If Team X met Team Y in the MLS Cup Final, Team X would definitely win.

SJC: Are you crazy? Do you even watch soccer? I watch the Premier League all the time.

Milbz: Maybe. Yes. The EPL is vastly different from MLS. You should know all of these things.

SJC: I don't care. You're stupid.

I'm sure Soccer Jiminy Cricket will love what I wrote in the Red Bulls section this week.

1. FC Dallas (Last Week: 5)

FC Dallas beat LA, NYRB beat NYCFC, New England drew at Orlando, and Seattle lost. The new top four reflects those results.

2. New York Red Bulls (Last Week: 4)

Did you like the first edition of New York vs. New York? Me too. It was fun. It showed the possibility of what rivalries not in Cascadia can be. It was American.

You know what I didn't like about it? The way we talked about it.

I'm absolutely certain that I'm in the minority of the American soccer community here, but this game wasn't a "Derby" and it certainly wasn't a "Daarbee" either. This was a rivalry game, and if you think it should be called anything else you were probably a Loyalist during the American Revolution. Man United vs. Man City is a Derby. The first Saturday of May in Louisville, Kentucky is a Derby. A soccer game played between American teams on American soil in the preeminent American city should not ever be called a Derby.

Here's an attempt to encapsulate a long, unpopular argument with a tweet and a paragraph without sounding jingoistic: This is the United States of America, not England. The EPL is fun, don't get me wrong, but we need to make MLS our own and stop thinking of it as inferior simply because of its differences in terms of image and semantics. There are actual reasons that make MLS inferior to the EPL and other leagues the world over, but the way in which we name our teams, talk about our games and utilize our language aren't some of them.

3. New England Revolution (Last Week: 3)

4. Seattle Sounders (Last Week: 2)

Remember this goal?

This goal totally reminded me of it:

5. LA Galaxy (Last Week: 1)

LA lasted at the top for a long run, bet now there's a new sheriff in town.

6. Vancouver Whitecaps (Last Week: 7)

7. Columbus Crew (Last Week: 8)

On The Godfather Scale of Danger, this team is somewhere between Fredo and Sonny, more on the Sonny side. Could they become Michael? There's a chance.

8. D.C. United (Last Week: 6)

9. Real Salt Lake (Last Week: 9)

This team reminded me of what I remember Salt Lake to be, and this goal reminded me of what a real MLS finisher looked like.

10. San Jose Earthquakes (Last Week: 10)

11. Houston Dynamo (Last Week: 14)

I have no idea if this Houston team is legit or not.

12. Sporting Kansas City (Last Week: 11)

13. Toronto FC (Last Week: 12)

I also have no idea if this Toronto team is legit or not. When I watch the Reds, I feel like a girl in the third grade pulling pedals out of a flower saying, "They love me. They love me not." This week, they loved me not.

14. Portland Timbers (Last Week: 15)

15. Chicago Fire (Last Week: 13)

16. Orlando City (Last Week: 16)

The Lions finally showed some fight this week, and scored more than one goal for only the third time in their MLS history. Despite the fact that most teams considering draws at home to be losses, this one felt like a win.

17. Colorado Rapids (Last Week: 17)

18. New York City FC (Last Week: 19)

19. Philadelphia Union (Last Week: 19)

20. Montreal Impact (Last Week: 20)

These last four teams are fighting for the title of Fredo on The Godfather Scale of Danger.