Fernando Clavijo! You disappoint me.

You see, Fernando, I had great hope for you. Great hope! I wanted you and your Colorado Rapids to take home the MLS Cup, and I wanted you to do it in a style never before witnessed in this league’s ten short years – without a playoff win, by penalty kicks alone. Had you done that then I could have waxed eloquent upon the Genius of Clavijo.

There would have been two parts to that genius. The first part you revealed earlier this week in an interview over at USSoccerPlayers.com. “What was your least favorite school subject,” they asked. “History,” you replied, “Why work in something that is over when it is so much to learn about today and our future.” Genius! Screw history. Think only of the future. I know what that means in the MLS-world. Screw the regular season. Think only of the playoffs.

The second part? Don’t lose, and then trust in Joe Cannon. (Well, maybe that’s three parts.)

If only the Rapids had done the job against Los Angeles then I could have lauded your brilliance. If only, if only. But the Rapids lost and now I’m compelled instead to write about the Foolishness of Fernando.

You cannot build a team with Terry Cooke on the right, a whole bunch of defense first-and-seconders behind him and a whole bunch of offense first and seconders in front of him. Oh, sure, sometimes you had Pablo Mastroeni in midfield, but not all that often. He wasn’t even available for half the season, and when it really counted in that fatal final game you played him in the back, not in the midfield. What’s that? Yes, I know Jovan was supposed to provide some midfield control and vision. Lots of things are supposed to happen. Often times they don’t, and that’s particularly true when it comes to “Have I ever told you I was at Man United with Beckham?” Kirovski.

I will leave you with one last thought, Fernando. History is our friend and guide. It’s a shame you didn’t learn that back in your schoolboy days because those who don’t learn from Major League Soccer’s history are doomed to sign Jovan Kirovski, Wolde Harris, and Diego Serna.

Peter Nowak began his last week of the season by taking Freddy Adu down a notch. The Chicago Fire ended Peter Nowak’s last week of the season by taking him down a notch. It was a devastating blow. He should have seen it coming. And it was a testament to his single-minded stubbornness that he didn’t.

I will go my way even if sometimes it’s wrong, or you thinking it’s wrong. I think it’s the right way because we have success and we’re not going to stop and I’ve done it for a long time and I never said it was the bad way to do it. Is it the hard way? Yes.

- Peter Nowak, October 30, 2005

Yes, Peter, it is the hard way. It’s extremely hard when the better teams in MLS have learned to negate your team’s strengths and punish your team’s weaknesses. When that happens I have no doubt it’s very hard to win games.

Last year DC United was an up and down team until they got Ryan Nelsen back from injury and inserted Christian Gomez into the lineup. Nelsen’s return coincided with the return of Rimando in the net, and Nelsen was able to organize the defense sufficiently well to make up for Rimando’s positional and stylistic faults.

But the truth is the defensive improvements only helped the team marginally. Christian Gomez was the key. Give credit to Nowak. He had a vision for the 2004 team and he built that team to fulfill that vision. The Argentine midfielder was the last piece of the puzzle. DC United went on to sucker-punch their way to the MLS Cup and their fourth league title.

The 2005 team was not the 2004 team, but at the same time it wasn’t all that different on the field. It played the same game; almost all of the essential players returned. The main loss was Ryan Nelsen and that absence was competently (although not masterfully) filled with the emergence of Bobby Boswell. And of course the team lost Eskandarian to injury as well, but that loss alone did not result in the team’s ultimate downfall.

And, yet, it was different, wasn’t it? The 2004 team was new and unexpected. MLS hadn’t seen anything like it. But some teams in other leagues had seen it before and in 2005 Pumas and Catolica taught Major League Soccer how to defeat the defending champions. Perhaps the loss to Dallas in the US Open Cup was the result of the consummate idiocy of an ill-timed red card, but the 4-0 defeat to Chicago that ended DC United’s season was the result of careful study.

Under Peter Nowak DC United doesn’t change its manner of play for anyone. That’s the source both of the team’s successes and its failures. But the failures have become more and more frequent in 2005, and unless Peter Nowak changes his predictable ways they’ll be even more frequent in 2006.

But was Peter Nowak taken down a notch? Will he see it coming next time? Or does he remain steadfast in his conviction that his way is the right way, the only way, the best way because it worked once before?

“Well informed sources in Miami announced the imminent fall of Fidel Castro, it was only a matter of hours.” So Eduardo Galeano marks the four-year World Cup beat in his classic Soccer in Sun and Shadow. “Well informed sources in New York announced the imminent improvement of the MetroStars, you’ll see next season.” Quadrennial after quadrennial Castro remains strong. Year after year the MetroStars suck.

What happened this year is what happens every year. The Metros collapsed. Sometimes the collapse is slow and sometimes it’s fast. But it’s always the same. And time and again the collapse seems deserved.

The MetroStars have come to epitomize everything that went wrong with Major League Soccer. They say “MLS is nothing but overly-packaged corporate schlock!” I present you with the MetroMedia All-Stars. (Lest we forget from what the name really originates.) They say “The big names in the league are nothing but washed up Euro-trash on an American vacation.” Can you say Lothar Matthäus? They say “Major League Soccer is run by incompetent corporate goons.” I present you with Charlie Stillitano , John Kluge, Stuart Subotnick, Nick Sakiewicz, and Alexi Lalas. They say “MLS vastly over-values the product they’re putting on the field.” I show you tickets costing a minimum of $26. They say “Major League soccer is a blue collar league suffering under illusions of grandeur.” I bring you The SuperClub.

What’s that I hear? “Well informed sources in Harrison, New Jersey announced the imminent improvement of the MetroStars, just wait until the stadium is finished.” That’s funny. I just read that “Well informed sources in Miami announced the imminent fall of Fidel Castro, it’s only a matter of hours.”

Let’s face it: the MetroStars aren’t a real MLS team. And they’re sure as hell not a model franchise. The MetroStars are a sack of misery in funny shorts.

No stadium alone can change that.

It’s a shame that I’m writing about the San Jose Earthquakes. They didn’t deserve to get knocked out of the cup by a mediocre team having an unusually good run. If the MLS Cup is supposed to crown the best team in Major League Soccer then it’s already failed to fulfill its aim.

And it’s an additional shame that I don’t feel very compelled to write about what the Quakes can take out of the season or what we as observers might learn from them. That’s what postmortems are supposed to do, but it’s just so unseemly in this context. See, when it comes to these postmortems you’re not really supposed to be dead. I know the titles indicate otherwise, but I don’t mean dead for real there. I mean just a little bit dead. But the Quakes might be dead for real.

It’s hard to write about San Jose with that possibility hanging over the team’s head. If that series against Los Angeles was the last Quakes game ever – well, that’s just a terrible way to go.

The Quakes have been neglected and beat up and kicked while they’re down so much and so often and so hard – over and over again. And that charlatan Tony Amanpour! And that corporate lackey! And that traitorous prima donna! You have to respect the fans that supported the team through all of that.

But through it all (OK, since 2001) they’ve played some first class soccer. That’s a pretty rare thing in this little league of ours. If they’re gone that’s a loss for everyone who cares about quality soccer in MLS. And although they’ll never admit it, even the Galaxy fans would miss the Quakes.

San Jose, I hope you’re back in 2006. I really do. I hope you’re back for good.

(Kansas City, I’m sorry to say it, but I don’t feel the same way about you. Unless you get a new stadium. Then you can stay.)