We’ve just wrapped up an NBA season where one of the biggest talking points throughout the Championship Series was the competitive imbalance between the two conferences. The lesson there? Once the Spurs made it out of the Western Conference and into the Finals, it was over. No real reason to play the final series.

The nice thing about soccer in general and MLS specifically (finally) is that generally, championships (UEFA Cup, World Cup, MLS Cup, etc.) are decided by a single match.

In the NBA, the presence of the best-of-seven format pretty much ensures that the better team will win. As we look at MLS so far this season, it’s a good thing that MLS Cup is one-and-done. If it weren’t, we’d probably be saying the same things about the Eastern Conference of MLS that we were about the Western Conference in the NBA – it just isn’t close.

The most damning piece of evidence of the competitive imbalance between conferences was submitted on Sunday.

After Toronto completely dismantled Dallas (4-0) on Sunday – that’s the Western Conference leader against the 5th place team in the East – you really have to wonder what the West has to offer.

You might be able to give Dallas a pass after their extremely crowded early-season schedule and losing their lead striker Kenny Cooper to long term injury, but 4-0 to an expansion team is embarrassing no matter the extenuating circumstances.

Even if you do give Dallas a pass for this match, the rest of the West leaves a lot to be desired.

Chivas USA has been up-and-down. They’ve been dominant at the Home Depot Center where they shut out the Rapids on Saturday but they’ve been terrible on the road.

Houston and Colorado both seem like they should be doing better than they are but without the wretched Galaxy and Real Salt Lake squads to beat up on – their records would be looking pretty weak as well.

The West can’t even blame the Gold Cup because the only missing players who were playing well are Donovan and Bornstein and in the case of the former the Galaxy weren’t winning when Lando was playing well.

Unless one of the teams out West makes a dramatic turn-around our best hope for a competitive MLS Cup will be if Don Garber looks at a map and realizes that Kansas City has no business being in the East and returns them to their rightful home where they will provide stiff competition for whichever of New York, New England, or DC comes out of the East.

Impressive Imports

The league came under a great deal of scrutiny over the winter as MLS rosters were bolstered with foreign talent that could best be described as closer to the end of their careers than the beginning.

The likes of Guillermo Schelotto and Juan Pablo Angel came over with a great deal of hype. The prevailing wisdom being "It’s OK to bring Beckham over because he’ll sell tickets but these other guys are just old."

Well, I couldn’t help but notice that Schelotto and Angel were both involved in the goals this weekend and they were joined by slightly less high-profile off-season signings Maykel Galindo and Luciano Emilio.

Throw in an assist for Abel Xavier in his debut and you have to conclude that even before Becks arrives on our shores that the level of talent was lifted greatly this past off-season.

Where is this going? If I were to guess, I’d bet that if MLS can continue to make steady progress with TV ratings, game attendance, and sponsorship revenue it will eventually be the best league in the Americas.

MLS teams are doing a better job of finding talent and the strength of the US economy (at least relative to the rest of the countries in the region) will make this the most attractive place to play on the way to or back from the greener pastures of Europe.

Gold Cup Reaction

OK, a break from MLS for a minute so I can rant about our boys.

I don’t want to over-react to what we’ve seen during the Gold Cup but how can I not complain about our inability to finish. I’m an Arsenal fan and I have to say that I felt like I’ve been watching a poor man’s Arsenal squad over the last week and a half or so.

The passing game has generally looked good, the defense has mostly been solid but the finishing has been atrocious. The British press got to calling this year’s addition of Arsenal “The Profligates” for their penchant for squandering opportunities and the same can be said for this edition of the National Team.

Even in the match we won 4-0 we missed some clear chances.

The match against Panama on Saturday should have been over within 10 minutes and instead we drew it out and drew it out. This probably won’t come back to haunt us in this tournament but if you don’t think this is going to be exposed in the Copa America, you’re crazy.

I’ll admit that I’m impressed that we’re creating as many chances as we are and all credit to Bob Bradley and the team for that but now it’s time to add the final piece to the puzzle.

Back to MLS

With Toronto and DC playing well; New York and New England cooling off; and Columbus showing some signs of life the Eastern Conference race is going to be a great one… Now if only Chicago could figure out what happened to its early season magic.

Clint Mathis continues to amaze – one game he looks brilliant, the next he’s invisible (or worse) – if you happen to have an MLS fantasy team you should be taking note and acting accordingly.

Think Yura Movsisyan has earned a little more playing time while Eddie Johnson is away on Gold Cup duty? If MLS wants to shake the image of the league as low-scoring they should just put the Wizards and Red Bulls on every week, for those of you not counting along at home that’s 13 goals between them in their last two encounters.

Finally, I think RSL’s season can best be summed up by the fact that Nate Jaqua scored on them Sunday night.