Mediocre Chivas, Galaxy don't befit L.A.'s great soccer culture

Cobi Jones, interim replacement for Ruud Gullit, is the fourth coach to pace the Galaxy's sidelines since the start of 2006. Christian Petersen/Getty Images Luis Bueno's Mailbag Submit a comment or question for Luis. Name: Email: Hometown: Question: SEND

There's no other soccer city in the United States quite like Los Angeles.

Between Major League Soccer games, friendlies, international tournaments and the scores of clubs and national teams that pass through, L.A. is the center of this nation's soccer universe.

It's a shame then that, because of the two local MLS sides, the bulk of the soccer here is dishearteningly mediocre.

The Los Angeles Galaxy have been in the business of making headlines, but lately, they're about anything but their play on the field. With a pair of dismissals earlier this week and the club's incestuous fawning over former U.S. coach Bruce Arena, the club generates more tabloid fodder than attention for their performance on the pitch.

Chivas USA, meanwhile, has yet to figure out how to consistently draw crowds four years into its own existence, and the lack of Mexican starpower is largely to blame.

While the opportunity for unparalleled success at the club level is there for both the Galaxy and Chivas USA, each has slightly more of an opportunity of playing in MLS Cup at Home Depot Center in November as the L.A. Dodgers.

Thursday's SuperClasico match between the Galaxy and Chivas USA speaks to the current state of the two sides. While the atmosphere and drama in the match lived up to the high standards the two teams have set for the rivalry, much of the attention was on anything but the game itself. Just three days after ridding themselves of general manager Alexi Lalas and coach Ruud Gullit, the Galaxy welcomed invited guest Arena, whose appearance alone drew attention.

"We are anxious to calm everything down," said Tim Leiweke, the chief executive of Galaxy owner AEG. "It is not our desire to throw the club into dysfunction, so as quickly as we can get through this process we will get through this process."

While hiring Arena or someone else to fill one or both of the vacant positions would certainly calm things down, it would do little to prevent the league's most high-profile club from going into a state of dysfunction. That ship sailed quite some time ago -- sometime in 2006, actually -- as instability and incertitude have become part of the club's standard operating procedure.

After the Galaxy did in '05 what the Galaxy did best before then -- win championships -- the club has seemingly overnight spiraled out of control. Cobi Jones is the fourth coach to pace the Galaxy's sidelines since the start of the 2006 season, after Steve Sampson's failures begat Frank Yallop's tumultuous tenure, who bolted out of town only for Gullit to take over and guide the club for all of 19 games.

After Thursday's 2-2 draw with Chivas USA, the Galaxy extended their winless streak to eight games and sit in fourth place in the Western Conference standings. With 24 points, the Galaxy have fewer points than every single Eastern Conference team. Worse, they have played more games than any other team in the league.

While this recent eight-game slide has taken its toll, the club is simply continuing a larger process of implosion with little to stop it. Interim boss Jones, whose tenure might only last one game, said more changes needed to be made to help right the ship but tried to absolve himself of any responsibility beyond the players and games.

"People on the outside seem to think there is a lot of turmoil with everything going on in the Galaxy organization, and obviously that is true to a degree, but for me, it's trying to get the team settled down and ready ... for the future games coming up," Jones said. "That's my aspect of what I'm looking at."

If there's any part of the Galaxy that is worth drooling over, it's the financial side. Leiweke said the club is "about to gross the most revenue in the history of soccer in this country." But even the sad state of on-the-field affairs has tempered the financial windfall.

"Right now, all I am focused on is fixing the soccer side: Get a leader and get out of their way," Leiweke said. "This not a position AEG feels comfortable in and so, the quicker we can find someone to take over the decisions and the leadership on the soccer side, the better we will feel."

Chivas USA, meanwhile, has struggled with attendance since Day One. While that has always been an issue, the club's winning ways a year ago gave the team something to be proud of. This year, injuries have taken a toll on the team while Brad Guzan's exit has unfortunately been the biggest transaction the club has been a part of.

Still, with no Mexican superstar to draw attention, the team might indeed continue playing before a minimum of 10,000 empty seats per game in the 27,000-seat Home Depot Center.

There was a time when it seemed Chivas would have an unfair advantage over MLS clubs, when a supposed pipeline between parent club Chivas de Guadalajara was supposed to give the MLS side unparalleled access to budding Mexican talent. Instead, it dried up as quickly as the team's ill-fated 3-4-3 formation from '05.

Since Juan Francisco Palencia and Juan Pablo "Loquito" García left the club following the '06 season, the team has inked exactly one Mexican-born player -- the recently-acquired, former-second-division-player Roberto Nurse.

The Chivas pipeline has resulted in failed stints by Edwin Borboa and Antonio Patlán, as well as the brief signing of Jorge Barrera, who never actually played for the club.

No Adolfo "Bofo" Bautista. No Omar Bravo. No Ramón Morales. No big name Chivas de Guadalajara star to the MLS side. But with no Designated Player slot available after former coach Bob Bradley dealt away the club's potentially valuable bargaining chip, salary constraints will continue to keep such name players away from the club.

In fact, the pipeline seems to be benefiting Chivas de Guadalajara even more as former washout Carlos Borja is finding ample playing time with Tapatío, Guadalajara's second-division side.

Fittingly, then, Thursday's latest and final '08 SuperClasico match finished in a draw. With nearly two months left in the regular season, each team will face an epic struggle just to reach the playoffs.

The challenge to find stability, though, seems quite a bit more daunting task for both sides.