My vote for MLS Player of the Week

Since I wasn’t good earlier in my life about voting for local and national political elections, I am attempting to earn my place in soccer heaven through dedication to this cause. I vote religiously.

The Week 1 selection was tougher than it looked. Javier Morales hit for two beauties against San Jose. Earthquakes coach Frank Yallop called them two of the best goals he’s seen in two-plus years at Buck Shaw. You can see them here.

But Omar Cummings scored a critical goal at Chivas USA. On a day when strike partner Conor Casey was pretty quiet, Cummings was involved in nearly every positive attack constructed by Gary Smith’s Rapids. And in 2010, getting three points on the road is a bigger deal than its ever been.

(FYI, I took some crap for saying that Colorado was going to be a decent team this year, possibly even a contender. It’s early. I understand that. Still, I’ll try not to bust up my shoulder patting myself on the back here.)

There is absolutely no way Cummings will get anywhere close to Morales in the voting, if only because most people probably didn’t see the match. For most folks, it was available only through one of the subscription packages. (I have one. I paid for it. And it still shut off after 65 minutes. Booo! The new MLS on-line site’s roll-out had some issues, to say the least.)

Still, I thought Cummings deserved some mention, if only here.

By the way, the best player on an MLS field on “Match Day 1” was probably Wilman Conde. The Fire’s center back was freakin’ all over the place. I do remember him giving away one ball needlessly. One. Otherwise, I don’t know that he did much wrong at all. But it’s hard to give a guy Player of the Week when his team lost, so I’ll just move on.