A theory about the steaming pile of pooh at D.C. United

Things really haven’t been good there for a while, and they sure aren't today. (For more on this year's woes, see my weekly MLS wrap at SI.com.) But they always seem to be on the rise, on the cusp of going all Ninja on MLS, because they always have a great player in the pipeline. If he’s not already at RFK, then Dave Kasper or someone is down in South America looking at the next great one.

We always expect United to do great things. Why? Well, because it’s D.C. United.

See, I think all things United get over-inflated due to a blend of abundant media coverage and D.C. United history.

The history part is easy. They ruled MLS back in the Wild West days (as Bruce Arena himself called them), locating and exploiting the salary loopholes earlier than others, assisted back in the day by a league office that looked the other way. (Now, all that is biting United because they are leaning too heavily on the glory days syndrome, thinking they were and might still be the smartest guys in the room, a condition which probably affected the hiring of Arena protégé Curt Onalfo.)

But I really believe the perennially inflated expectations have a lot to do with ace reporter Steven Goff and other good coverage the team gets. It’s not that Goff and others are complicit in drinking the Kool-Aid. They aren't. It’s just that the team gets such good coverage and always has. So it gets stirred up in the buzz cycle, creating a situation where all things United tend to land with greater importance than they probably deserve. Goff is simply the best reporter in the country, so we get so much more news out of D.C. and about the team.

When D.C. United identifies a player and pursues him, everybody assumes that he must be pretty good. Makes sense, right? I mean, you have to be a good player to be pursued by D.C. United.

Then he arrives at RFK and everybody says, “Well, the guy has something special. After all, he turned up at D.C. United, so he must be a really good player.”

See how that circular pattern works? It’s the old “Heads I win, tails you lose” kind of thing. There’s no losing for United.

Well, until they start losing. And then everyone looks at each other, shrugs their shoulders and asked, “What happened?”

The truth? Probably as simple as this: the players weren’t that good all along.

Danny Allsopp? Meh. It's just one game, but he doesn’t look very fast. And I had my doubts all along that he could produce in MLS. But I will say it’s still early.

Cristian Castillo? Heard a lot of great things. I’m still waiting to see these great things.

Santino Quaranta? He’s a good player. Is he great? I don’t think so. But he gets a lot of miles out of a really good story of a human being turning his life around, so we might tend to inflate his true level of talent.

I could go on. I mean, how many goalkeepers and defenders have come through RFK?

Same deal. He’s great! He’s the answer!

Until he ain’t.

Meanwhile, a player like Ryan Smith lands at Kansas City and nobody outside the Heartland hears about it. (That dude is fun to watch. He's going to be a handful for right backs all year.)

It seems like every year United is picked to do well. Then we look at a team like Colorado, just to pick out an example. Colorado stinks, right? (Not really. Not this year, especially. But follow along here … ) Colorado is never picked to do well.

Do you realize that Colorado collected more points over the last two seasons (2008 and 2009) than D.C. United?

So the talent at RFK isn’t really any better than a lot of other MLS destinations. But these other places, well, they are supposed to lose. They don’t get good players. Meanwhile, when the talent at RFK starts stinking up the joint, everybody is running around trying to figure out what the hell is going on. I mean, it can’t be the talent, right? Because these guys are good.

I’d like to hear what my SB Nation mates over at Black and Red United have to say about my theory. Meanwhile, somebody run over to RFK and help Curt Onalfo start picking up the pieces. Stat!

FYI, I think it will take 45 points to make the playoffs this year. United has zero points out of three matches. That means they’ll need a record that looks something like 13-8-6 the rest of the way. Impossible? Certainly not. But you need talent to pull it off – and I’m not sure they have enough of it around RFK.