Level Set 14, FC Dallas: Embracing the Ceiling, Perhaps Reality

FC Dallas Academy, Class of [Every Year].

What follows is a brief history of FC Dallas, plus more brief notes on whatever long-term tendencies they have. Their 2025 season gets weighed on both sides of that and the whole thing ends with where I see things with them in this very specific moment in time - i.e., before First Kick 2026. You should count on things happening between here and there.

The post ends with a scale I came up with to measure the long-term success of every team in Major League Soccer. It does some things well (e.g., count trophies/achievements), other things less well (capture recent trends). It's called the Joint Points Scale and you can find a link that explains what it does. I was really stoned when I came up with the scale and wrote the post. Caveat lector. With that...

Thumbnail History
FC Dallas, fka, the Dallas Burn have the singular honor of playing in the most WTF MLS Cup ever played. When they lined up against the Colorado Rapids – then competing in their second final – I have to believe that the collective response boiled down to, “sure, why not?” Apart from winning the 2016 Supporters’ Shield (and tying Red Bull New York on total points in 2015), FC Dallas have not enjoyed what most people – including what I'm guessing is a non-trivial percentage of their fans - would call obvious success. When it comes to actual silverware, they have the Shield mentioned above plus U.S. Open Cup titles in 1997 and 2016 (a great year, by their standards), aka, not much to fill the cabinet after 30 seasons. And yet they still gently undermine the entire “Joy Point” concept (see below for methodology*) because they rank ninth in MLS history based more for consistency than what any fan would recognize as joy. They racked up most of those points by just clearing low bar to make the playoffs over MLS’s first ten seasons – which took some fucking missing when the league had only 10-16 teams – and, while things have slowed down, they have generally made the playoffs every other season (or so) since then. More to the point, it’s not like Dallas hasn’t tried to keep up with MLS’s bigger, richer teams: hell, they swung hard to land one-time FIFA Player of the Year, Denilson, if at a bargain price; they very much got what they paid for. To their credit, they kept their chins up on either side of that debacle, with smart(er) signings like Ariel Graziani (his second stop) and Ronnie O’Brien, some of your better surprises of their eras, even if injuries ate too much of O’Brien’s career. Their hit-rate improved on the foreign signings side, even with some hitches, with league-elite players like David Ferreira and, less so (due to injury), Mauro Diaz, or even a higher-profile (if gently under-performing) player like Fabian Castillo. More than anything else, Dallas has relied on, and I mean this sincerely, top-notch budget signings – e.g., Michael Barrios, Blas Perez, and running one of, if not the most effective academy systems in these United States. The long list of graduates include Kellyn Acosta, Jesus Ferreira, Reggie Cannon, Brandon Servania, Ricardo Pepi, and, from the LA Galaxy’s 2024 MLS Cup team, Edwin Cerrillo. [NOTE: I like to limit links with active players; who knows where they'll go?] Moreover, Dallas’ belief in youth has kick-started some of the all-time great careers in MLS history (picking through this all-time list), e.g., Walker Zimmerman, Drew Moor, Clarence Goodson, Matt Hedges…I hope you’re seeing the pattern in there (see below). Against that, I’ve covered what all the above has given them and have no doubt that falls short of what both the organization and the fans of it want. Still, that dynamite academy, aka, America’s answer to the Eredivisie’s AFC Ajax, doesn’t look like it’s going away anytime soon…and yet, who can help but wonder how high they could rise if they kept some of those promising players two days after their 20th birthday.

Getting Reacquainted with FC Dallas, MLS's Consummate B (or B-) Students

How's your Italian, young man?

[Standing Disclaimer: While I have watched…just a stupid amount of MLS over the years, I don’t watch the vast majority of games, never mind all of them. As such, it’s fair to take anything below that isn’t a hard number or a physical trophy as an impression, a couple steps removed.]

Thumbnail History

FC Dallas, fka, the Dallas Burn undermine the entire “Joy Point” concept (see end of post for methodology*) because they rank seventh in MLS history more for consistency than what any fan would recognize as joy. Choosing their best season required no more thought than choosing between the two seasons they actually won a trophy. Dallas rose to these lofty heights the same way Red Bull New York did – i.e., by being in the league for as long as they have and consistently making the playoffs. Unlike the Red Bulls, I don’t believe anyone outside their most committed fans (meant, here, as both committed and “committed”) have ever uttered the words, “I think this is Dallas’ year. They did reach MLS Cup once, in 2010, but they lost to…the Colorado Rapids. (When people tell you that MLS is a weird league, believe them.) And yet, and to their very real credit, Dallas have missed the playoffs just seven times in 28 seasons (including one season they got tagged by the Wooden Spoon (2003)) and they finished in the top half of the table in (literally) half the time. Not a bad run, all in all, but not a great one, and not what any reasonable person would describe as “joy.” If one had to grade the Dallas franchise what could you give them but a B, or maybe even a B-. On the plus side, they do have that dynamite academy, aka, America’s answer to Ajax in the Eredivisie…makes you wonder how high they could rise if they kept some of those promising players two days after their 20th birthday. Or thereabouts.

Best Season(s)

The 2016 season, easily, and with nod to the prior season as a sign of things to come. I had to check back to both rosters to remember who suited up for them in both years (2015 and 2016) and, small coincidence, those same players are well-represented (if not over-represented and via a cheat) in the 10 Players to know section below. Those sections speak to another general truth about FC Dallas: it’s less that they never make ambitious signings than that they often miss the mark when they do, sometimes wildly. At any rate, Dallas won both the Supporters’ Shield and the U.S. Open Cup in 2016, which means their fans felt actual joy once – which I suppose beats the usual experience of salivating over the latest academy kid that they’ll say goodbye to right around the time they remember his name...

Portland Timbers 1-1 FC Dallas: The Limitations and Blessings of "Eh, Good Enough"

Explain that entire civilization and make it POP.

Had FC Dallas’ Paul Arriola not flubbed on one-and-a-half breakaways, had Jesus Ferreira not been called offside on Dallas’ best team attack, had Aljaz Ivacic failed to see the same player’s shot curl around Larrys Mabiala at the tail-end of their best chunk of the game, and had the Timbers not worked the ball smartly from right to left – and for once – to set up their best chance from open play, I could have started watching that game around the 85th minute and walked away without feeling I'd wasted 85 minutes of my life.

MLS Week 24 featured all kinds of good, compelling games, many of them with scores ending in results positively begging for a longer look. This was not one of them.

On a weekend when chaos reigned, the Portland Timbers served up another plate of the same-ol’-shit, a ho-hum motherfucker of a 1-1 draw at home against a team that, say it with me, “is above them in the standings, but not playing their best at the moment.” I’m at the point where the words “unbeaten run” have become a triggering event. If you want to find something to feel good about in this one, you’ll have to sift through a ton of dirt. And archaeology feels like a good metaphor for this one: sometimes you have to look at a potsherd and expand on it to explain a whole goddamn forgotten civilization. Or maybe you just chuck the potsherd and figure it was worth forgetting.

Tthat’s my cue to admit to missing just about everything besides Dallas’ still-later equalizer. As noted in the game thread, I thought Matt Hedges nodded home the equalizer; in reality, it came off Diego Chara’s head, and I can’t think of a louder way to whisper, “maybe you’re cursed” than that. Unlike many a Timber, Chara had a decent night, i.e., leading a defensive line that had, comedic fuck-ups notwithstanding (see Arriola’s two spurned chances), managed Dallas’ feeble attack well enough. I touched on Dallas’ salad days above – the first 20 minutes of the second half, give or take – but, again, it took Portland’s worst moments to give them their good ones.

Going the other way, at least they had them. If you take the chance flagged in the mess of a run-on sentence that started this post and maybe the chance that teed up Portland’s late, yet not late enough penalty kick, the Timbers didn’t do collectively much all night, 16 shots and five shots on goal be damned. The few things that happened for either team came in individual moments – again, see the above run-on sentence. With only a few exceptions – e.g., Santiago “Wee Wrecking Ball” Moreno on the attacking side, Dario “Hack the Bone” Zuparic on the defensive side, a couple bail-outs from Ivacic and Marvin Loria finding the rare openings – everyone in green and flat yellow fell somewhere between good enough (e.g., Bill Tuiloma, David Ayala), undistinguished (e.g., Yimmi Chara) and invisible (e.g., Jaroslaw Niezgoda, but also look at that passing map).

Timbers v FC Dallas Preview: Don't Stop...Believin' (Hold on to That FEE-eee-ling!)

Don't fuck with the Jesus...

With the Portland Timbers approaching the now-or-never moment of the season – and they just let a moment go last night – they’ve got FC Dallas coming to visit on Saturday. On the plus side, Dallas has by and large followed the same script – i.e., start strong, then.....fade away - that has dogged their entire history.

In a fun twist, they’ve turned that grand narrative into micro-narratives for their games lately. I’ll get to that below, but let’s start with the basics:

FC Dallas
Record/Basics: 9-7-9, 36 points, 6-3-3- home, 3-4-6 away; 33 gf, 26 ga, +7 goal differential
Last 10: LTLTTLTWWL (2-4-4, 1-2-2 home, 1-2-2 away; high side of middling)
Oppo: v VAN, @ ATX, @ LAFC, v MIA, @ HOU, v NYC, v ATX, @ RSL, v LAG, @ SEA

What We Know About Them
They’re perennial contenders for MLS’s most effective development/selling team – a model that has consequences for their consistency, obviously – but Dallas also serves as the stomping grounds for MLS 2022 MVP candidate, Jesus Ferreira, as well as another USMNT-bubble player, the indefatigable Paul Arriola. Matt Hedges, one of MLS most reliable long-term CBs, anchors a backline that, as evidenced by the numbers, doesn’t allow a ton of goals. The who’s who gets a little thin from there, but still includes Paxton Pomykal, the eternal Comeback-Player-of-Next Year (though he has had a decent run this season), and Timbers fans will recognize at least one right back, assuming the start him (Marco Farfan.

Notes on Recent Form
As repped in numerical form above, pretty shaky – and regardless of venue. Their schedule hasn’t been easy by any means – and the wins they posted (0-1 at Real Salt Lake, and a 2-1 home win over the Los Angeles Galaxy) had the added bonus of taking all the points from rivals – but a frisky, upwardly-mobile team gets more than a third of the points out of that stretch. That said, both wins came recently and the way Dallas rotated their starting XI at Seattle (pretty thoroughly) floats a plausible theory that they rested starters for the Timbers because they felt better about getting points against them (or, alternately, they saw Seattle as vulnerable (fairly, given their recent record) and gambled). In other words, they might have shaken off a bout of midsummer doldrums just in time to ruin a Rose City Saturday afternoon.

Portland Timbers 2-0 FC Dallas: On Good Problems to Have

Die, motherfucker!

Let’s face it: attrition loomed large tonight, as one Portland Timber after another threatened to limp off the field. Only two did in the end…the team’s starting centerbacks. No big whoop…

So, yeah, both Liam Ridgewell and Roy Miller left the game, to be replaced by a Tetris-esque shifting of players/positions, and Timbers fans endured scares here and there throughout the game – whether it was Fanendo “Brace, Y’all!” Adi hurting (was it?) both ankles or Diego Valeri lying on the ground for two minutes that felt like five games’ worth of no one knowing how to make the Timbers’ attack work – but Portland hung (hanged? nah, think I got the verb right) on for the 2-0 win against visiting FC Dallas, aka, the team most likely to (what? win the league? be broadly awesome? prove the reality of The Youth Movement?). And, while that win was mostly encouraging, caveats attach to this thing like remoras that suck blood and eat happy thoughts…

…still, good win. This was my best-case scenario, so, hell yeah, I’m happy. It’s just that…I know stuff that lets me (makes me?) look at this game, and Portland’s last, with the coldest, deadest eyes since zombies.

First, the bad news: this is not The Best Possible Version of FC Dallas. I’d actually argue that, for a team without Walker Zimmerman, Matt Hedges (who is…just holy shit good), and Kellyn Acosta, Dallas played above their available level. God knows they made Portland labor to score – even as both goals resulted from the kind of fuck-ups that drive coaches to drink and/or early retirement. All in all, Dallas defended well enough tonight, but, when Adi stumbles just so, and after the kind of lucky bounce that only happens when a team presses allows Sebastian Blanco to feed him the simplest of passes, and when the other goal comes off another complete collapse, you credit the team that scored first, and ask what exactly went wrong for the other team very shortly thereafter.