Play-offs or Concurrent Season with a domestic cup?

[Bon_Mot]

Which do you prefer?  MLS and its Amercian way of doing things with a regular season and then play-offs.  Or how UEFA has a regular season and a domestic cup that runs simultaneously?

With the MLS allowing 8 of 13 teams into the play-offs, its current system seems kind of ludicrous.  It's just "Get in, and then win, baby!"  A team can take almost an entire month off and still be named MLS Cup Champion.  Expansion over the next few years (which should bring the league to 16 teams) might help keep out the mediocrity in the post season, but it's almost as if the regular season is meaningless. 

Also, as it is now, the US Open Cup is meaningless, too.  Can anyone remember who won it this year?  It's an afterthought.  And the fact that two A-League teams were in the semi-finals shows just how little importance the MLS places on it.

Since I'm venting...  I would also like to see the MLS go to a single table format instead of conferences and put some logical stability into the schedule.  Having a fantasy team showed just how crazy the schedule was.  Houston went through a stretch of something like 5 games in 8 days due to the crazy MLS schedule, SuperLiga, and the Open Cup.  I think they should have breaks around international competitions and bigger gaps around Cup play.

And...  I know it will never happen, but I would love for the MLS to absorb the A-League and have some type of relegation system in.  It will never happen, though.  A-League venues aren't big enough and sponsors would surely balk at the idea that there could a possibility that LA and/or New York would not have a team available to put on television because they weren't in the top flight.

Wow.  I was just gonna put a silly little poll on here cuz I was bored, but I kinda went off didn't I.

[bullets13]

umm... what you said  ;D.  i agree with you on pretty much all points.

[bullets13]

it'd be nice if soccer got big enough in the states for new york to have a few different teams to choose from, and create darby matches all over the US.  of course, if it got that big, the teams would all have die-hard fans, and relegated teams would still have big fan bases like the smaller teams in england.

[SEsoccerplayer]

Yeah we will most likely be six feet under watching those games.

[Jsmity]

you hit the nail on the coffin... WOOPS.. I mean head  :