If one was to believe the Caps twittersphere, you’d think that every time the league decided to have “Heineken Rivalry Week” that every team would have to play their a rival. A little naive perhaps, but fair enough. I see a number of problems within this.
First all, Rivalry Week is nothing more than a manufactured piece of business by MLS’ marketing arm, Soccer United Marketing, and Heineken. I think them calling this weekend Rivalry Week is a few steps beyond self-aggrandizing when only 4 of 11 matchups people would consider rivalries (FCD/Houston, NYCFC/RBNY, DC/Philly and SEA/PDX). I should disclose that I did just tune into NYCFC/RBNY only in the interest of background noise over my clothes dryer.