The Premier League and other levels of the English soccer pyramid awards the title to the team with the best record. There are no playoffs for that prize.
However, in the promotion part of the competition, there are playoffs.
For example, in the English League Championship (tier 2), the top team wins the title and promotion to the Premier League. The second place team gains promotion to the Premier league. The third place team plays the sixth place team in one of the semi-finals, while the fourth and fifth place clubs play in the other semi-finals. The respective winners match up in a final with the winner gaining the third promotion slot to the Premier League.
MLS does it entirely differently. There is no promotion/relegation. The regular season winner gets the Supporters Shield (and an automatic bid to the CONCACAF Champions League) but the MLS Cup goes to the winner of the playoffs. The MLS is divided into Eastern and Western Conferences. The top two teams in these conferences are slotted into the Conference semi-finals with their opponents determined by knock-out matches between #3 vs. #6 and #4 vs. #5. The Conference semi-finals are two-legged as are the Conference finals. The MLS Cup is a single match at the home field of the finalist with the best regular season record.
This year Toronto dominated the regular season and are expected to win their playoff contests for the Eastern Conference's slot in the MLS Cup. It isn't clear who is the strongest in the Western Conference as the regular season point separation between #1 through #5 was a mere 4 points. An indication of the parity of the West is the first leg results between Portland/Houston and Seattle/Vancouver yielded the identical scores of 0-0!
Portland scored the most goals in the Western Conference. Seattle had the second best defense in the Western Conference. Using the "defense wins in playoffs" rationale, am picking Seattle.
In a Seattle vs. Toronto re-match for MLS Cup.... will it be 0-0 like last year with Seattle winning in PKs? I suspect this year Toronto wins it in regular time!
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