Hello, hello, and welcome to the Total Soccer show.

My name is Taylor Rockwell, and we have got an MLS playoff review show for you today.

The first match of each round one playoff series is in the books.

That was a lot of administrative legwork, Joe Lowry, but I think we got there in the end. I'm so proud of us, Taylor. You know what? We can parse through the details of a format that's, let's face it, not super complicated, even though the players don't seem to like it. I thought we got some banger games in the opening stages of the playoffs, some games that I really, really enjoyed. The fact that we get to break them all down today, Taylor genuinely brings me joy. Me as well. Me as well, because I thought there were a lot of really interesting games and a lot of really interesting moments. I want to start up front with, again, like an administrative structural thing. So for people who have now started watching the playoffs or are new to the playoff format, we had the play in games. Then we have a best of three series where the top seat hosts the first game. If you win the second game, then you are through. And if not, then you get the third game, the tiebreaker. But Joe, we're also getting penalties after each game. Can you explain why that's happening? Well, so just to be clear, we're not getting penalties after each game. No, each game, regardless of the score. Five nil to the galaxy, and then they go to the penalties just to make sure. If the rapids in that five no loss have gone to penalties and that had made all five of their penalties and the galaxy had missed all five, then you go to the actual penalty shootout to determine who wins the game. Yeah, there's no extra time at this stage of the playoffs.

To be honest, and maybe I should know this, probably should.

I don't know when that comes into play.

It certainly comes into play before MLS Cup.

But in these round, in this best of three part of the of the playoffs, there are no extra time periods a lot, which is amazing because extra time is bad and penalty kicks are way more fun, even though they are crazy and heartbreaking. They are, but why can't it just end in a draw? And then I guess because you have to have a winner, but you need to have a tiebreaker, right? If you're in a best of three, you can't have one team win one game, one team win another game and then a draw. I guess you could just go to the penalty shootout after the third game. But that's, I feel like that's less fun. Honestly, I would rather have more penalty shootouts and fewer draws. I guess that's fair. And it removes away goals. It removes goals scored from any sort of consideration. So it does make it a bit more straightforward.

It is just kind of odd to get a penalty shootout after a nil-nil game that was a bit dull, a bit dull.

But we'll talk some more about some of those games later on, Joe. We are going to stick to the

established format for now of ranking each series of games in order of Joe's excitement.

We did that in the playoff preview. We're going to kind of continue with that form. And then maybe at the end we will revise it based on what is left to play for in these games. But Joe, the number one series that you were most excited about was whoever Inter-M Miami was facing. At the time, we weren't sure if it would be Atlanta or Montreal. Obviously, it was Atlanta, and obviously it was a win for Inter-Miamy. It very much was a win for Inter-Miamy. A game that somehow I didn't really feel like they ever totally got out of first or second gear in this match. Okay, can I ask you a question about that? Like, my first note on this was this was a strange game because it felt like it could have been five to one Miami at half time.

But then there's a moment when it looked like maybe Atlanta were going to go up two to one because Miami weren't out of second gear.

Well, and maybe this is the Brad Guzan effect because he was actually fantastic in this game and erased a lot of the dangerous moments that Inter Miami had to the point where it only ended up being a one goal margin of victory from Miami as they win 2-1 at Chase Stadium on Friday. Guzanne erased a lot of what Interimami tried to write on the chalkboard, and Interimami still, to their credit, created plenty of chances. But I think they left something on the table in this game, not that it matters, right? Because goal difference doesn't matter. They got the win. They took care of business. So there's no, there's no issue here for Inter Miami. But I did sort of think, man, if this is Miami not quite at their best, and we've seen them play better soccer than they did in this opener against Atlanta, they're going to be a problem, especially, spoiler alert, when we saw the Columbus crew falter and we saw LAFC look a bit vulnerable at times. The Galaxy didn't, you know, didn't play the strongest of opposition. Neither did Miami. But they certainly took care of business. And Carson, this Miami team has more levels to reach. At the same time, I do think part of this is the fact that Guzan was just so good.

If he's not playing one of the best games of his career, frankly, like he was that good

at 40 years old in this match, we are probably thinking about this game and talking about this

game in a slightly different way.

Agreed. Now we're going to talk about this game from the perspective of the left back, which we all saw coming.

There were some impressive left back performances in this first match round of round one, whatever we're going to call it.

Giordiabba with the winner, how important has he been for Inter Miami this season in this campaign and then in this game in particular?

Yeah, I mean, he was excellent in this game.

That goal is a well-taking strike from outside the box. He's got the quality to hit those kinds of balls in the final third. I'm generally anti-long shot. But, man, when it's Jordi Alba or, you know, one of the other Barso boys hitting some of those strikes, you are more okay with it. Alba's been another attacker for Inter Miami,

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