MLS Round 22 in MLS had a distintively red tint

I get on the MLS referees pretty good at times.  Heck, who am I kidding? I beat 'em like eggs. So it's just fair that I comment when the men in the middle get things right.

And they got things right in Round 22 of Major League Soccer when it came to dealing with the miscreants.

It was the players who took leave of their senses this time around.

I do get it. MLS referees are inconsistent. They are every bit as dependable as a 2-year-old in a nice restaurant -- you never know what they might do. So I understand that players get frustrated, because what just happened to Peter may be treated differently than what is about to happen to Paul.

On the other hand, players must keep their cool.  Period.  They must be smart about things.

With eight rounds to go, playoff race are tighter than Tom Hicks' wallet at the moment. Teams need their best players. And yet, several valuable starters will have the night off.

Houston's Andrew Hainault was the first to go Saturday. He took a yellow card for impeding RSL's Fabian Espindola. Fair enough. It happens. A few minutes later, in very similar circumstances, he did the exact same thing. With the same result. Go figure.

And yet, there he was, acting shocked -- shocked! -- that he was shown a second yellow. I mean, he was there for the first one, right?

The TV announcers from this match are apparently so inured to the physical play in MLS, they missed the actual reason Hainault was sent off. FSC announcers Max Bretos and Chris Sullivan talked about Hainault striking Espindola (on both occasions). Yes, the Dynamo right back got his elbow up high as he was beaten on both sequences. But that's only a small part of the reason referee Paul Ward issued the yellow cards. On both occasions, the Dynamo defender made absolutely no attempt to win the ball. Espindola was going by, and Hainault's clear intent was to impede the attacker, with not so much as a token effort to turn toward the ball. It wasn't even close, and the yellow was 100 percent justified in both cases.

Later, Clint Mathis slammed the ball into the ground in frustration on the sideline. Slammed it hard. That kind of outburst is a yellow card anywhere in the world, under any circumstances. Should it be? Maybe not; it is a little parochial in tone.  We can debate that sometime over cold Pacifico with lots of lime.  But it is for now and always has been.  Mathis knows so.  He lost his cool and hurt his team -- something that happens a lot around Real Salt Lake.

Two ejections in one match may seem like a lot. But it was nothing compared to the Home Depot Center, where the anger meter was cranked up to 11.

David Beckham's reckless lunge at former teammate and friend Pete Vagenas was as ill advised as it was awful.  What has yet to be said is how pointless it was.  Vagenas is a very ordinary MLS player.  At that point of the match (17th minute), inside Seattle's half, there was zero point in Beckham going so hell-bent for possession.  What, he was worried that Pete Freakin' Vagenas was going to spin away cleanly and then go slaloming through the Galaxy defense?

Ridiculous. Good for referee Ricardo Salazar, who had the cajones to eject Major League Soccer's most expensive part-timer.  Even Galaxy manager Bruce Arena admitted that when players propel themselves the way Beckham did, they are risking expulsion. Beckham knows so. As Arena said, this isn't his "first rodeo."

Tyrone Marshall's red for Seattle in the same match? Marshall probably does enough in team warm-ups to deserve an ejection.  So, yeah, let's just move on.

Eddie Lewis' red later? He boxed someone's ears. Red. Case closed.

I've already covered the Lunge of Zoltan in yesterday's entry. Kansas City's newly signed Hungarian striker Zoltan Hercegfalvi needs a talking to after stomping on Mike Banner's Achilles . And besides that, he has way too many syllables in his name, so I'm already over him.