Delayed (Over)Reaction: DC

I may have been MIA for two days, but don't think I haven't been stewing over the Sounders loss on Thursday night. After last Saturday's thrashing of New England, I uttered the following words: "I'm not going to allow myself to overreact because the fact remains that we are the same team this week as we were last week." The same still applies. We are a mediocre team that needs things to break the right for them in order to win. Against New England, it was Leo's wonder strike that broke things open. Against DC, not only did we not get an early break, DC got one when Chris Pontius' shot deflected off Jeff Parke and into the goal.

Where was the sense of urgency? Why didn't it show until the 90th minute? Why are crap teams like DC and NY able to come in and steal 3 points?

Here are some additional thoughts:

• Their remain two huge elephants in the room that no one wants to talk about. first, is Kasey Keller. I'll be strung up for asking this, but is Keller close to being done? How did he let in another softie? Is something wrong? Do we need to be prepared for him to step aside? It appears that he is thinking about retiring by his comments after the game, "I said my whole career that once I feel I can't do the job then I have to stop doing the job. But I feel great physically, I feel good in training, everything's going great. It's just frustrating that with game and the L.A. game that I've hurt the team when my job is to keep them in this game... I wanted to play another year, but not if I don't play to the level that I expect of myself and the level that the players and the fans and the coaching staff expect of me. I will work extremely hard to try to make it better."

• Second, is it time to start questioning Sigi? How is it possible that they came out flat again to start the game? How come there was no tactical changes at halftime? Why did Sturgis come in for Ianni rather than for a defender? Ditto for Nyassi. Why is he unable to push the buttons this year? Is something going on in the lockeroom?

• The worst thing about the game was that, just like the LA game, they were unable to pick up Keller after his mistake. I know I only play rec ball on Sunday's, but when our keeper has a stellar gaffe, we as a team pick up our play to try to get the goal back. The problem is that Freddie Ljungberg is the on field leader and he is too busy worrying about the refs to lead this team.

• The two goals at the end were definitely unexpected. It was nice to see the team keep applying pressure but again, why not earlier?

Now that I have that out of the way, let's focus on the future. We are 4-6-3 on the year with a two week break for the World Cup. After that we get Alonso and Jaqua back and add N'kufo. The projected starting 11: N'kufo, Montero - Ljungberg, Evans, Alonso, Zakuani - Riley, Ianni/Parke, Marshall, Gonzalez will be the most talented in the league. Can they mesh and play with passion and purpose? And of course, can they score some freaking goals?