Defending champions in all sports have had down subsequent seasons, but few have imploded quite like Colorado. Despite qualifying for the playoffs, the Rapids' season was a roller coaster. Struggling with injuries and added games the entire season, the team ...
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Changing coaches often means changing playing styles, and the decision to hire Oscar Pareja as head coach means the Colorado Rapids of 2012 may look quite different from the teams of 2010-11.

Giving Pareja the reins of his first MLS team is going to create a roster shakeup. The Colombian, a veteran of MLS campaigns from 1998 through 2005, has already talked about the need to find a Carlos Valderrama-type playmaker for the Rapids.

Colorado spent 3,330 minutes this season defending the 2010 MLS Cup Championship, which put the team 180 minutes shy of defending its title.

Graham Zusi provided the services in the 28th and 76th minute as Sporting Kansas City recorded another 2-0 victory over the Rapids, giving KC a 4-0 aggregate win in the Eastern Conference Semifinal.

The Denver Broncos are not the only recipients of the unbridled optimism of Colorado sports fans and writers.

Trailing Kansas City 2-0 on aggregate when they take the field tonight at Livestrong Sporting Park in Kansas, the Colorado Rapids have suddenly become the beneficiaries of miraculous hopes for improbable outcomes.

After a stellar 2010 campaign, Omar Cummings has had a season to forget. On Thursday night, however, he reminded everyone just how deadly he can be.

Cummings was alone in the penalty area when his roommate, Kosuke Kimura, passed to him in the waning moments of the first half. Kimura, who made regular forays into the attack, saw Cummings just after receiving a pass from Brian Mullan.

The Colorado Rapids kick off defense of the 2010 MLS Cup tonight in conditions reminiscent of the night the team won the title in Toronto in November.

It will be chilly in Dick's Sporting Goods Park for the 8 p.m. battle with the Columbus Crew. But there will be plenty of heat on the field for the Rapids.

If you need any evidence of the uneven season the Rapids have endured so far in 2011, look no further than this season's golden boot winner.

On a team with Conor Casey, Omar Cummings and Caleb Folan, it should have been that one of them would win the title as the team's top scorer.

Surprises: However, it was not to be.

The Colorado Rapids roster is being tested by CONCACAF Champions League and MLS play, and it is being found wanting.

The latest evidence came on Saturday night as the Rapids fell to the Chicago Fire, one of the worst teams in MLS, 2-0 at Toyota Park in Bridgeview, Ill.

While it was the most disastrous result in the latest string of games, it was also further proof of the mounting fatigue for a squad battling in two competitions.

At 10:35 p.m. on Saturday, Colorado Rapids fans got a funny feeling. It's called satisfaction and it came in the form of a 2-1 win over the stumbling San Jose Earthquakes.

It was satisfying because it was the sort of game the Rapids should win, but the team has stumbled to get earlier this season and at many times in the past three or four years.

The emergence of Sanna Nyassi as a speedy striker has a been a big part of Colorado's 3-0-1 record since losing Conor Casey for the season to a ruptured Achilles tendon.

What should have felled a team that was struggling to score instead led to a four goal outburst from Nyassi and 10 points from four games.

Even with a two-year absence from the league, the San Jose Earthquakes remain one of the teams the Colorado Rapids have faced more often than almost any team in Major League Soccer.

The Rapids have played Los Angeles 55 times and Dallas (first as The Burn and then as FC) 51. Next on that list is San Jose, which has met Colorado 46 times since that first MLS season in 1996.

The Colorado Rapids have only four home games remaining in the MLS regular season, and as the dates dwindle, The Tuesday List takes a look at how the roster has changed since the team moved to Dick's Sporting Goods Park for the 2007 season.

Looking at the 2011 roster, we go back in time to who was here in each of the previous seasons.

Brian Mullan made the most of a Friday night game, launching a goal of the week nominee, and Sanna Nyassi turned provider as the Colorado Rapids downed the Columbus Crew 2-0 at Dick's Sporting Goods Park in Commerce City.

Colorado improved to 9-6-10 (37 points) and dispatched the third Eastern Conference leading team in the past four games.

When the Columbus Crew visited Colorado this past fall it was for a first-round playoff match that the Rapids won 1-0 on a Pablo Mastroeni goal.

While that win put the Rapids (8-6-10, 34 points) on the road to the MLS Cup title in 2010, the stakes are not much lower this Friday when the two teams meet at Dick's Sporting Goods Park.

Bring on the Eastern Conference leaders, please.

The Colorado Rapids faced the conference leaders for the second time in nine days and emerged with three points. This time it was in Philadelphia where the Rapids defeated the Union 2-1.

While it wasn't as dominating as the 4-1 beating Colorado delivered to the New York Red Bulls on July 20, it was an even more rare creature.

Tim Ream and the rest if the Red Bulls couldn't stop Sanna Nyassi on Wednesday. Nyassi's hat trick helped him earn MLS honors on Monday. (Photograph by Jessica Taves/ColoradoSoccerNow.com)

The Colorado Rapids finally had a player named MLS Player of the Week, and it only took one of the best debuts by a forward ever to get it.

Rarely does a tie feel like a defeat more than when the closing goal comes on a dubious penalty call at the end of the game.

For the Colorado Rapids, it was the old sinking feeling that comes from letting points slip away at home to a poor side that has mustered only one win on the road. The fact that the tie came after Kosuke Kimura scored a ludicrous goal made the 2-2 draw with the New England Revolution only that much more unsettling.

Although there have been many wide open games in the previous 15 MLS All-Star gatherings, Colorado Rapids players have rarely stolen the spotlight.

With Omar Cummings picked at the lone representative for this year's showdown against Manchester United at the New York Red Bull Arena in Harrison, N.

Sanna Nyassi answered the question of who would score in Conor Casey's absence and delivered one of the best performances ever by a Colorado Rapids player on Wednesday night.

The midfielder-cum-forward scored three goals and got credit for an assist on the fourth as the Rapids eviscerated the New York Red Bulls 4-1 at Dick's Sporting Goods Park.

Conor Casey could only smile as he scored his sixth -- and ultimately final -- goal of the 2011 season in a 2-1 win over the Vancouver Whitecaps. With Casey out for the season, Colorado begins the search for a new scorer. (Photograph by Jonathan Ingraham/ColoradoSoccerNow.com)

Maybe Scott Palguta has a few more goals in him this season.

The Colorado Rapids, the defending MLS Cup champions, avoided a shutout in the league's selection of all stars on Monday as forward Omar Cummings was named to the team by coach Hans Backe.

Cummings, who struggled with injury earlier this season, will be on the side that faces Manchester United on July 27 at the New York Red Bull's arena in Harrison, N.

An offensive explosion the likes of which the Colorado Rapids haven't produced in three months proved to be not quite enough on the road against the Seattle Sounders.

Wells Thompson and Jeff Larentowicz scored in the first half to put the Rapids up 2-1 at the break. Seattle came back with three second-half goals and held on after a late Caleb Folan strike to win 4-3 on Saturday.

The Colorado Rapids are undefeated when Scott Palguta scores.

Admittedly, the reserve defender has only scored twice in his career, with both goals coming this season. Each strike, however, has been the winner in 2-1 decisions for the Rapids (6-5-9, 27 points).

Palguta, who came on when Danny Earls couldn't continue after 23 minutes, was in the right place at the right time to stroke home a rebound from a Conor Casey header and put the Rapids up 2-0 on the visiting Vancouver Whitecaps on Saturday night.

The Colorado Rapids have now perfected the art of the draw: The team can make a 1-1 tie look thrilling.

For the ninth time in 19 games, the Colorado Rapids came away with a share of the points. This time, it was Sporting Kansas City playing at home in Kansas City, Kan., on Wednesday night.

It was a fair result for a team that took a first-half lead and then played with fire in the final third of the match.

An own goal and a spectacular strike put the Colorado Rapids in a first-half hole, and then an ejection sealed the team's fate in a 3-1 home loss to the Los Angeles Galaxy on Saturday night.

The loss ended a nine-game unbeaten streak for the Rapids (5-4-7, 22 points) and continued a run of disappointing results for the team at Dick's Sporting Goods Park this season.

This is the fifth, and likely final, season of David Beckham with the LA Galaxy, and as the MLS leaders arrive in Colorado to take on the Rapids, this Saturday night may be the final chance for the midfielder to flash his famous right-footed free kicks at Dick's Sporting Goods Park.

If he produces something positive for the Galaxy in the thin air at Commerce City, it will be a sea change for the superstar who has been either absent or a nonentity in Colorado since joining the league in 2007.

The MLS and Red Bull New York announced today that individual tickets to the 2011 AT&T MLS All-Star Game on July 27 at Red Bull Arena featuring the MLS All-Stars against Manchester United are sold out to the general public.

The match will be telecast live on ESPN2, Galavision, and TSN at 6:30 p.

Colorado set an MLS record with its sixth consecutive draw on Saturday night, a mark that is neither dubious nor wondrous. Instead, it is the sort of miasmatic milestone that is coming to define the Rapids defense of the 2010 MLS Cup.

Colorado had the better of possession during the night and took the lead in the 63rd minute on Conor Casey's cheeky chip from the penalty spot of Faryd Mondragon.

Photo by LA Galaxy

For American soccer fans, we are entering a frantic month of soccer. In addition to our normal MLS action, we will have the chance to see the Gold Cup and an impressive friendly against Spain. With the action spread out across the U.S., this may be the most soccer saturated this country has been since the 1994 World Cup - cities across the country even without MLS teams will get to see the beautiful game at a high level.

Macoumba Kandji has returned to practice for the first time since he tore a ligament in the MLS Cup in November, but the injury list for the Colorado Rapids is not getting any shorter.

Marvell Wynne and Joseph Nane went on the injured list for Saturday's showdown with Eastern Conference leaders Philadelphia Union.

Although the U.S. Men's National Team didn't take anyone off the Colorado Rapids roster for the CONCACAF Gold Cup, June 5-25, Jamaica picked two, Omar Cummings and Tyrone Marshall.

Rapids forward Cummings and defender Marshall were named to the Jamaica National Team's final 23-man roster for the 2011 CONCACAF Gold Cup on Monday afternoon.

By Andrew Villegas Every year, we working stiffs await with eager anticipation the day when MLS salaries are released. We crunch numbers and either feel good or bad about how much money professional soccer players in America make. Also we feel better or worse about how much money we make ourselves. With that in mind, below [.

As the Colorado Rapids see the revolving door at forward continue with injuries, the team keeps finding a way to pull a point.

On Saturday in Washington, D.C., Drew Moor found the net off a set piece in the 23rd minute off a free kick from Jamie Smith. Moor's strike appeared it would be enough in the first half as the Rapids controlled play and D.

After a midweek tease, the MLS slate is full this weekend with all but two teams playing on Saturday. For those looking forward to a little Friday night soccer, there will be none so you'll just have to wait for Saturday night's glamorous TV lineup, which includes the renewal of the U.

Three days after coming back to tie and then beat the Houston Dynamo, the Colorado Rapids settled for a 0-0 draw with the New England Revolution on Saturday night.

The tie moves the Rapids to 4-3-2 (14 points) and gives the team four points from the first two games of a three-game road trip.

David Ferreira should be in the running once again for MVP. (Getty Images)

We've pushed through the positional rankings on here and have done a few other previews to get things going for next week. It is time once again to dip back into the other previews for the upcoming 2011 Major League Soccer season.

Maurice Edu returned from injury to score the final goal as Rangers hammered Hamilton Academic yesterday. Edu had been down since November, but he has featured regularly for the Scottish side this season and should be the American every team scrambles to pick up.

The MLS Supplemental Draft will help teams fill out their reserve team rosters.

Union

According to the Geman newspaper Nürnberg Zeitung, Toronto FC are also interested in Marek Mintal. In the report, FC Nürnberg Sports Director Martin Bader confirms the interest in Mintal from the Union: "There is a free request." The report goes on to say that "Mintal himself was tight-lipped yesterday and would not comment on the speculation surrounding his future.

(Editor's Note: This is the final part in a series looking at the Rapids expanded roster for 2011.)

Looking at the Rapids future has been an exercise in looking at what the team already possesses. In considering signing a Designated Player, it's time to look outside the club.

Where is the rest of the league going, and do the Rapids need a Designated Player to keep pace?

(Editor's Note: This is the fourth part in a series on what the Rapids will do with an expanded roster in 2011.)

Who will be the sixth forward?

This is the key question for the Rapids attack as they start the 2011 season. The team has only five forwards on its roster, and one is coming off a major knee injury.