The Daily Wave: Breaking Down The Second Half Schedule.

The Colorado Rapids sit at 7th in the Western Conference at 5 wins, 7 losses and 5 draws. 3-3-2 at home, 2-4-3 on the road. They sit two points behind the last playoff spot, currently the Vancouver Whitecaps, a team the Rapids will play three times the rest of the season. The positive for the schedule is that the Rapids will have more home games (9), than road (8). The negative is the schedule makers are not making it easy on the Rapids by giving them three matches spread over ten days twice more this season.

Starting with their only match against the current Supporters Shield leader Montreal Impact this Saturday followed by two home games against Eastern Conference foes New York Red Bull and D.C. United next Wednesday and Sunday respectively. Judging by the way the first set of 3 games in 10 days played out I hope Colorado is still clinging to life in the playoff race like the Rapids are now. The last set of will not be as bad travel or health-wise because the first game is in Los Angeles against Chivas USA on a Sunday (8-11), then six days off and two matches on a Saturday and Wednesday (8-17 & 8-21) that are both at home. I forgot to mention that the two teams we would have to jump over, the Sounders (3 games) and the Whitecaps (2 games), have several games in hand on the Rapids so the two points out of the playoffs is actually a larger gap.

Right now those leads the Rapids blew against Houston, Salt Lake, Portland, Dallas, and San Jose look very important in the tight playoff race. I hope when the eulogy of this season is written it's not about the wasted leads which admittedly I don't expect to win every game but during all five draws this season the Rapids have had the lead at one point. Keep the lead three times and where does that put Colorado in the table? Fourth place.

With Martin Rivero out for two weeks he is going to miss at least four games starting with last Sunday at Portland and hoping to make it back a week from Sunday against D.C. United. Maybe he should rest and come back July 20th. The nagging injuries that he is going through is going to make this a lost season. It's not worth it for him to come back and be lost for the entire season at this point. The Rapids should rest him until fully healthy and nagging injury free.

July and August is going to make or break the Rapids as 6 of 9 matches are at home. September and October will see only 3 home games (out of 7) at Dick's Sporting Goods Park. With road trips to Kansas City, Montreal, Seattle, and Portland again, the Rapids need to make the most of their home games starting with the July 4th game against the New York Red Bull and Thierry Henry. The scourge of the first half of the season was giving up the lead. At this point I'm hoping the Rapids have leads to give up.