Atiba Hutchinson is anchoring the midfield for Besiktas, currently in first place in the Turkey’s top division. Before that, he spent years as the linchpin for PSV Eindhoven. Hutchinson, who was announced as Canada’s male soccer player of the year Friday, understands that he’s kind of gone where no Canadian has gone before. And, looking at rosters across Europe, we …

He’s won MLS Cups. He’s been an MLS All-Star. He’s an MLS team captain. And, when healthy, he’s an automatic Canadian national-team starter. So there’s nothing wrong with the fact that his first interaction with the media as a Toronto FC midfielder felt like a bit of a victory lap. He’s earned it.

Portland’s 2-1 triumph over Columbus in MLS Cup will likely be held up as the new standard for everybody who believes the quality of officiating in North America simply isn’t good enough.

While most of our hockey culture doesn’t translate well to other North American leagues, the playoffs-or-bust mentality of the NHL is a lesson that Major League Soccer fans need to learn.

“The first thing is that if you sign for a club, you want to do well for that club,” Keegan said. “I’m not looking too far ahead at this point, but I’d be lying if I said the reason I came over wasn’t to hopefully play in MLS one day. That’s kind of been a goal of mine… You want players to do well for your club, but you don’t want players who are satisfied with what they are doing. You want players with high ambitions.”

According to MLS, he got 96.38 per cent of the club votes and 97.18 per cent of the media votes. Those who voted against him went to a “what-league-were-you-watching?” prison to be reprogrammed.

As MLS began its playoffs, NASL finished the final week of its regular season. So, this will be the final instalment of our power rankings.

But, he scored many of his 17 goals this season for Orlando City on turf. And he thinks that Canada will have an advantage over Honduras in the Nov. 13 World Cup qualifier at BC Place because of the artificial surface.

And, in Montreal’s playoff match against their 401 rivals, Bernier was called upon to start. And, he stomped all over the hearts of Toronto FC fans.

If Kyle Porter plays 22 minutes or more for Atlanta in the final week of the NASL season, he is guaranteed to be the Canadian minutes leader in MLS or NASL this season.This is the penultimate instalment of the Power Rankings, with the MLS regular season having wrapped up this past weekend and NASL having just one week to go (save for FC Edmonton, which has a bye on the final week of the season).