Halfway through the second round of Major League Soccer playoffs and the Sounders are already contributing to a familiar storyline of the regular season meaning too little.
They head into Thursday’s second leg of the Western Conference semifinal against the Portland Timbers at CenturyLink Field facing elimination and minus injured MLS Defender of the Year candidate Chad Marshall and very likely without midfielder Cristian Roldan. Of four conference semifinalists coming off first-round byes, the Sounders and New York Red Bulls both trail and risk being ousted by lower seeded squads – which would maintain the 50 percent ratio that’s happened at since the opening Knockout Round playoff format was introduced in 2011.