Lancos fills in for injured Torres

CARSON, Calif. — Real Salt Lake central defender Daniel Torres was a late scratch from Saturday's lineup with Chivas USA after straining his left hamstring during warm-ups.

Whether or not that contributed to the lopsided outcome is mere hearsay.

RSL newcomer Chris Lancos started in his absence, his second appearance with the club this season but first regular-season game. Lancos replaced Eddie Pope in the 62nd minute of Wednesday's U.S. Open Cup qualifying win over Kansas City, but that match doesn't count in the regular season statistics.

Because of the injury to Torres, Stewart had to push from his more comfortable right-back position to central defender. It's hard to imagine that Torres' presence could've prevented the first goal, but it might've made a difference in Chivas' second goal when Maykel Galindo raced past Stewart.

At halftime, Lancos was replaced by Andy Williams as RSL committed more bodies to the attack in hopes of pulling off a miracle.

FATIGUE IRRELEVANT: A lot was made about Real Salt Lake playing on such short rest Saturday. Perhaps too much was made of it, because looking at last year's results, there doesn't appear to be any correlation between fatigue and results.

Last year, every MLS team endured at least one stretch when they played three games over a seven- or eight-day stretch, with some doing so three or four times. In all, there were 26 instances when MLS teams played three games in seven or eight days, and the combined record of those teams in the third and final game of that stretch was 10-10-6.

If fatigue is supposedly a factor, one would expect that stat to reflect more losses than wins.

Even more interesting, of the five teams that endured an even lengthier stretch, only one appeared to suffer legitimate adverse effects, while two seemed to benefit.

New England and Chivas each had a stretch last year when they played seven games in a span of 21 days, finishing with impressive 3-1-3 and 2-1-4 records, respectively.

Chicago had a stretch of four games in 11 days, racking up a 2-2-0 mark.

New York was the only team that seemed to wear down during a busy stretch, finishing with an 0-4-1 record while playing five games in 13 days. Dallas didn't exactly play lights out soccer during a similar stretch of five games last year, but 2-3-0 isn't horrible.