Are Barcelona the Only Threat to Real Madrid in La Liga?

When Real Madrid beat Mallorca 4-1 on May 13th, Los Blancos were officially crowned champions of Spain, and simultaneously achieved an historic total of 100 points for the year.

In a way, it was the culmination of Johan Cruyff's revolution at Barcelona 20 years earlier.

When Cruyff instituted his groundbreaking philosophies that would produce greats such as Pep Guardiola, Xavi, Andres Iniesta and all the others who have perfected "tiki-taka" football, he reignited the flame that lights the ferocious rivalry between Barcelona and Real Madrid.

The arms race was back on. Madrid bought new waves of Galacticos in the early 2000s, and continued to ramp up their transfer activity as their rivals' golden generation first began to flourish.

What we got was a thrilling competition between two high-powered enemies and some truly wonderful Clasicos. But the hyperactivity by the wealthiest and most historically-significant clubs in the land turned La Liga into a two-team race.

We've seen—and continue to see—an increasing dichotomy between the perennial front-runners and the very good teams in the second tier.

Fans of mouthwatering football surely enjoyed the swashbuckling display that Real Madrid put on last season. At an expense of countless millions of Euros, the crowd at the Santiago Bernabeu was treated to many memorable displays from a team that outscored their opponents by a total of 89 goals.

This dominance produced a 100-point season and the La Liga title. But there are only so many points that are available in a given year, and, save for Barcelona, nobody came anywhere close to matching Los Merengues' total.

Right, Barcelona—the other half of the equation.

The Catalans can mostly thank a sluggish start to the season for the cession of the title to Madrid, but they nevertheless kept the race close until the very end of the season.

Barcelona, when they finally hit top form, dominated their opponents as thoroughly as their rivals, and decisively pulled away from the competition to ensure a two-team title race.

Last season, they were the only credible threat to Madrid, and the only team that kept La Liga interesting at the top.

How vast was the disparity between the old foes and everyone else? The statistics tell the tale.

Barcelona finished second, with 91 total points. While they were nine shy of Real Madrid, third-placed Valencia amassed only 61 points—an incredible 30-point gap between the bubble of the top two and the real world.

Moreover, Madrid and Barca had goal-humongous differences of 89 and 85, respectively. Again, Valencia came in third with 15.

As I said before, points and goals have to come from somewhere, and the cumulative affect of playing the two giants a total of four times took its statistical toll on Valencia and every other team in Spain.

Four of the top five goal scorers from last season played their home matches at the Camp Nou or the Santiago Bernabeu. The same is true of seven of the top 10 assists leaders.

And Lionel Messi scored more than double the amount of league goals as anyone not named Cristiano Ronaldo.

The massive disparity between the top of the heap and all the rest is plain to see, and does not stand to get better any time soon.

One hoped that Malaga, backed by Qatari owners who were initially eager to splash the cash on new signings, could tip the balance a bit.

After one year, though, the experiment has gone horribly wrong. Several players have lodged complaints over unpaid wages; no new signings are forthcoming, and one of the club's best players, Santi Cazorla, is reportedly on his way to Arsenal.

Meanwhile, the big boys gobble up talent.

Jordi Alba secured his move from Valencia to Barcelona at the conclusion of Euro 2012, and will revitalize what was perhaps the only position in the Catalans' entire team for which a replacement was needed.

La Masia continues to churn out remarkable talent, and Real Madrid will buy any talented and interested player at any time, no matter how superfluous he might be.

As television deals continue to deliver disparate revenues to the two most profitable clubs, it becomes even more difficult for other teams to succeed against the titans of the league.

We can endlessly debate whether Barcelona or Madrid is the better team; the table last season showed it to be the latter, but what is still arguably the greatest club side ever can easily bounce back with a vintage campaign.

Each team eases to victory in its own aesthetically pleasing way, and each is has its own core of superstar players who drive the team forward.

The question of which team is the best in La Liga is the same, and will be for the foreseeable future. There is no sign of regression to the mean either inside or outside of the top two; rather, the table is getting more polarized every year.

While the Barcelona-Real Madrid rivalry constitutes a league in itself, the real competition for the rest in Spain is the chase for third place.

Unfortunately, that is the closest any other team can hope to get to the title.

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