Schalke 04 to fine players for scoring own-goals, lots of MLS defenders owe money for last 18 years | SIDELINE

Own-goals just happen sometimes. They're no fun, and when you're on the wrong end of one, you just want the ground to open up beneath you.

Let's take a quick Mario de Luna break.

Ok, we're back. For one German Bundesliga club — Schalke 04 — players will, this season, be fined by the club roughly the amount of $1,000 for any opposing teams' free kick or corner kick resulting in an own-goal. No, seriously, this is a real thing that is happening.

August 9, 2013

So this naturally got us thinking: who would be the most heavily fined players in Major League Soccer history if the league and/or clubs enacted such policies? We chose to one-up Schalke, though, and go for own-goals resulting from both set pieces and the run of play.

Thanks to our friends at Elias Sports Bureau, we can report that the following players would have been the most frequent payers to The own-goal Collector:

4 own-goals ($4,000) - Houston Dynamo defender Bobby Boswell, D.C. United defender James Riley and New England Revolution head coach Jay Heaps

3 own-goals ($3,000) - Columbus Crew defender Chad Marshall; MLSsoccer.com's own Cory Gibbs, a former Chicago Fire defender; former MLS journeyman defender Eric Denton; current Seattle Sounders assistant coach Ezra Hendrickson; Columbus Crew and USMNT legend Frankie Hejduk; FC Dallas defender Jair Benitez; former USMNT star defender and five-time MLS Cup winner Jeff Agoos; KICKTV presenter and Megan Rapinoe BFF (pending) Jimmy Conrad: Real Salt Lake defender Nat Borchers; and former Columbus Crew defender Ritchie Kotschau

Other notables - Real Salt Lake/NBCSN/Fox Soccer color commentator Brian Dunseth (2 own-goals - $2,000); current San Jose Earthquakes and USMNT defender Clarence Goodson (2 own-goals - $2,000); current LA Galaxy and USMNT defender Omar Gonzalez (1 own-goal - $1,000); and LA Galaxy midfielder Pablo Mastroeni (2 own-goals - $2,000)

Pay up, fellas. A handful of the players' Twitter profiles are linked above. Feel free to send them this link to assist The Collector in his collecting duties.

PS - De Luna should be fined extra, right?