Let’s remember when Seattle was awarded a MLS team, on this day in 2007 (November 13)
Yesterday, everyone in Seattle was celebrating the Sounders’ second MLS Cup championship. It’s pretty great (IMO) that it all began twelve years-minus one day ago.
Per Glenn Drosendahl of HistoryLink:
On November 13, 2007, a group of investors representing Seattle is officially granted an expansion franchise for Major League Soccer (MLS), the sport’s premier league in North America. The successful bid comes after more than 10 years of trying. Completion of a suitable stadium has paved the way. The emergence of a strong ownership group, led by California movie-industry executive Joe Roth (b. 1948), seals the deal. The resulting team is named the Sounders after the city’s original North American Soccer League entry. Beginning play in the 2009 season, the new team shatters MLS attendance records; fills Pioneer Square with marching, chanting, cheering fans wearing the team’s colors; and even makes the playoffs.
Top-level American soccer had been missing from Seattle since the original Sounders, who had begun play in 1974, folded in 1983, one year before the entire North American Soccer League collapsed. Major League Soccer was established in 1993 without Seattle. Any attempt by the city to land an MLS team depended on having a stadium built for soccer. The existing venues — the huge Kingdome and little Memorial Stadium — were deemed unsuitable by the league’s commissioner.
In 1996 Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen (1953–2018) agreed to buy the Seattle Seahawks on the condition that a new stadium be built to house the National Football League team. He wanted about three quarters of the cost to be paid by public funds, which required approval by the state’s voters. There was considerable resistance to the idea, especially if the stadium would be used for only 10 games a year. Urged by members of the sizeable local soccer community, Allen agreed to make the building suitable for Olympic and World Cup soccer as well as football. The resulting added support appeared to swing the election. On June 17, 1997, voters narrowly approved $300 million in public funding for the $430 million project. “It was a squeaker. We needed soccer. It powered this thing through,” said Bert Kolde, president of Allen’s organization, Football Northwest.
Hell yes.
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