Sometime this week it's going to be announced that Seattle's soccer team the Seattle Sounders will be entering the MLS. GOALSeattle says tomorrow. Our friend in Chicago who knows about these things says it'll be announced at MLS Cup, which isn't until November 18, so we'll discount that and say tomorrow. It seems pointless, by now, to argue whether or not it will be announced. The Sounders aren't selling 2008 season tickets, Paul Allen is involved, Qwest Field, although not a fan favorite as a MLS venue, is ready and willing. It's happening. Tomorrow.

How long the team will stay at Qwest Field is yet to be determined. The bid seems like it's drawn up with plans to stay there indefinitely, but that's counter to prevailing MLS wisdom that says that a smaller, soccer-specific stadium is absolutely essential to the general health and well being of individual teams and the league. MLS audiences get lost in the cavernous stadia, even when they're a good MLS size of, say, thirty thousand. It's difficult to sell season tickets because the impression is that there will always be day-of-game seats available, and rent at the giants can be a back-breaker for sports franchises of this size, although that one might be mitigated by the presence of Allen in the ownership group. Plus Qwest Field has Field Turf and not real grass, although from time to time real grass is laid over the fake stuff. We'll see.

About Paul Allen; what finally pushed him over the edge? Last November (in a post entitled "Why Major League Soccer Is Never Coming To Seattle") we said:

the real reason MLS soccer will never come to Seattle: Paul Allen.

Allen's whims have a strange habit of sprouting into physicality in ways that fundamentally change Seattle: Qwest Field, the EMP, South Lake Union, etc. And he's got the giant money bags MLS is looking for in an owner. Problem is the guy has absolutely no interest in soccer and even if he was into it another thing he's into is making Seattle pay for the shit that he's into. See Qwest Field. See SLU light rail.