Oh When the Sounders Come Marching In

It's cool that Drew Carey has been the face of the new Seattle MLS team, appearing at the G&D and showing up in the booth for Monday Night Football to talk about the team's plans in Seattle, but he's kind of a Cleveland guy. Couldn't we get a Seattle name that's about on par with Carey? Like....oh god there is no Seattle name on par with Drew Carey. Long live Seattle guy Drew Carey!

And the stuff Carey has been saying about the new team has really rubbed us the right way. Giving fans the option to buy voting rights in the team? That's a masterstroke. European fan groups have long been able to influence the teams they cheer for to change strategies or hire, fire and trade personal. In the case of Barcelona and maybe a few other clubs that power comes from fans with voting rights, but usually it stems from fans forming supporter groups and just generally being incredibly well-organized (or, less frequently, being incredibly violent, OR being incredibly well-organized AND incredibly violent, but that seems about as likely in Seattle as public mass transit). Already there are messages popping up on supporter sites for other MLS teams hoping to follow Seattle's lead here.

Another of Carey's talking points has been a marching band for the new team, which is another fantastically good idea. In a sense, it's another way to rip off the Europeans and the pageantry and noise spectacles that surround their teams, but it's a very American take on how to achieve those things. What American sport boasts the most pageantry and noise? College football, which has always been, and continues to be, despite the MLS, our closest approximation of European football. What makes college football college football? Ok, not just the marching band, but it helps.

Now if only Drew Carey can figure out how to build a small stadium here...