Reporting from Seattle — The MLS Cup logo gleams from up high, freshly painted atop the Space Needle, along with the logos of the Galaxy and Real Salt Lake.
It's a sign that the 14-year-old league's championship game has finally arrived in the Northwest; it will be played Sunday at Qwest Field between the aforementioned teams.
It's also a sign that the "dog and pony shows" have hit town. Call it hokey. Call it a sales pitch. It's here.
On Wednesday, for instance, when the M/V Tacoma lurched up to Pier 52, the ferry had on board former UCLA and Galaxy coach and current Seattle Sounders Coach Sigi Schmid, as well as former UCLA and U.S. national team winger and current Sounders technical director Chris Henderson.
Wouldn't you know it, they were bringing the sterling silver Philip F. Anschutz championship trophy to Seattle -- not the way they would have preferred, of course, which would have been to win it.
"MLS made a great decision in expanding to our region," said King County executive Dow Constantine, the obligatory politician on hand. "Here's a place where darn near every kid grows up playing soccer."
Then, on Thursday, MLS Commissioner Don Garber participated in an online chat on the Seattle Times website, telling the world that all was well with MLS and would be even better in the foreseeable future.
"This season will forever be known as one of the key moments in the history of soccer in America," Garber said during the day.
Finally, on Friday afternoon, Galaxy forward Alan Gordon and Real Salt Lake goalkeeper Chris Seitz were cajoled into Seattle's virtually unavoidable photo op -- tossing dead fish around at Pike Place Market.
It's all about buzz and image. And in Seattle, MLS had the soccer success story of the year, perhaps of the decade. So why not celebrate?
Beneath the surface, of course, and not mentioned too loudly on a championship weekend, are a number of niggling little issues and a few not-so-little ones.
MLS attendance, for example, was down 2% in 2009 to an average of 16,037, even though the Sounders averaged a league-high 30,897, even though Sunday's title game is a sellout, and even though Toronto FC has sold out every game in its three-year history.
The reality check comes with the knowledge that the New England Revolution drew a paltry 7,416 for a home playoff game against the Chicago Fire, or that the defending league champion Columbus Crew drew only 10,109 for its home playoff game against Real Salt Lake.
