This past Saturday, unbeknownst to many in America, your Seattle Sounders won the MLS Cup, or MLS title, or MLS Shield, or whatever they won.

Now it is probably clear to you that I am no soccer wonk. However I did pick up a few things when watching this epic final game this past Saturday at the local Buffalo Wild Wings.

First, did you know they call soccer ‘football’ in other parts of the world? Weird huh? I mean yes the players use a foot to play the game, but many times they also use their other foot as well. So why don’t they call it feetball? Seems more appropriate to use the plural form.

Second, I found it odd that no one on the field of play ever just picked up the ball with their hands, run over to the other goal, and simply throw it in. That seems a lot easier than kicking the ball around. I mean it is harder to control the ball with just feet; there are no fingers on your feet. Yeah, you have toes, but you can only pick up small objects with your toes. Toes are so little compared to fingers. And the ball, well, that ball is so big. I guess I understand kicking that ball instead of trying to pick it up with your toes, but still really think using your hands would add a lot more to the game.

Third, apparently you do not need to shoot the ball on goal to win the game. Seattle had exactly zero shots on goal while Toronto had literally infinity times more shots on goal (or in an arithmetic perspective, +12 more shots). Funny that a game where the entire goal is to score a goal, a team need not even attempt to shoot the ball on goal yet still win.

Finally, it is obvious from this one viewing that it is very hard to score in general (please reference point 2 for a solution to this). I mean they played for over 2 hours and no one could score one of these goals. In fact, everyone was so frustrated the referees decided to play a completely different game to break this scoreless tie; line a player up right next to the goal and let them kick it in. Wow, that was way easier. I mean this game went to something that was impossible to do to something that was extremely easy to do. But alas, for Toronto, it was not easy enough and Seattle made 5/6 of these shots while Toronto only could manage 4.

So there you go. A feetball championship won by a team refusing to pick up the ball, not even attempting to shoot on the goal, and crossing their fingers that the other team can’t kick the ball into the goal from a few feet away.

Regardless of my naivete on this game and the satirical tone of this post, it was really cool to experience a win with many other Seattleites who care far more about this than I do. Civic pride is always a fun and wonderful thing, and I will not belittle that excitement.

Today there will be a parade in downtown Seattle for our new heroes. I am sure dozens of people will be there in this 35 degree weather to welcome them. And they deserve it.

So congratulations Seattle Sounders. You may not have deserved to win that game, but you got it. So hold on to this championship like grim death, because titles are very very hard to come by in any sport.