MLS soccer comes to Houston

It's official — Houston has a new major-league sports team. Major League Soccer announced Thursday that the San Jose Earthquakes will be relocating to the Bayou City immediately, less than four months before the beginning of the 2006 MLS season.

Anschutz Entertainment Group, which owns the team, said Houston's ethnic diversity, size and sports mania made it the right choice for the move. There are still a lot of details to work out, like dates for ticket sales and where the team will play, though the Chronicle reports the main contender seems to be UH's Robertson Stadium — at least for now:

MLS has said it expects to have a plan for a soccer-specific stadium in Houston carved out in the near future. Although nothing is concrete, Garber has said he would seek a public-private partnership in the building of a venue. Such a partnership would be similar to the one forged in Frisco with the city, school district and team owner Hunt Sports for Pizza Hut Park, home of FC Dallas.

Well, of course. Houston needs another new stadium, don't you think?

The Earthquakes have been around since 1974 and have been an MLS member team since the league was conceived in 1994. And they've been pretty good lately, it seems: They've won two MLS cups, in 2001 and 2003. They're leaving San Jose because negotiations for a stadium there kept falling through. Wow, Houstonist is starting to see a lot of similarities between "football" and football!

Oh yeah, one more thing: Don't call them the Earhquakes anymore. AEG has retained the rights to the team's name and colors with an eye toward using them for a future San Jose expansion team. AEG will hold a team-naming contest for the Houston franchise; in the meantime, the Chronicle is hosting an online discussion about potential team names.

The Houstonists, anyone?