For the first time since MLS Cup in Columbus some 462 days ago, the Portland Timbers have a road win.
They got it at 2017's first time of asking, beating the LA Galaxy 1-0 at the StubHub Center on Sunday afternoon in a game that was in turns sensational and then just plain silly.
Bookended by a goal and a save good enough to win any game, this one had dives, injuries, possibly a dive leading to an injury, a red card, a goal-line clearance, goalkeepers attempting bicycle kicks, and everything in between. It was a typically bizarro March MLS game.
But for the Timbers, it was a deserved victory. Starting a high school senior in Marco Farfan and a player who joined the club four days ago in Roy Miller, the Timbers won a building where the home team had lost just five times in their last 62 games. For the first time since they joined MLS, Portland is 2-0-0.
It's quite an achievement. Caleb Porter's March record as manager of the Timbers coming into this season was — by his standards — a dismal 1-5-8. You could easily make the case that Portland's early-season futility cost them playoff berths in 2014 and last year.
Considering that history, nothing that has happened in the first two weeks of this season has challenged the now popular stance that this Timbers team is the best one ever assembled.
Of course, the team that Portland beat on Sunday might be the worst Galaxy side since David Beckham's first full season in the league nine years ago — and the lineup Curt Onalfo fielded to face the Timbers was a weakened version of that.
LA was without starting fullbacks Ashley Cole and Robbie Rogers, Cole's backup Dave Romney, central midfielder Jermaine Jones, and forward Gyasi Zardes. Before the second half started, they'd be down Jelle Van Damme and Giovani dos Santos as well.
Portland, having won a dry-run of this game in their final preseason tuneup two weeks ago, was primed to play well — and, after just eight minutes, they'd scored one of the best goals in club history.
It started with an LA corner, which was cleared into the path of Sebastian Blanco. The Argentine ran onto the ball, took two touches, looked up, and dropped a 50-yard pass onto the head of Diego Chara.
Chara nodded the ball — on the fly — into the path of the onrushing Diego Valeri, who charged past LA rookie defender Nathan Smith, and tucked the ball in front for Chara, who had continued his run, to tap home.
It was a fabulous, fabulous piece of counter-attacking soccer — taking, from the time Blanco collected the ball, just five touches in ten seconds. Chara, who started the play in the Timbers' six yard box, finished it in LA's goalmouth.
It was the Columbian's first goal since his flying header against this same LA team in October of 2015, and it might have prompted a similar mauling to the one that the Timbers delivered on that famous day. Instead, things got wacky. Fast.
Some twenty minutes after Nagbe's goal, Chara went down in midfield, ostensibly under the challenge of LA's Belgian captain Van Damme — who protested demonstratively, and was given a yellow card by referee Baldomero Toledo.
Three minutes later, Van Damme — not exactly famous for his restraint and level-headedness — was sent packing in one of the stranger incidents you're likely to see all year.
Van Damme went flying in with a fairly absurd challenge David Guzman, who hit the ground in pain. Toledo did not hesitate in reaching for a second yellow card, only for replays to show that Van Damme had actually made no contact with Guzman.
An incensed Van Damme stomped around the field, while Guzman would have to leave the game holding his shoulder. In Toledo's estimation, Guzman simply tripped as he was trying to avoid Van Damme's lunging tackle — but Toledo's estimations, as some twenty MLS clubs will attest, aren't always bound by accuracy.
In any case, the only alternative is that Guzman dove so hard he hurt himself — a feat attempted, if not always consciously, by a number of mainly Latin American players over the years, but rarely if ever achieved.
After the game, Van Damme tweeted a picture of two men diving into the ocean. It was his most valuable contribution of the evening.
LA came into the game with ten men, but it was the Timbers who had the best chances to score the second goal of the afternoon — with Fanendo Adi rounding goalkeeper Clement Diop on three-on-zero break after Rafael Garcia fell down, only for Garcia to race back and break the play up in front of an empty net.
It was by no means a great showing with a man advantage, and to secure the points, the Timbers needed Gleeson to make a stunning reaction save from point-blank range on a flick-on header from LA winger Romain Alessandrini in the penultimate minute of stoppage time.
That said, Porter was rightfully pleased after the game with his team's performance. It was the end of the road hex that torpedoed 2016, and, despite LA's woe, a gritty performance.
The recently maligned Ben Zemanski was solid in place of Guzman in the second half, while a backline comprised of players who had never met each other until just before the game kept the team's first clean sheet of the season.
Roy Miller and Lawrence Olum both looked composed in central defense, but the plaudits mainly fell at the feet of Marco Farfan — who, on his MLS debut, looked like a ten-year veteran.
Farfan, despite a tough assignment against US international Sebastian Lleget, was quick, read the game well, and easily could have had an assist with an excellent cut-back cross to Valeri in the second half.
That things went well wasn't unexpected — Porter has been absolutely bullish on his young left back, and not because he's sentimental — but Farfan's effort still made for a big day in the maturation of the club and experience of those who follow it.
Watching a player who has grown up — and, in this case, is still growing up — in your city and in your club adds a whole different dimension to supporting a team. Farfan is Portland's first ever player to check those boxes.
Things are well with the Timbers right now. The depth that Porter promised would come up big this year has already begun to show its metal. In Blanco, the team finally has a DP winger willing to work his tail off on both ends of the field. In Farfan, the club has a blueprint for its future.
Compared to the desperate straits that the Galaxy and their under-fire manager Onalfo find themselves in — LA is now 0-0-2 for the first time since 2001 and has already lost more home games this year than they did last year — the Timbers could hardly be sitting prettier.
