Major League Soccer continues to expand its reach across the nation.

Austin will field a club in 2021 and is rolling out a soccer-specific stadium.

The league is huge in Atlanta, with home games drawing 72,000-plus inside an NFL stadium.

So why aren’t the Dynamo bigger? And why does MLS continue to be an afterthought in America’s fourth-largest city?

Texans, Astros, Rockets. Cougars, Aggies, Longhorns. Heck, even LSU’s football team can feel more important than the Dynamo in Houston.

You can say that MLS will never be big here. Football city, baseball town, basketball proud. NFL, MLB, NBA, NCAA. Bandwagon fans, winners-only, superstars required … transplants, commuters, sprawl, suburbs.

We know all the old arguments already.

I will counter with the undeniable success of Atlanta’s team in a similar Southern city. Mention that MLS has soared in Seattle and Portland, Los Angeles now has two teams, and Nashville, Miami and St. Louis are next up on the expansion list. And point out that John Walker, president of business operations for the Dynamo and Dash, acknowledged this week that Houston’s MLS team has serious work to do to connect with soccer supporters in this city.

As MLS has grown — expansion fees have reached $200 million; the league is eyeing 30 clubs, with Charlotte and Sacramento also aiming for teams — the Dynamo have been on the outside looking in.

“All we have to do is just look around the league,” said Walker, during an interview at a coffee shop across the street from the Dynamo’s downtown stadium. “We look at Portland, look at Seattle, look at Kansas City with sold-out stadiums. We strive to be there, and we’re working to do that.”

Nurturing the fan base

Walker was direct and refreshingly up front discussing the state of the Dynamo. He didn’t blame anyone else — fans, the local media, Houston’s Big Three. He is aware that clear opportunities haven’t been maximized and the future is waiting.

“Between the multicultural nature of our city, the growth of MLS, the popularity of the sport in the United States, the number of youth that are playing here, all the ingredients are there for us,” said Walker, who was hired last November after working with the NBA’s Phoenix Suns and Memphis Grizzlies. “It’s incumbent upon the franchise to create and foster those relationships and create them at a grassroots level. Because it can’t just be transactional.”

The Dynamo’s recent news cycle captured the team’s inability to maintain positive momentum.

Last month, Rockets superstar James Harden joined the ownership group of the Dynamo, Dash and BBVA Stadium. It could become an eventual wake-up call for those sleeping on the Dynamo and MLS.

“Houston is my home now, and I saw this as a way to invest in my city and expand my business interests at the same time,” Harden said in a statement. “Soccer in general, and especially MLS, have exploded in this country throughout my lifetime. I’ve been a fan of the game for several years, and I know that Houston has a massive soccer fan base, so it was an easy decision for me when this opportunity arose.”

Last week, the Dynamo fired Wilmer Cabrera as coach after just 2½ seasons. Entering Saturday night’s home match against Colorado, the Dynamo (9-13-3) were ranked ninth out of 12 clubs in the Western Conference and sliding toward the bottom of the league.

Fans quickly began a “Let’s go Dynamo” chant after the Rapids, next to last in the West, took an early 1-0 lead on Star Wars Night. But on a perfect mid-August evening for soccer, the crowd appeared to number in the low thousands and multiple seating sections were noticeably empty as the sky darkened.

Back-to-back MLS Cup championships in 2006-07 and a new stadium in 2012 couldn’t sustain the Dynamo’s early buzz. Recognizable names moved on. Now, new faces have been brought in to move MLS forward in Houston.

“Most of these new franchises that are coming into MLS, they have a couple years of run-up to paint the picture and to cultivate fans, do some branding, give it a club feel, get a rush of enthusiasm about it, a countdown clock and all that kind of stuff,” Walker said. “So when they come out of the gate, everybody is really, really excited about it. We don’t really have that benefit because next season will be our 15th season. We have to manufacture that and create that while we’re still playing.”

This would help big time: “We need to make the Dynamo cool in our market,” Walker said.

Astros steal some thunder

Attendance issues have mirrored the club’s on-field struggles. After ranking in the top 10 from 2006-15 and placing fourth as recently as 2012, the Dynamo fell to 17th in 2017. According to the Sports Business Journal, the Dynamo only topped five teams in 2018 average attendance in early August.

An Aug. 3 match between the Los Angeles Galaxy and Atlanta drew 72,548 at Mercedes-Benz Stadium, topping the Texans’ last home playoff game at NRG Stadium.

“We’ve been in between 15th and 20th in the league,” Walker said. “We should be in the top 10 every year, just the size of the market alone.”

Asked if a team rebrand could be in the works, the Dynamo’s president said “everything’s on the table.”

Since 2015, the rebuilt Astros have won a World Series and consistently packed nearby Minute Maid Park, while the Dynamo have fallen off the local radar. Walker acknowledged that the seasons overlap and Houston’s MLB team has pulled in casual fans who follow the city-wide energy that comes with winning.

“There are certainly a lot of folks who are going to Astros games now on a regular basis that four or five years ago were not,” he said.

But Walker also stated what all Houston sports fans know — it’s much bigger than that.

“The biggest challenge for us is relevance in the market,” he said.

Dynamo interim coach Davy Arnaud watched soccer rise in Kansas City during his playing days. Lingering doubt was eventually replaced with local pride.

“To be completely honest with you, I was just as surprised as anybody,” said Arnaud, a Nederland native. “Really, seriously, and in a good way … at how unbelievably impressive it was, the way that it just seemed to come from out of nowhere. Before the rebrand and the new stadium, Kansas City’s were not the highest attended games.

“When they were first doing it, everybody was kind of thinking, ‘Man, is this going to work?’ It’s a big investment in the stadium and all that. But the job that they did there at the time was phenomenal. What was important was that the city was obviously proud of their sports teams, No. 1. No. 2, I remember that the players had a good connection with the city.”

If the Dynamo can figure themselves out, MLS is ready to provide an extra bump. At the same time that the league is stretching out across the country, the level of play and national recognition are improving.

“I’ve been around the league for a long time. We knew, I think, several years ago that it was heading in the right direction,” Arnaud said. “But specifically within the last four or five years, you just see how it just continues to get better, it continues to grow. I only think it’s going up. I really do. It’s a good moment to be a part of this sport in our country.”

The time is ripe

Local fan and market research are being combined with league research to highlight a new path for the Dynamo. To Walker, creating new, young fans is as important as building off the potential of a modernizing downtown.

“The Dynamo are going to be really relevant again at some point. It’s inevitable,” he said. “So what can we do to accelerate that and to do it in a way that is thoughtful and strategic for long-term sustained relevance? We don’t want to just give away every ticket and give away free hats and scarves and everything, and have everybody come and love us for a year.”

Reaching soccer devotees such as Cesar Avellan is a start.

Avellan, 33, is a Real Madrid fan and leads a local Supporters group, Peña Madridista HTX. Like Walker, Avellan said the Dynamo have been missing their opportunity, but the opportunity still remains.

“We’re a huge melting pot and we don’t have people that are going to (Dynamo) games,” said Avellan, who has recently increased his support of the Dynamo and hopes other Supporters groups follow. “They could be doing so much better.”

The Dynamo agree.

The market is there. Houston has spent the last decade proudly promoting itself as a modern destination city. The Texans, Astros and Rockets drive our daily conversations.

MLS is expanding. Soccer is bigger than ever across the globe. Daily scores and news are now featured on ESPN’s rolling ticker.

In 2019, it’s time for the Dynamo to stop going backward.

“I’m really bullish on it,” Walker said. “I think it’s going to take us a little time to get to the level where we’ve got that momentum and people start going, ‘Hey, we’ve got to go out and go do this.’ But I think it’s coming.”

brian.smith@chron.com

twitter.com/chronbriansmith