Birmingham has a professional soccer team, and if you believe in this city then you'll support it.

It can't be written any simpler.

It doesn't matter if you've never kicked a soccer ball in your life. It doesn't matter if you've never been to a match. Black and white people. New immigrants and old. This is your team, and it can be a reflection of this city with the right kind of spirit.

Birmingham already succeeded in resurrecting the UAB football team. Now is the second act.

If Birmingham wants to send a message to the world that things are different, here's its chance. There will be naysayers, of course. Don't ignore them. Invite them to a game, too.

Soccer is here, y'all, and it's going to be a lot of fun.

Team USL Birmingham was introduced on Tuesday at Good People Brewing Company, and the venue for the big announcement was fitting. It was at Good People back in 2014 when video clips of Birmingham's World Cup soccer celebrations went viral.

Since then, Birmingham's support for the U.S. Women's and Men's National Teams has continued to surprise the country's soccer establishment. Birmingham-area TV ratings for World Cup matches were among the nation's best. In 2015, the USWNT set an attendance record (35,753) at Legion Field for a stand-alone women's match in the southeastern United States.

"Soccer has grown tremendously, and there is still a wide area that it can grow," said Birmingham Mayor William Bell, who was so excited about the USL celebration on Tuesday at Good People that he announced the new club himself. "Throughout the years, soccer has grown and grown in excitement, and we oftentimes watch on TV as other cities and other countries have experienced live soccer right there in their communities. Well, today the time has come. The time has come."

Birmingham's soccer team begins playing in the United Soccer League in 2019. USL is a second-division league, which means it's one tier below Major League Soccer. People have already started asking me if Birmingham can make the jump to MLS. I don't know the answer to that question, but I do know, even if it's a long shot, this is the most realistic path for Birmingham to finally have a major professional sports franchise.

Other cities have embraced USL teams and supported them so passionately that MLS awarded their cities a franchise. It's not simple, of course, but it happened in Orlando after that city built a downtown, soccer-specific stadium, and it is close to happening in Sacramento.

Nashville debuts in the USL in 2018, and already that city is putting together an ownership group to try and take its club to the MLS. FC Cincinnati of the USL averaged over 20,000 fans per game last season, positioning itself for a strong MLS bid. That should be Birmingham's goal. It's going to take people who love and believe in Birmingham to make it happen.

Good news. There are a lot of those people around.

Small markets can succeed in professional sports with the right community support. The San Antonio Spurs are the franchise all other franchises emulate in the NBA. Memphis has the Grizzlies. Unlike the Birmingham Barons, which is a farm team of the Chicago White Sox, USL Birmingham will be an independent franchise. It can create its own destiny, and, in a way, it already has.

How this town landed a franchise in the USL is a reflection of the new energy pumping through these streets. It is a testament to the hope of a younger generation that Birmingham can achieve something greater than itself. The grassroots movement to bring soccer to Birmingham started with two guys out of college who had a crazy dream. They wanted to start a pro soccer team for their city.

In 2014, Morgan Copes and John Killian founded a team called the Birmingham Hammers. Copes and Killian were young, and still are, but these guys had a vision and they believed. The Hammers started out as an amateur club before attracting investors who wanted to take it to the next level.

It doesn't get any more grassroots than that. This is Birmingham's team, started by Birmingham millennials. Over in Atlanta, that city was awarded an MLS franchise because they had a billionaire backer and a publicly funded mega stadium. In Nashville, another billionaire is leading that push for MLS.

In Birmingham, this new franchise will live or die through its fan support. It started from grassroots, and from there it will succeed. If USL Birmingham wants to prosper, then its new investors need to do two things: let Copes and Killian run the team, and look for some affordable land near Lakeview.

Oh, and keep the name the Hammers. The kids don't want it any other way.

Joseph Goodman is a columnist for Alabama Media Group. He's on Twitter @JoeGoodmanJr.