After a disappointing follow-up to their 2015 championship season, the Portland Timbers kick off the 2017 Major League Soccer campaign with a home game Friday night against expansion side Minnesota United FC. It’s that time of year when fans and supporters around the league feel optimistic about their teams being championship contenders before opponents, injuries and reality have a say.

The Timbers looked good in the preseason, unveiling what is arguably Portland’s best midfield corps in the team’s MLS history. The addition of Sebastián Blanco will pay dividends in the attack as he joins Darlington Nagbe and Diego Valeri, the team’s other prodigious offensive midfielders. David Guzmán, a defensive midfield acquisition, looked sharp in the early stages of his partnership with club mainstay Diego Chara. With Fanendo Adi as the lone striker at the top of the formation, this team is going to score goals. If preseason games are an indication, the Timbers will play more possession soccer this year as opposed to their recent propensity for playing a direct style.

The unknown is the defense. There is some good news. Jake Gleeson is proven and solid in goal. The fullback positions are also in good shape with Alvas Powell and Vytas Andriuškevičius both able to defend and contribute in the attack. The problem, as it was last year, is with Portland’s centerbacks. Liam Ridgewell is another year older and has a tendency to miss games because of injury. His presumed partner at the position, Gbenga Arokoyo, ruptured his Achilles tendon early in the preseason and is out for the year. The Timbers plan to add a starting-quality player to fill Arokoyo’s position but haven’t signed anyone yet. At the time of this posting, it appears that won’t happen before the season starts — not ideal. It’s likely the team will lean on veteran Lawrence Olum to hold the position for the time being.

The vulnerability of the backline means the Timbers will be less aggressive in the attack when playing on the road. The first test comes on March 12 when the team travels to Los Angeles for a game against the Galaxy. The Timbers never won a road game in league play last year, and the pressure is on to end this streak quickly in 2017.

In the meantime, Friday’s home opener should be a good show of attacking prowess against a team with a giant bullseye on their jerseys — literally. Target is Minnesota United FC’s corporate jersey sponsor, but it’s an unfortunate logo for an expansion team that is going to lose a lot of games this year. Friday night will be a good time for the Timbers’ home fans, but until the defense is strengthened Portland has question marks in regard to how good they’ll be this year. That said, I’m optimistic. It’s finally soccer season again:

See you at Providence Park. Onward Rose City!

Last year, on December 6, the Portland Timbers won their first Major League Soccer championship. Less than a year later the team has failed to make the playoffs in their title defense — a disappointing end to a disappointing season. What went wrong? Plenty.

For starters, the team dealt with a ridiculous amount of injuries in 2016, which created inconsistencies and chemistry problems. Nowhere was this truer than on defense where the Portland backline kept changing throughout the season. This contributed to the Timbers giving up a Western Conference-worst 53 goals.

Some players left the team to play in foreign leagues. Players who were expected to step into these vacated roles failed, often miserably, to produce. Two of them didn’t even finish the year with the team.

While the Timbers were excellent at home, in 17 tries they failed to win a game on the road. The last MLS game win away from Providence Park was last year’s championship match in Columbus, Ohio!

The team also got off to what has become their trademarked slow start. Under current head coach Caleb Porter, who took over in 2013, Portland had never won a game in the opening month of the season. They finally destroyed that trend and won their first match of the long campaign on March 6, but they didn’t win another game until April 16. Between these dates they had three losses and two draws.

It’s likely the short off-season didn’t help Portland. The time from the championship game to 2016 training camp was about six weeks. That wasn’t much time for rest or for the front office to deal with the challenges that came from making it to the top of the league. MLS is parity-driven and salary capped. The system is designed to make it harder for the current champion to repeat. That said, everyone expected more from the Timbers this year.

Portland was supposed to make a strong run at the U.S. Open Cup. They entered in the fourth round of the annual competition and beat San Jose but fell to Los Angeles in the next round — not even making the quarterfinals.

By winning the MLS Cup in December Portland automatically qualified this year for CONCACAF Champions League, the annual continental tournament for the top club teams in North America, Central American and the Caribbean. The Timbers were eliminated in the group stage, failing to make the knockout round. This was also a major disappointment.

The Open Cup and Champions League competitions run at the same time as the regular MLS schedule, so the Timbers had a lot of extra games this year. Still, the team and its supporters had higher hopes than what ultimately transpired.

In spite of the setbacks the Timbers still had a chance on the last day of the season to qualify for the playoffs. All they had to do was win a road game in Vancouver against the Whitecaps, a regional rival and team that had already been eliminated from playoff contention. Portland was blown out 4-1 in an uninspired performance. Losing by three goals also meant no Cascadia Cup. The Timbers had all but sewn up this annual competition between Vancouver and Seattle before laying an egg in the final game. Season over.

It didn’t get much better a day later when a couple of Timbers were arrested on suspicion of driving under the influence. Club supporters who were already upset by a lackluster season found themselves further disappointed, this time by something more serious than errors on the soccer pitch. How each player’s situation is resolved from legal and discipline standpoints remains to be seen.

And so into the long off-season the team goes. There will likely be quite a few new faces around Providence Park next year. Club captain Jack Jewsbury, who came to the Timbers just prior to the start of the team’s inaugural year in MLS, has retired. Other players are likely to leave for different leagues, and of course some won’t be returning as the front office works to upgrade their positions.

The Timbers will be different in 2017, but expectations remain high. The team wants better results and supporters demand them. In the meantime the playoffs go on without Portland with a new champion to be crowned in December. For now we have to fondly remember that rainy night almost a year ago when the Timbers celebrated a remarkable championship run. There is a long road ahead to make it back to the top.