Editor's Note: Each year, the weekly business newspapers published by Portfolio.com parent American City Business Journals anoints their executives of the year. This year, Portfolio.com presents profiles of the top execs from cities including Milwaukee, San Francisco, Baltimore, Minneapolis and Dallas. Today, the series begins with an in-depth look at Vulcan Sports & Entertainment CEO Tod Leiweke from Seattle.

Tod Leiweke may be the CEO of Seattle’s pro football and soccer teams, but it’s a job that can transcend sports. Such was the case one sunny spring day in 2008 when Leiweke was called upon to introduce the Dalai Lama to 50,000 adoring people at Qwest Field.

Leiweke was standing with a group of young people as the Buddhist spiritual leader’s car pulled up. Security guards popped out, scanned the area and then tapped on the car window. The Dalai Lama stepped out, and made a beeline for the kids.

“It was absolutely beautiful,” said Leiweke. “The man is so inspirational. It was just thrilling.”

Thrilling, except for one small episode that still leaves Leiweke feeling a little uncomfortable.

“The translator referred to me as ‘landlord,’ ” said Leiweke. “I wanted to correct him. But I said to myself, OK. Not exactly the characterization you wanted for the Dalai Lama, but so be it.”

As CEO of Vulcan Sports & Entertainment, Leiweke is in a sense the “landlord” of Qwest Field. But he doesn’t rule over billionaire Paul Allen’s sports empire like some feudal lord. Not his style.

Nor does he like to bask alone in the spotlight. That’s especially true, Leiweke said, about this year’s biggest local sports story: the spectacularly successful birth of his Seattle Sounders FC. Leiweke credits other executives, the owners — and especially the fans.

Jon Fine, CEO of the United Way of King County, said Leiweke doesn’t want to be the guy taking credit for successes. Leiweke’s talent, Fine said, is his ability to work with people at all levels.

“For Tod, it’s not about him, it’s about the success of the organization,” said Fine.

But it’s unlikely that the rookie Sounders would have shattered just about every American record for soccer attendance, ratings and merchandise sales without Leiweke at the helm.

“This is not just blowing some smoke. In my mind Tod is one of the best executives in the entire sports industry,” said Major League Soccer Commissioner Don Garber.

With the Sounders, Leiweke and Co. rewrote the playbook on expansion team launches, fostering a green-tinged fan frenzy that helped Seattle forget the fresh loss of the NBA SuperSonics. Because of this achievement, as well as his community contributions, Leiweke is the Puget Sound Business Journal’s executive of the year.

Friends and colleagues say Leiweke instills loyalty in team members while deferring to their expertise. Leiweke’s also a customer-first guy. As a sports exec — in cities from Kansas City, Mo., to St. Paul, Minn., to Seattle — Leiweke has found innovative ways to heighten the home crowd’s experience. He pumped up Seahawks fans by raising the 12th Man flag at Qwest Field, and built an online “democracy” to make Sounders fans feel like owners. He once even installed an arena organ disguised as an ice-making machine to whip up the hockey-crazed fans of Minnesota.

Despite this flair for whipping up sports passions, Leiweke is a no-drama guy. He gets things done quietly, a trait that has been useful in serving a flashy Sounders ownership group that includes Hollywood personalities and the multifaceted Allen, whose yen for employing gifted athletes goes along with his taste for collecting the world’s largest yachts and enough rock ‘n’ roll artifacts to literally fill a museum.

“Tod’s just a normal guy. He treats everyone with respect and dignity,” said Ed Viesturs, a renowned mountaineer and close friend who has climbed Mount Rainier with Leiweke the past two summers.

This “normal guy” was picked by Allen in 2003 to oversee the billionaire’s latest acquisition, his hometown football team. The Seahawks had fallen so far that Leiweke’s first home game didn’t even appear on local TV because the seats hadn’t sold out. Under Leiweke’s leadership, the Seahawks have logged 54 consecutive sellouts, landed a $75 million stadium naming deal with Qwest Communications, fielded a league MVP player, and made the franchise’s first Super Bowl appearance.

In 2007, Allen made Leiweke CEO of his entire Vulcan Sports empire, putting Leiweke, who turns 50 in January, in charge of three of the Northwest’s four major pro teams. In addition to running the Sounders, Seahawks, and NBA Portland Trail Blazers, Leiweke manages Portland’s Rose Garden arena and Seattle’s Qwest Field.

It’s not all been smooth sailing in Leiweke’s sports world.

The Seahawks piled up 19 losses over a recent 27-game span. Frustration over those defeats led Leiweke to announce in early December the firing of Sea-hawks General Manager Tim Ruskell­­, a man he helped hire in 2005.