Hello World
When giants of soccer walk away, there is an expectation of emptiness. A stage set, an actor missing. A spotlight lit, a figure vacant.
There’s a good argument to be made that over the past decade, there has been no larger figure in U.S. soccer than Alex Morgan.
From her pace-setting 10 million Instagram followers, to her trophy cabinet (two World Cups trophies and an Olympic gold), to her battles for equal pay, research for parenting athletes and safer worker conditions in the National Women’s Soccer League – very few active or recently retired players, women or men, come close to the influence and achievements of ‘No. 13.’
Megan Rapinoe’s activism and trophy cabinet certainly comes close, and Christian Pulisic’s marketability is notable. But Morgan has been the No. 1 soccer superstar.
Morgan has been a huge draw. A grassroots and commercial behemoth. After she shocked the world by announcing her sudden impending retirement via social media last Thursday, the San Diego Wave sold 11,000 tickets in one day as fans in California and across the country swarmed to witness the end this past weekend.
“Soccer has been a part of me for 30 years,” an emotional Morgan said via a video message last week. “It has been a long time coming, and this decision wasn’t easy, but at the beginning of 2024, I felt in my heart and soul that this was the last season.”
Morgan may have known this past spring that she was ready to play one final season, but the news to retire so suddenly, this week, was expedited by becoming pregnant for a second time several weeks ago.
One only has to look at how broadcast companies leapt at the chance – at just a couple of days notice — to increase the visibility of her final-ever match. A flex of the expansive $240 million four-year broadcast deal the NWSL inked in 2023.
We saw CBS, Amazon and ESPN all come together to create a ground-breaking simulcast to show Sunday’s NWSL match between the San Diego Wave and the North Carolina Courage across all platforms, both on television and streaming.
So, is there an impending void? A vacuum of stardom on the horizon for the U.S. women’s national team and the American game in general?
Well, you can hear the chants. Poetic now, it’s the farewell she deserves.
play-by-play announcer Maura Sheridan.
This was a question on people’s minds on Sunday night, whether in San Diego’s Snapdragon Stadium or at home watching from home, tuned into one of the many television channels.
There Morgan was, departing the field one final time. Literally stepping away from the game that had made her an icon.
Intentionally subbed off in the 13th minute, with the fourth official raising her ionic number.
Morgan paused in the center of the field, surrounded by her teary teammates and respectful opponents. She untied her aqua-colored cleats slowly, grasped them in her hand, and let the visual metaphor sink in of the athlete hanging up their cleats. Who would fill the shoes?
“Well, you can hear the chants,” play-by-play announcer Maura Sheridan uttered as the moment took place. “Poetic now, it’s the farewell she deserves. Alex Morgan walks off the pitch for the final time, the end of a legendary career.”
The 26,515-strong Snapdragon crowd rose to its feet and found a volume it didn’t know it previously had, roaring: “A-lex Mor-gan, A-lex Mor-gan…”
The next generation
While memorializing the end of Morgan’s playing career was the impetus of Sunday night, what we really learned from this moment, and the past few days, was that we are at the beginning of a new age.
One without Morgan, but brighter for everyone because of her career.
As Morgan leaves the game, what becomes clear is how much better off soccer is because of her. The stage she’s set for others to walk out onto is a much stronger one than when burst onto the public scene in 2010 with the USA – or when she made her NWSL home debut, for the Western New York Flash, in front of 2,164 in 2011.
This is evident in the tributes from the next generation of superstar players to have crossed paths with Morgan.
“You can say that she’s changed the game of soccer but it’s so much more than that, she’s changed the world in such an amazing way,” Trinity Rodman, who has played on the national team with Morgan since 2021, beamed to the media on Saturday, One of the many heirs to the throne of being the USA’s next most brilliant and high-profile superstar.
“I just looked up to her…the training wheels are coming off and it’s like passing the torch again. [I never thought] Alex Morgan was never going to retire, but now she is, it’s wild.”
Coaches too were effusive to note how they were inspired to demand more, and follow their dreams after encountering Morgan.
“She also influenced me, when I was at Tottenham,” Gotham FC head coach Juan Carlos Amoros said on Saturday. Amoros coached Morgan in North London during a brief five-month loan spell in the Fall of 2020. During that time, under pressure from Morgan and her relationship with Nike, Spurs’ women’s team started training at the men’s facilities.
“Once Alex [Morgan] came, the club really realized the power. It made everyone in the club realize how important the women’s club was. … She was always working the hardest, making everything the best it could be. Helping us behind the scenes. She was someone who gave me belief and strength.”
Morgan’s ability to change soccer came not only in terms of statistics, inspiration, and monetary growth, but because of player safety too.
Yes, Morgan helped propel a landslide of investment into the women’s game. But arguably within the game, her biggest achievement will be advocating for lesser-known players within the NWSL and the USWNT. Making their lives safer and happier.
Sinead Farrelly walked away from soccer in 2016 after falling victim to acts of abuse in the NWSL. Following Morgan’s advocacy for Farrelly and former teammate Mana Shim in 2021, the U.S. Soccer Federation and the NWSL led investigations to address the systemic abuse across the women’s professional game.
In 2023, Farrelly and Shim both returned to playing professional soccer and won the NWSL Championship with Gotham FC. Fittingly, on Sunday, at a NWSL match in New Jersey, Farrelly, 34, also formally retired too.
“The decision to play soccer again came from the heart, and I’m so proud of myself for facing the shadow rather than running from it,” Farrelly wrote in a personal essay, in the summer of 2023. “As scary as it was, and as much work as it’s required (and continues to require) me to put into it, I’ve arrived at a point of total fulfillment. I feel whole playing this beautiful game again.”
The joy Morgan inspired in peers and in the next generation is truly how her everlasting legacy will be measured.
When the television cameras turn on and capture all the major matches and breakout stars in U.S. soccer, it will be in part because of a path laid by Morgan.
When anyone in the soccer media landscape, including players, can find platforms or type on a keyboard to share their stories, analysis and opinions, it will be in part because of Morgan.
“I’m floored by how well covered this sport is 1725920768,” Morgan mused this past week about how the media has grown since 2010. “All of the reporters and people that dug in at little or no salary to cover women’s soccer for so long, when they did it for the passion. Because that’s what we did [as players].”
Morgan’s final match was billed as a goodbye. But in reality it’s a welcome note.
The acknowledgment of all her accomplishments has helped us see how far we’ve come. And, the next chapter starts now. A greater phase for soccer. An era that is budding with many different stars, protections, and investments.
New figures to meet the moment, stand in the spotlight and expand the stage even further.