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 JUNE 3 –10, 2019 VOLUME 130 | NOS. 14/15

BON VOYAGE
In their final World Cup tune-up
before heading to France, Tobin
Heath (17) and the USWNT took
down Mexico 3–0 on May 26.

PHO T OGR A PH BY
E R IC K W. R A S C O

ON T HE C O V ER:
Hair and Mak eup b y
Da v id Sear le, Jame s
A n t hon y and Vane s s a
Blanchar d L ee f or
A r t is t Un t ied A genc y

W O M E N ’ S
NBA FINALS College basketball
86

5 MINUTE GUIDE DRAYMOND GREEN ANTOINE DAVIS

Essential info for World Cup Regular-season force. Can the pencil-thin shooting
2019, whether you’re casual Postseason superhero guard eat his way to the NBA?
2 0 1 9 fan or hard-core supporter By L. Jon Wertheim
By Rob Mahoney

Baseball
92
MEGAN RAPINOE 1991 WORLD CUP NELLIEBALL
Captain. Playmaker. Activist. Origins of the women’s Cup A mad scientist coach saw THE SAVE
And this is her moment and the U.S. dynasty this NBA coming years ago How it changed baseball
By Jenny Vrentas By Grant wahl By chris ballard By Emma Baccellieri
Farewell, proven closer?
By Tom Verducci

Stanley Cup finals

MEET THE 23
Get to know the members of
the USWNT
By Avi Creditor, Laken Litman
and Kellen Becoats
OLIVIA MOULTRIE 80
Soccer
What a 13-year-old pro tells
100
us about women’s soccer,
youth sports and parenting
BRUINS VS. BLUES
By Chris Ballard
Their 1970 series—that WAR AND CLEATS
photo!—produced two paths Honduras vs. El Salvador, on
By Michael Farber, special the pitch and the battlefield
reporting by Alex Prewitt By Michael Mcknight

DEPARTMENTS SI T V P. 4 LE ADING OFF P. 6 EDITORS’ LE T TER P. 12 INBOX P. 14 SCOREC ARD P. 19 FACES IN THE CROWD P. 30 POINT AF TER P. 108
NOW ON

FILM
SCHOOL
Watching game
tape with an
NFL player
can be very
illuminating,
especially with
someone as
knowledgeable
as safety
Eric Weddle
(below), who
recently signed
a two-year deal
with the Rams
after spending
12 seasons
with the
Ravens and the
Chargers. The
MMQB’s Andy
Benoit sat
down for The
Big Interview
with Weddle,
who offered
insight on
everything
about the game.

A L F R A N C E S CO (D O B BS) M A RK A L B ER T I / I CO N SP O R T S WIRE /G E T T Y IM AG E S (D O B BS PA SSIN G); J O E R O B B IN S /G E T T Y IM AG E S (W ED D L E)

Flight Club
JOSH DOBBS is proud to be a nerd. Before he was drafted in the fourth round
by the Steelers in 2017 to back up quarterback Ben Roethlisberger, he graduated
from Tennessee with a 4.0 average and a degree in aerospace engineering.
“I was always fascinated with airplanes,” says Dobbs, who grew up in HOW TO
Alpharetta, Ga. In the latest installment of 24 Hours With . . . SI TV traveled WATCH
with Dobbs to Waco, Texas, as he fulfilled a childhood dream: flying a fighter
jet with the Air Force demonstration squadron known as the Thunderbirds. For classic
While he tries to fend off Mason Rudolph on Pittsburgh’s QB depth chart, Dobbs has an eye sports movies
on his post-NFL career, which may include designing airplanes. “Kids have dreams in athletics and TV shows,
and academics, and people try to put a lid on it and say you can’t do both,” says Dobbs, 24, plus Crossover
TV and other
who has attempted 12 passes in his two seasons with the Steelers. “I’m here to say you can.
compelling
There’s enough time in the day to accomplish everything you want in the classroom and on original
the sports field as long as you have the discipline and the time management to do it.” programming,
go to SI.TV

4 S P O R T S I L L U S T R A T E D | J U N E 3 –1 0 , 2 0 1 9
®/™ Trademarks © Mars, Incorporated 2019.

Like mother's milk.

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PEDIGREE® Puppy satisfies
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LEADING OFF

TOAST
OF
THE
COAST
HE BIGGEST stage race in the
T U.S., the Tour of California
attracts the world’s top
riders, who traverse a course that
ranges from beaches to vineyards to
snowcapped mountains. In recent
years it has also become a proving
ground for up-and-coming talent,
and the 14th edition, from May 12
to 18, was no exception. Four men
won their first World Tour stages,
including Tadej Pogačar of Slovenia,
20, who took the overall title.
The reigning women’s world road
champ, Anna van der Breggen of the
Netherlands, 29, was untouchable
over three stages.
 L’ETAPE UNIQUE
Stage 4 offered spectacular
views for the riders as they
traveled 138 miles along the
Pacific, from Monterey through
Big Sur (left) to Morro Bay.

PHO T OGR A PH BY
KOH JIRO K INNO
LEADING OFF FOLLOW @SIFULLFRAME

PELOTON
POSTCARDS SE A N M . H A F F E Y/G E T T Y IM AG E S (RI G H T ); L EF T, F R O M T O P : C H RIS G R AY T H EN /G E T T Y IM AG E S; KO H JIR O KIN N O ; SE A N M . H A F F E Y/G E T T Y IM AG E S

Stage 1 (top)
began with a
flat, 80-mile ride
around Sacramento
before mixing in
two punishing
uphill stages, from
Pismo Beach to
Ventura (center)
and from Stockton
to Morgan Hill,
which combined
for close to 25,000
feet of climbing.
The final stage of
the women’s race
(right) ran 78 miles
through the
Angeles National
Forest. Italian
rider Elisa Balsamo
outsprinted the
pack to capture
her first World Tour
stage victory.

8 S P O R T S I L L U S T R A T E D | J U N E 3 –1 0 , 2 0 1 9
LEADING OFF FOLLOW @SIFULLFRAME
 PINE TIME
The race’s second stage, on
May 13, was a 14,500-foot climb
through the Sierra Nevada range,
finishing at South Lake Tahoe’s
Heavenly Ski Resort.

PHO T OGR A PH BY
SE A N M. H A FFE Y/GE T T Y IM AGES
EDITORS’ LETTER

TEAM
SPIRIT
BY T HE EDI T ORS
OF SPOR T S ILLUS T R AT ED
OT COUNTING NBA-stocked
N Olympic basketball squads,
the women’s national soccer
team is the most galvanizing force
the U.S. sends onto the international
athletic stage. Since the Women’s
World Cup debuted in 1991—read the
origin story on page 54; listen to it by
downloading SI’s Throwback series
wherever you get your podcasts—
the U.S. has won three of the seven
tournaments. (Germany, with two, is
the only other nation with multiple
Cups.) The USWNT has been No. 1 in
the world rankings since June 2017; it
has never been lower than No. 2.
The Americans have been soccer
superwomen, yes, but they represent
far more. Brandi Chastain’s shirtless
World Cup celebration, 20 years ago
this summer, made her an instant
icon of female empowerment. Retired
star Abby Wambach is an activist
for women’s equality; current stars
Megan Rapinoe (page 32) and Alex
Morgan are leading a lawsuit against
U.S. Soccer to narrow the pay gap
between men and women. “Playing on
this team comes with a certain weight
when it comes to being in the public
eye,” defender Becky Sauerbrunn told
Yahoo! Sports last week. “It’s also one
of the blessings of being on this team,
that you have a chance to impact and
to inspire.”
Bringing us to this issue, our
preview of the 2019 Women’s World
Cup, which kicks off in France on
June 7. We wanted the cover to honor
not only the entire USWNT but also
the impact their fighting spirit has on
their young fans. So for a photo shoot
in San Jose last month we invited
U-8, U-9 and U-10 players from the
California Thorns and De Anza Force
North, two U.S. Soccer Development
Academy teams in the Bay Area, to
pose with the World Cup squad.
The result: Six collector newsstand
covers that, when laid side by side,
feature 23 world-class players and
23 next-gen hopefuls. (Subscribers
will receive a seventh cover with a
variation of the same theme; go to
backissues.si.com to order any of the
seven.) Winning the World Cup—that’s
the U.S.’s ultimate goal in France. But
the looks on those girls’ faces prove
that this team’s impact will be felt long
after a trophy moment.

Cover 1 USWNT: Alyssa Naeher, Mallory Pugh, Samantha Mewis, Becky Sauerbrunn; Youth: Marie Djacga, Scarlett Costa, Isabella
Guillebeaux, Sadie Goldberg Cover 2 USWNT: Kelley O’Hara, Morgan Brian, Abby Dahlkemper, Julie Ertz; Youth: Mariana Nanez, Sofia
R O B ER T B E C K (COV ERS); SI V ID E O (4)

Mello, Rishika Kothari Cover 3 USWNT: Lindsey Horan, Carli Lloyd, Ali Krieger, Tierna Davidson; Youth: Delaney Miskella, Avery Edson,
Isabella Cain, Emmy Salita Cover 4 USWNT: Alex Morgan, Emily Sonnett, Megan Rapinoe, Rose Lavelle; Youth: Madison Bowen, Kayla
Sims, Neirah Hafis, Sophie Stewart Cover 5 USWNT: Tobin Heath, Ashlyn Harris, Crystal Dunn, Allie Long; Youth: Claire Chen, Hannah
Goldberg, Molly Grodzinsky, Emmalina Abou-Assaleh Cover 6 USWNT: Adrianna Franch, Jessica McDonald, Christen Press; Youth:
Addison Subala, Sophia Kennedy-Contreras, Sophia Malloy, Katie Lu
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©2019 S-VC, Inc. GATORADE and the G BOLT Design are registered trademarks of S-VC, Inc.

GET MORE OUT OF ZERO.

ZS UE GRA OR
ALL THE ELECTROLYTESz
 As a baseball fan since
the early 1960s, I’m
finding today’s game
too boring and too
long. The solution
is simple: Keep the
25-man roster but
allow no more than
nine pitchers, instead
of the 12 or 13 most
teams have. This will
help pitchers pace
themselves and
prevent managers from

INBOX FOR MAY 20, 2019 FULL SWING

Baseball’s new boom-
overdosing on relievers
and slowing the pace
of play. The game could
or-bust era has much get back to normal
THE LAST WALTZ? basketball I’ve ever in common with the within a few years.
It was strange to read seen before KD got NBA’s sudden love of the George Harris
about the Warriors there. Now the Dubs run three-pointer.Here’s a Agoura Hills, Calif.
being so good even way too much isolation case in point: The Bucks
without their best for him. It may make took 44 threes in the
player, Kevin Durant, them more efficient, but Eastern Conference
only to watch them it’s not as much fun to finals opener, a
finish off Houston watch. 108–100 win over the
and sweep Portland Tork Mason Raptors, who put up
while KD sat out. Most Stevens Point, Wis. 42 shots from deep—
great players make (Via Facebook) between them, 46.5% of
their teammates their field goal attempts
better—Durant never DIVINE SECRETS were from beyond the
has. He said he joined I found it very arc. The next day, the
the Warriors because interesting that Brewers hit four home
they play basketball the Suzanne Lenglen runs to beat the Phillies RAW TALENT
way it’s supposed to be and the Williams 11–3, even though they I don’t have a beef
played, yet they do that sisters, despite struck out 14 times about this meat
judging (SI, May 6)
better when he’s not on their careers and left 12 runners

T O PI C A L PRE SS AG EN C Y/G E T T Y IM AG E S (L EN G L EN); G RE G N EL S O N

story, but it is a cut
the floor. It will be more separated by on base because above other SI articles.
fun to watch them win a nearly 85 years, they couldn’t get I hope that coaches
title without him. had overbearing small-ball hits.The grill the competitors in
(M E AT J U D G IN G); J O H N W. M C D O N O U G H (COV ER)

Kerry Walsh fathers who guided fundmentals are workouts to get a good
Clinton, Ind. their star paths. losing out to big- grade while making no
George Bertram time, splashy plays. mi-steaks.
Golden State played Campbellsville, Dave Wedeward Aldon Rachele
the most gorgeous Ky. Janesville, Wis. Roosevelt, Utah

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ON DECK
The next edition of SportS IlluStrated will
be the June 17, 2019, issue. Look for
it on newsstands and in your mailbox
beginning on June 12.

14 S P O R T S I L L U S T R A T E D | J U N E 3 –1 0 , 2 0 1 9
 Hillshire farm® turkey
is slow roasted for hours.
And devoured in seconds.

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every slice for freshness. Which leads to the best Turkey, Arugula & Tomato sandwich
you’ve ever tasted. Visit HillshireFarm.com for more sandwich inspiration.
 NEWSMAKERS P. 2 2
A FORCE
DE TOUR
AF TER WINNING HIS
FOURTH MAJOR IN T WO
YEARS, BROOKS KOEPK A
HEADS TO PEBBLE BEACH
IN FULL CONTROL
BY MICH A EL ROSENBERG
PHO T OGR A PH BY ERICK W. R A SCO
A LIFE REMEMBERED P. 2 3 GAMEPLAN P. 2 4
B
ROOKS KOEPKA will arrive
at Pebble Beach Golf Links
this month seeking his
third straight U.S. Open title—which,
like most things with Koepka these
days, seems utterly impossible and
entirely likely. He was not supposed to
win two straight Opens. He was not
supposed to follow with two straight
PGA Championships. He has turned
the expectations of the sport inside-
out. How much longer can he do it?
Any attempt to put Koepka in
historical context runs the dual risks
of overhyping or diminishing him.
Yes, what he has done in the last two
years is reminiscent of the best runs
of Jack Nicklaus and Tiger Woods.
J U N E 3 –1 0 , 2 0 1 9 | S P O R T S I L L U S T R A T E D
FACES IN THE CROWD P. 3 0
No, this does not mean he is as good
as Nicklaus or Woods. And no, that is
not an insult.
Other golfers (chart, next page)
have been as dominant as Nicklaus
or Woods for a stretch, just as other
baseball players can put together a
week or two to rival Mike Trout’s best.
Tom Watson won five majors from
1980 through ’83; Rory McIlroy’s run
of four started with the 2011 U.S. Open
and ended with the ’14 PGA. But what
distinguished Nicklaus and Woods was
an ability to play so well for so long.
How can Koepka match them? He
must stay healthy. He must maintain
his mental state as he gets older. And
he will probably have to prove he can
19
 SCORECARD
GO
FIGURE Super streaks
After winning the PGA Championship at Bethpage last month, Brooks Koepka
became just the sixth player in the modern era to win four majors in the span of
win on a variety of layouts. three seasons. Jack Nicklaus and Tiger Woods have done it twice.
Because he drives the ball an
average of 308.7 yards, Koepka is
1951 1960 1965 1970
easily dismissed as a power-hitting
bro. The truth is that he is very smart; 1952 1961 1966 1971
he has a magnificent short game and
1953 1962 1967 1972
putting stroke. And what makes those
bombs off the tee so impressive is that
BEN HOGAN ARNOLD PALMER JACK NICKLAUS
he controls them. Of the 13 players
ahead of him in driving distance,
only one, Gary Woodland, is better at
1980 2000 2005 2017
keeping the ball in the fairway.
Koepka’s ability to control long 1981 2001 2006 2018
drives explains why his four major
1982 2002 2007 2019
wins are U.S. Opens and PGAs. The
Masters, with its forgiving “second
TOM WATSON TIGER WOODS BROOKS KOEPKA
cut” of near-rough, does not demand
strict accuracy off the tee. And the
British Open, with its ancient, dry, KEY: THE MASTERS U.S. OPEN BRITISH OPEN PGA CHAMPIONSHIP
contoured courses and heavy winds,
does not require long, towering drives.
The Masters and British both a major when he contends. McIlroy played the course. He shot an even-
reward creativity and imagination sometimes has trouble getting out par 70. And Sunday, playing in a
above all else. Koepka has played well of his own head. But Koepka has the brutal wind, Koepka finally started
in each, at times—he finished second ability to perform under pressure, struggling, but he never panicked.

B RY N N A N D ERS O N /A P/SH U T T ERS T O C K (C A N O); M EL ISS A M A J C H R Z A K / N BA E /G E T T Y

this year at Augusta—but he has yet to to think under pressure and to Many rowdy and frequently obnoxious
win either. Koepka probably can’t get understand how the course and his fans at Bethpage were desperate to see
to 10 major wins by winning just U.S. swing change from day to day. him fail, if only for the theater. Koepka

IM AG E S (KO RV ER); IS T O C K P H O T O/G E T T Y IM AG E S (CO PY M AC HIN E)

Opens and PGAs. Last month’s U.S. Open win at parred three of the last four holes in
What made Woods and Nicklaus so Bethpage Black illustrates the point. extremely difficult conditions to beat
good, at their peaks, was that on any On Thursday his swing was grooved, Johnson by two strokes.
kind of course, in any conditions, they and he shot a 63 that could have been “I do think this is probably even
were the best player in the world. We a 61. But then, as caddie Ricky Elliott more satisfying than his other wins,”
can’t say that about Koepka . . . yet. later said, “He didn’t hit the ball too Elliott said, and Koepka agreed. It
But we can say this: He is the best well on Friday, but his misses were on was his most satisfying because, on
player in the world at managing the fairway.” Koepka still shot 65. Sunday, it was the most difficult.
his game in tense moments. Dustin Armed with a seven-stroke lead But winning major championships
Johnson is good for at least one really on Saturday, Koepka did not try to is almost always difficult. Koepka
poor decision in the final round of protect it or expand it; he simply cannot make it seem easy forever. ±
SIGN OF THE
APOCALYPSE

THEY SAID IT

BENCHED BY THE METS AFTER “ W H AT ’ S Y O U R ∑ KYLE KORVER, Jazz guard in

TWICE NOT RUNNING OUT his Creighton commencement
GROUND BALLS, ROBINSON T R A D E VA L U E ? speech, recalling the time
CANÓ HAD TO LEAVE A GAME A P P A R E N T LY the Nets traded him for
TWO DAYS LATER WHEN HE cash considerations and
INJURED HIS QUAD RUNNING
MINE IS A
OUT A GROUND BALL. COPY MACHINE.” to buy a photocopier.

20 S P O R T S I L L U S T R A T E D | J U N E 3 –1 0 , 2 0 1 9
 Lower carbs. Lower calories.
Higher expectations.

2.6 g C A R B S
90 C A LO R I E S

TM

Drink responsibly. Corona Premier® Beer. Imported by Crown Imports, Chicago, IL. Per 12 fl. oz. serving average analysis: Calories 90, Carbs 2.6 grams,
Protein 0.7 grams, Fat 0.0 grams. Compared to 12 fl. oz. serving Corona Extra Calories: 149, Carbs: 14.0 grams, Protein: 1.2 grams, Fat: 0.0 grams.
 SCORECARD

NEWSMAKERS

OF ROYAL
LINEAGE
FIRST PROGENY ARE
HIT TING THE TRACK

NAME TRACK PLACE PRICE INCE RETIRING from racing in 2015, Triple
S Crown winner American Pharoah has sired
Naas (Ireland) 1st (of 8) $750,000 hundreds of foals from the stables at Coolmore
Tesorina 3rd (of 6) N/A Ashford Stud for six-figure fees. His yearlings—

H EIN Z K LU E T M EIER (A M ERI C A N PH A R OA H); DAV ID FI T ZG ER A L D/SP O R T SFIL E /G E T T Y IM AG E S (M O N A R C H O F E G Y P T ); S A M M EL L ISH / IN PI C T U RE S /

G E T T Y IM AG E (KIP C H O G E); CO U R T E S Y O F PELO T O N ( T RE A D MIL L); J E SSI C A RIN A L D I / T H E B OS T O N G LO B E ( T R A F FI C); G E T T Y IM AG E S (S Q U IRREL)
including the cleverly named Mia Pharoah, Egyptian
Maven 1st (of 6) N/A Princess and American Dream—have sold for as much
as $2.2 million at auction. Now some are starting to hit
the track as 2-year-olds. On April 13, Monarch of Egypt,
Sweet Melania Belmont Park (U.S.) 3rd (of 5) $600,000 a chestnut colt who sold for $750,000 last September,
comfortably won a five-furlough race at Naas
South Saqqara Cork (IREland) 7th (of 10) $300,000
Racecourse in Ireland. Five others have since debuted.

Kipchoge’s projected
TRACK average speed

At Full Speed Maximum speed on

the Peloton Tread
Eliud Kipchoge of Kenya, the holder of the marathon
world record at 2:01:39, set in Berlin last September,
who also ran a 2:00:25 in an unofficial Nike- Inner-city peak traffic speed in Boston, rated
sponsored time trial in 2017, announced he will the most-congested city in the U.S. by INRIX
11
once again attempt to break two hours this October mph
in London. To break the barrier, Kipchoge, 34, will Top speed of a
have to average 4:34.57 per mile over the 26.2-mile gray squirrel
course. To put that into perspective, consider this:

22 S P O R T S I L L U S T R A T E D | J U N E 3 –1 0 , 2 0 1 9
 A LIFE REMEMBERED

BILL
BUCKNER
1949–2019

HEN HE broke into the majors with

W the Dodgers in the early 1970s, Bill
Buckner was a promising prospect
out of Napa (Calif.) High who could do it all:
run, hit for average and power, and play a slick
first base. In ’75, a serious ankle injury took
away his speed; he played hurt for the rest of
his career. Before every game, Buckner went
through a series of elaborate exercises just to get
himself on the field. “One of the guttiest players
around today,” writer Dick Young remarked
in ’77. “He plays with a bad ankle, takes an
aspirin, and steals a base.” Buckner, who died
this week at 69, would play until he was 40 years
old—22 seasons, for five teams. In 2004, as one
of his former clubs, the Red Sox, marched to a
World Series win, Buckner could barely watch.
“I couldn’t even enjoy it. I kept getting pissed
off—them showing that play,” he told SI. That
play, of course, was the ground ball that rolled
between his legs, allowing the Mets to win
Game 6 of the 1986 World Series. “I don’t
think that’s what sports should be about.
I finally got up and said, ‘Forget this.’ ”
Eventually, Sox fans came to
understand that Buckner’s career was
about much more than one play: He was a
batting champ, an All-Star, a career .289
hitter who logged 2,715 hits. In 2008,
Buckner returned, finally, to Fenway
Park to throw out the first pitch at
Boston’s home opener. “[It was]
about as emotional as it could get,”
he said. “I had to forgive the media
for what they put me and my
family through. I’ve done that,
and I’m just happy.” ±
F O C US O N SP O R T S /G E T T Y IM AG E S

J U N E 3 –1 0 , 2 0 1 9 | S P O R T S I L L U S T R A T E D 23
GAMEPLAN: THE SMART FAN’S GUIDE TO RIGHT NOW

TROPHY WATCH

LIFE UEFA CHAMPIONS

LEAGUE FINAL
June 1, 3 p.m. ET on TNT
Finally, an English
WAY NE GRE T Z K Y
team not named
IN T ER V IE W S S TA NL E Y Manchester City will
CUP WINNERS ABOUT win a trophy. Finalists
HOISTING HOCKEY’S Tottenham and
Liverpool both trailed
ULT IM AT E P RI Z E
3–0 in the semis.

LISTEN
READ
THE GREAT ONE ON 1
Available now on Apple Podcasts, THE MVP MACHINE
Spotify and NHL.com By Ben Lindbergh and Travis
Last year, while filming a Sawchik, out June 4
series of sit-downs with The authors go deep
celebrity hockey fans, inside baseball to
Wayne Gretzky would reveal how data
warn his guest that he is driving player
was still learning how to evaluations in front
conduct interviews. “I can offices across Major
be interviewed all day long League Baseball.
and it doesn’t bother me,”
Gretzky says. “It’s not as
easy to ask the questions.”
This year, taping a
four-part podcast for

B RU C E B EN N E T T S T U D I OS /G E T T Y IM AG E S (G RE T ZK Y ); I CO N S BY M A R T IN L A K SM A N (3)
NHL Studios, he was less
nervous—partly thanks
to that past experience,
but also because he was
talking about a subject
he knows well: winning a WATCH
Stanley Cup. Gretzky and
his guests—Mark Messier,
QUIET STORM: THE
Luc Robitaille, Martin
RON ARTEST STORY
St. Louis and T.J. Oshie—
May 31, 10 p.m. ET on
discuss playoff memories
Showtime
and what it’s like to win it
Director Johnny
all. “By no means am I Doc
Sweet’s new film
Emrick,” Gretzky says,
documents a complex
“but Doc Emrick can’t
athlete’s challenging
skate like I can.”
upbringing and
—Jacob Feldman
controversial career.

24 S P O R T S I L L U S T R A T E D | J U N E 3 –1 0 , 2 0 1 9
 SCORECARD

HEALTH That was the case for Sue Knight, who was
diagnosed with breast cancer in January 2014. The

THE GOOD
51-year-old Milwaukee real estate agent enjoyed
sports but, like Cooley, never contemplated doing a

RACE
triathlon. She started training with Team Phoenix a
few weeks after her treatment ended, even though
she could barely walk up the stairs. But, slowly,
A PROGRAM HELPS CANCER the Team Phoenix staff built Knight’s strength,
SURVIVORS GO FROM and she finished the race. She then came back as
T RE AT MEN T T O T RI AT HL ON a volunteer to help more survivors, and she’s even
persuaded her daughter to attempt the triathlon.
“The camaraderie and sisterhood in the 14 weeks
is amazing,” Knight says. “That’s what kept me
BY JEREM Y FUCHS going—so much encouragement and support.”

EVERLY COOLEY, a 52-year-old college

B academic adviser in Milwaukee,
likes to be active. Until recently that
meant walking 60 minutes every other day and
taking Zumba classes. But a triathlon? No way.
(Especially because she just learned to swim.)
How about the idea of attempting one a year after
a cancer diagnosis? “I would’ve thought you were
crazy!” Cooley says.
But it’s not crazy. After her June 2018 diagnosis,
Cooley was declared cancer-free in April, and
this summer she’ll become one of 250 women to
have participated in Team Phoenix, an initiative
founded in 2011 by Milwaukee’s Aurora Research
Institute that plunges female cancer survivors into
a 14-week program to get them ready for a sprint
triathlon—a 750-meter swim, 20-kilometer bike Team Phoenix is not the only program of its MAXIMUM
ride and five-kilometer run. kind. In 1995 a Canadian doctor started a club for EFFORT
“Our job is not done just getting a patient dragon boat racing—an ancient Chinese rowing More than
through surgery or chemo or radiation,” says sport—in Vancouver. The International Breast 50% of Team
Judy Tjoe, a breast oncology surgeon at Aurora Cancer Paddlers Commission now has festivals Phoenix
Comprehensive Breast Cancer Center and the around the world, with partner organizations in athletes have
program’s founder. “The reason for treatment is to nine countries, including the U.S. continued
give people a life. But it needs to be a good life.” For Cooley, the benefits of triathlon training to attempt
Research shows that exercise may increase aren’t just physical. “You meet people and you don’t triathlons
long-term cancer survival rates and decrease the have to explain a lot of things,” she says. “We all after finishing
their first, the
risk of recurrence. Despite that, most don’t adhere have different types of cancer. But we all heard the
organization
to the American Cancer Society’s guidelines for words you have cancer. That bonds you.”
says.
exercise—at least 150 minutes of moderate activity When Cooley races on July 28, she’ll have
SE A N K EN N EDY (K NI G H T )

a week—and even if they do, many stop three to company: Knight plans to participate despite her
six months after treatment is finished. But 85% cancer’s recurrence. “It’s important to get my body
of Team Phoenix members continue to exercise back,” Cooley says. “It’s shifting my mind from ‘I’m
according to the ACS guidelines. trying to live’ to ‘I’m living life again.’ ” ±

J U N E 3 –1 0 , 2 0 1 9 | S P O R T S I L L U S T R A T E D 25
 SCORECARD
NOMINATE NOW
To submit a candidate for Faces in the
Crowd, email faces@simail.com
For more on outstanding amateur
athletes, follow @SI_Faces on Twitter.

FACES IN THE CROWD Edited by JEREMY FUCHS

MARGO MASON MCKENZIE PAAP DREW PAIGE BEENEY DAVID

Lacrosse Softball SHELLENBERGER Bowling HUNSBERGER
Pittsburgh Excelsior, Minn. Triathlon Salado, Texas Wrestling
Indianapolis Duncan, S.C.
Mason, a junior Paap, a senior Beeney, a senior at
midfielder at outfielder for Drew, a junior at Stephen F. Austin, David, a freshman at
Westminster College in Minnesota State, in Southport High, was named MVP Byrnes High, pinned
New Wilmington, Pa., Mankato, broke school finished in 1:01:33 of the Division I Summerville’s Rico
netted 10 goals in a career records for hits to take his third championships after Robinson in the first
16–8 win over Notre (307), runs (197) and consecutive USA rolling eight strikes period to take the
Dame of Maryland stolen bases (112) Triathlon High and a spare in a 4–1 106-pound title in
in the Division III in a doubleheader School national finals victory over Class 5A, capping
tournament. She’s sweep of Upper Iowa. championship, top-ranked Vanderbilt. a 50–0 season. He
only the third player in She finished the year winning by 2:32. Last She had a total pinfall earned county and
the event’s history to batting .364 with October he came in of 626 over three region II-5A titles, and
score 10 times. Mason 42 steals. In 2017, seventh at the Youth games. Beeney earned he also beat seven
finished the season Paap ranked third in Olympic Games in honorable mention eventual champions
with 96 goals. hits (100) in Division II. Buenos Aires. All-America. from four other states.

US A F O T O IN C . (M A S O N); B RID G E T F OW L ER /SPX SP O R T S (PA A P); CO U R T E S Y O F D RE W SH EL L EN B ER G ER (SH EL L EN B ER G ER);

UPDATE

H A RDY M ERED I T H (B EEN E Y ); H ER A L D J O U RN A L /G O U P S TAT E (H U N SB ER G ER); B E V ERLY S C H A EF ER (U PDAT E)

Game of Throws
Obiageri Amaechi, a sophomore at Princeton, appeared in Faces in
the Crowd in the Sept. 24–Oct. 1, 2018, issue, after taking gold in
the discus at the U.S. junior championships with a throw of 186' 11", a
personal best and an Ivy League record at the time. She has since broken
that mark multiple times—most recently at the Ivy League Heptagonal
Championships, in May, when the San Francisco native had a throw of
190' 1", the 10th-best heave in the nation at any level this season. It was
good enough to earn Amaechi a second straight top two league finals
finish; she was also named the meet’s most outstanding performer. An
All-America, she has been throwing only since her freshman year at
Abraham Lincoln High. Last season Amaechi, who also finished 14th at
the junior worlds in Tampere, Finland, was seventh at the NCAAs. —J.F.

30 S P O R T S I L L U S T R A T E D | J U N E 3 –1 0 , 2 0 1 9
 MEGAN RAPINOE
by kneeling during
Her roles as activist

32 JENNY
BY PHOTOGR APH BY
BR A D SMITH/
VRENTAS ISI/SHU T T ER S T OC K
 IN P IN O E

V E R I TA S

is a lead plaintiff in a gender-discrimination lawsuit against U.S. Soccer who drew the federation’s ire
the national anthem. She’s also the co-captain and key playmaker for a team seeking its fourth world title.
and team leader would pose a tricky balance for some—but she has been waiting for this moment

W O M E N ’ S

2 0 1 9
 U S A

W W C

THE STANDOUT
Rapinoe’s platinum-
blonde hair may be her
most distinctive trait
appearance-wise, but it’s
nothing compared to her
freewheeling style of play.

Alex Morgan, “both on and off the field.”

Megan Rapinoe demands your attention. The veteran
forward buzzes around the left side of the U.S. attack,
constantly threatening to create scoring chances.
Wherever her platinum-blonde hair flashes on the pitch,
she is finding the ball, sucking in defenders, bending the
play to her will. ¶ In the 35th minute of a friendly against
New Zealand in mid-May, Rapinoe makes one of those
plays the U.S. women’s national team will need in the
World Cup: Spotting forward Tobin Heath near the far
post, she whips a low cross through two Kiwis to her
teammate, who taps it in for the goal, the first in a 5–0 win.
Heath leaps into Rapinoe’s arms, one of which is encircled by the
blue captain’s armband, in front of a crowd of 35,761 at Busch Stadium inequality by kneeling during the national
in St. Louis. On the ESPN broadcast, former team captain Julie Foudy
praises the vision and footwork necessary to facilitate the play. “All Soccer requiring players to stand.
of that,” she says, “is Megan Rapinoe.” The game is merely a tune-up
for what’s to come this month in France. Still, Rapinoe does what she from the broader public and skepticism from
Rapinoe’s freewheeling style of play led to
the World Cup moments, eight years ago, that
introduced America to her. There was that
time against Colombia when she scored and
then grabbed an on-field microphone to belt
out “Born in the U.S.A.,” and that perfect left-
footed cross she launched 45 yards straight to
Abby Wambach’s head to save the quarterfinal
against Brazil and secure her place in Ameri-
can soccer history.
Since then, Rapinoe, 33, has continued to star
for the U.S. while using her voice for more than
karaoke. She is just as enamored of the game as
she was when she and her fraternal
twin, Rachael, would travel 21⁄2 hours
one-way from their hometown in
Redding, Calif., to club practice in
Sacramento. But now in her third
and likely final World Cup, the games
have taken on a new meaning: The
renown her play earns her will help
spotlight her activism.
She has been one of the team’s
clearest voices in demanding gender
equality, in March bringing suit
against U.S. Soccer with 27 of her
teammates, alleging gender dis-
crimination. (The case is proceed-
ing in federal court.) And nearly
three years ago, she risked her
spot on the national team to join
Colin Kaepernick in peaceful protest of racial
anthem before games, which resulted in U.S.
Her boldness has brought some criticism
R O B ER T B E C K

always has, through her 153 (and counting) national-team caps—she U.S. Soccer; not long ago, she wondered if her
makes everything happen. international career was fading out. But today
“Every team needs a Megan Rapinoe,” says superstar forward she shares the team captaincy with Morgan

34 SPORT S ILLUS TR ATED J U N E 3 –1 0 , 2 0 1 9

 P R E V I E W

M E G A N R A P I N O E

and Carli Lloyd precisely because of her defiance of both age and
convention. In challenging the established orders in her sport and
her country, Rapinoe brought new challenges upon herself—and she
raised not only her voice but her game.

T WA S on the flight back from Germany after the 2011 World

Cup that Rapinoe, 26 years old and newly famous, decided she
would tell the world she was gay. Her sexuality wasn’t a secret;
she had been out to family and friends since her days as an All-American
at Portland. She had also been vocal on social media in support of gay
rights. Her teammate and close friend Lori Lindsey suggested bringing
her own story to the cause. Lindsey knew Rapinoe had the star power,
charisma and conviction for her words to travel.
The next summer, before the 2012 Olympics, Out published an interview
with Rapinoe in which she became the first prominent U.S. women’s
soccer player to say publicly that she is gay. That was the beginning
of her activism. A few months later, Lindsey, too, came out
in an online magazine for LGBTQ+ women.
Rapinoe leans on a strong support system
that includes Rachael, who played with her
on the 2005 NCAA national championship
team, and her parents, Jim and Denise, who
had been responsible for driving the twins to those club soccer practices.
The youngest of six kids, Megan and Rachael always had a ball with
them, so Denise enrolled them in soccer at age five—but she also took
them to volunteer around their community in rural Northern California,
at their church, homeless shelters and food banks.
When Rapinoe came out publicly, she was thinking of kids like the one
she had been, quiet and not entirely comfortable in her own skin until
she discovered her sexuality. “As she developed more confidence and
security in who she was, slowly her voice became bigger,” Rachael says.
This spring, Rapinoe became the first openly gay woman to pose for
SI Swimsuit, challenging the issue’s hetero norms; this month, Rapinoe
is launching a fashion-related business with Heath, Christen Press
and Meghan Klingenberg that she says has little to do with sports.
She also now leans on her partner, WNBA star and four-time Olympic
champion Sue Bird, whom she began dating in 2016, one of the most
turbulent periods in Rapinoe’s life. Rapinoe copied the diet, training
and sleep regimen that helped Bird extend her playing career and also
found her “sounding board.”
After Rapinoe came out publicly, she emerged as a regular starter and
one of the best players in the world during the U.S.’s 2012 gold medal
run, scoring two goals in the 4–3 dramatic semifinal win over Canada.
Since then, she has been named a World Cup All-Star (2015) and has
twice been short-listed for FIFA Women’s Player of the Year (’15, ’18).
Lindsey, an alternate for those London Games, noticed a new freedom
to Rapinoe’s play from the previous year in Germany—something she
has continued to see since. “The more she speaks out, she is bring-
ing more to her game,” Lindsey says. “There’s a power to it that goes
beyond the field. When what you are doing goes beyond soccer, the
playing aspect doesn’t feel as heavy.”
U S A

W W C

I WAS ON MY OWN,” RAPINOE SAYS. “THAT OPENED UP THIS NEW CONFIDENCE IN ME OF LIKE, F--- IT,
I KNOW THAT IN MY HEART, MY INTENTIONS ARE GOOD , AND
WHETHER SOCIETY AT LARGE IS SUPPORTING ME, IT’S NOT SOMETHING I CAN GUIDE MY DECISIONS ON.

N SEP TEMBER 2016, both Rapinoe and the women’s national
team were at crucial points. She was then nine months removed
from her third ACL tear since ’06, suffered during the ’15 World
Cup victory tour, and one month removed from the disappointing Rio
Games. (The U.S. lost on penalty kicks in the quarterfinals to Sweden,
missing the final for the first time since women’s soccer became an
Olympic sport in 1996. Because of her right-knee injury, Rapinoe had
played only 27 minutes.) “There were a lot of things happening all at
that same time,” Rapinoe says. “It was kind of like this defining mo-
ment in my life. Like, what are you going to be?”
Rapinoe’s team, Seattle Reign FC, was in Chicago one Sunday to
play the Red Stars. The decision she made that night, to kneel dur-
ing the national anthem, was meant as a small gesture of solidarity.
She thought simply that Kaepernick’s peaceful protest against racial
injustice, which had begun two weeks earlier,
was worth joining; as an advocate herself for
LGBTQ+ rights, Rapinoe could relate to his fight.
“He was out there, kind of on his own,” she says.
On her team, and in women’s soccer, so was
she. The Reign’s next game was near Wash-
ington; Lori Lindsey was living in D.C. and
decided to attend. As she walked up to the
Maryland SoccerPlex several minutes before
kickoff, Lindsey couldn’t figure out why she
was hearing the national anthem. Washington
Spirit owner Bill Lynch had worked to head off
Rapinoe’s demonstration by ordering that it
be played while both teams were still in their

“and [you] don’t have time

For the U.S.’s most versatile player, the journey from left behind to left back was
a painful one—but there’s a happy ending, no matter what happens in France
BY LAKEN LITMAN
CRYSTAL DUNN wanted to
watch the 2015 Women’s
World Cup—just not by
herself. And that was a
problem for the fragile
22-year-old defender.
She was the last player
cut before the U.S. squad
headed off to Canada
that June, and it was too
humiliating to relive that
pain with her teammates
on the NWSL’s Washington
Spirit. Dunn recalls feeling
embarrassed, “like I’m
useless, worthless.” Her
family, six hours away
in Rockville Center, N.Y.,
wasn’t an option either.
What Dunn needed was
someone nearby who loved
soccer as much as she did,
and who wouldn’t judge her
emotions, which she says
were “up, down, all around.”
One person had potential:
the Spirit’s French-born
athletic trainer, Pierre
Soubrier. He was cool
and kind, and he knew
the game well from his
days playing in the French
Ligue 1 with Toulouse FC.
Eventually Dunn asked him
to watch with her. Soubrier
was hesitant; they had a
professional relationship.
But he agreed, and the two
hit it off while catching the
U.S.’s three knockout-stage
games at a D.C. bar.
Soubrier would listen
to Dunn vent and then
remind her how talented
she was, advising her to
use the adversity as a
learning experience. “Life’s
too short,” he would say,
to waste with negative
thoughts.” Recalls Dunn,
“That’s what saved me,
knowing that life goes
on—there’ll be a couple of
months where you feel left
behind, but then you realize:
I’m valuable. And I can work
on ways to improve.”
Now, Dunn sees how it’s
all connected: her getting
cut, her reaching out to
Soubrier, her growth off
the field and on it. Three
months after her U.S.
teammates lifted the
World Cup trophy she won
NWSL’s MVP award, as
a high-scoring forward.
(Her 15 goals were one
behind the league record.)
She made the 2016
Summer Olympic team
 P R E V I E W

M E G A N R A P I N O E

locker rooms, “rather than subject our fans and
friends to the disrespect we feel such an act
would represent,” the team said in a statement.
“F---ing unbelievable,” Rapinoe told reporters
after the game.
Later that month the USWNT played two
friendlies, against Thailand and the Nether-
lands. Rapinoe continued to kneel. U.S. Soc-
cer issued a statement during the first of those
matches saying that it expected players and
coaches to stand for the anthem “as part of the
privilege to represent your country.”
Morgan says, “I never saw her as not being one
of the core players of this team.” As for how the
federation and the fans were treating Rapinoe?
“I don’t feel like she was always supported.”
In the months that followed, Rapinoe believed
she was “on the outs” with the national team.
She was not called up for two October friendlies
against Switzerland; in November, she did not
DAV ID E . K LU T H O
“I could have faded out pretty easily. My back really was against the
wall, in a lot of different ways,” Rapinoe says. One of those ways was
that Rapinoe was still working her way back to her pre-injury level of
play. That was the reason USWNT coach Jill Ellis gave to ESPN then
for Rapinoe’s absence. But after U.S. Soccer adopted a policy in Febru-
ary that all players “shall stand respectfully” during the playing of the
anthem, she was called up for the next matches.
“U.S. Soccer can say what they want, but I never really saw the field
again until the new rule was made that you are not allowed to kneel,”
Rapinoe says. “Sometimes the obvious thing is the obvious thing. No
one ever said that, of course, and there were other factors as well; I
don’t want to say that was everything. That puts Jill in an awkward
position for me to say that. But I didn’t ever play until the rule was
made. If that’s an odd coincidence, then I guess that is what it is.” (A
U.S. Soccer spokesperson declined to comment.)
Those close to Rapinoe noticed the criticism had taken a toll. “She
has always been really loved,” Lindsey says, “and I think for the first
time she really got a sense of, there are hate messages; they are scary
and real.” Rapinoe describes that time as “personally, very challenging
for me.” She lost weight. The Rapinoe SC business she started with

dress for two matches against Romania. When Rachael took a substantial revenue hit from decreased attendance at
the roster for the SheBelieves Cup was announced their training clinics and a decline in apparel sales. Their customer
in the spring of 2017, Rapinoe was again left off. inquiry inbox was flooded with hate mail; a local club team they were

at forward and started leading role. The two

all four games. She spent
a season with Chelsea,
where the experience of
four Champions League
games forced her to learn
to be more technical and
tactical, seeing the field
better and more creatively
and becoming more active
without the ball. That
versatility helped her lead
the North Carolina Courage
to the NWSL title in ’18 and
will now allow coach Jill
Ellis to deploy her as the
USWNT’s first choice left
back in France. Dunn credits
this resurgence to Soubrier,
who, she says, “helped me
see that [’15] was just the
beginning of my story.”
It’s a story in which
Soubrier now plays a
started dating after that
2015 NWSL season and
married last December
on Long Island. “Who’s
to say [this] would have
happened if I were at the
World Cup [four years
ago]?” Dunn says.
“It was part of the
learning experience, how
pissed off she was,” adds
the 31-year-old Soubrier,
who’s now the head trainer
for the Portland Thorns.
(This month he’ll cheer for
his adopted team over his
native France, which has
the second-best Cup odds,
behind the U.S.) “Looking
back at how much good this
one thing has had on her
professionally, personally—
it’s been a blessing.”
 U S A

W W C

partnering with for a soccer clinic near D.C. in October 2016 suggested its World Cup play. Rapinoe wants the lawsuit
a venue change and extra security to protect against protestors. (None to remain a topic during the tournament; she
showed up.) “The hate that came out of it was really sad,” Rachael says, wants the federation to have to explain why she
“and I think that’s why Megan still feels heavy about the situation.” earns less than men do.
These days, the sight of Rapinoe standing stoically with her hands “I will be, I am sure, frustrated for the rest
clasped behind her back during the anthem still angers some fans. of my life with these issues, as many other
But she isn’t changing her ways, not now, not after her lonely protest marginalized people are,” she says. “But we
clarified her purpose. “I was on are making progress, and we are seeing that
my own,” Rapinoe says. “That groundswell, and that shift in culture and the
opened up this new confidence in FOLLOWING SUIT narrative. It is extremely motivating and en-
me of like, F--- it, I know that in Rapinoe hopes the ergizing to feel as if you are part of change. To
players’ case for
my heart, my intentions are good, be a part of that greater movement within this
equal treatment gets
and whether society at large is sup- even more attention country, whether it is Black Lives Matter, the
porting me, it’s not something I can during the team’s run #MeToo movement, Time’s Up, the women’s
guide my decisions on.” in France. movement—that’s an incredible feeling.”
Rapinoe has al-
N THE 30-plus years that ready decided how
the U.S. women have played I HAVE she would respond
internationally, they have
LEARNED TO t o a n i n v i t a t i on
enjoyed more competitive success to visit the W hite
than their male counterparts— USE MY House if the U.S.
three World Cup titles and four PLATFORM successfully defends
Olympic golds, compared with FOR GREATER its World Cup title:
zero of each. Nevertheless, the THINGS THAN “Absolutely not.”
women contend, gender-based She would be open
discrimination has affected their
SOCCER,Ó ALEX to going to Wash-
paychecks and playing, training MORGAN SAYS. ing ton and meet-
and travel accommodations. U.S. AND
“ ing with members of
Soccer has denied the claims, THAT’S government, but not
countering that the men’s and
GOT A President Trump.
women’s teams are separate or-
ganizations with different pay LOT TO “I am not going to
fake it, hobnob with
structures, with the women paid DO WITH the president, who
guaranteed salaries and benefits PINOE. is clearly against so
while the men are compensated many of the things
when they report for national that I am [for] and so
team duty. many of the things
The five players who filed a wage-discrimination complaint with that I actually am,” Rapinoe says. “I have no
the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission in March 2016 got interest in extending our platform to him.”
notice of their right to sue earlier this year, allowing them to bring Back in St. Louis, as Rapinoe warms up,
their fight to federal court. On March 8 of this year, International watching from the stands is a 48-year-old
Women’s Day, 28 players brought a gender discrimination lawsuit woman wearing a number 15 jersey. Ramona
against U.S. Soccer. Rapinoe is the second named plaintiff. Morgan Midgett and her husband, David, got hooked on
is first. “I have learned to use my platform for greater things than women’s soccer during the 2011 World Cup—the
soccer,” Morgan says, “and that’s got a lot to do with Pinoe.” tournament that launched both Rapinoe the
The suit is about more than top players’ wages, she argues. It’s about player and Rapinoe the activist. Midgett cheers
equal investment in women’s programs at all levels. “The interest the way her favorite player makes things hap-
EL S A /G E T T Y IM AG E S

for women’s sports is there. I see it every day,” Rapinoe says. “Look pen, on and off the field. “I love how outspoken
at what the national team has done with not as much funding and she is, and how she stands up for everyone’s
investment from the federation.” rights,” she says. “She represents what America
Naturally, the national team has been asked if the lawsuit will affect should be.” ±

38 SPORT S ILLUS TR ATED J U N E 3 –1 0 , 2 0 1 9

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42 SPORT S ILLUS TR ATED J U N E 3 –1 0 , 2 0 1 9
 B Y AVI CREDITOR,
L AKEN LITMAN AND
KELLEN BECOATS

A few figures you need to know about the U.S. women heading to France.
Twelve: the number of World Cup winners on the roster. Six: their Olympic gold medalists.
And 2 to 1: their betting odds, making them the favorites to hoist the 2019 trophy. Less
quantifiable? The power these players have to inspire the next generation of soccer stars

PHOTOGR APHS BY
ROBER T BECK
 D
K E
F
E
N
E D
R E
S R
S

ASHLYN
HARRIS CRYSTAL
DUNN
From 2015 roster
snub to ’19 roster
lock, Dunn, 26, will
be one of coach
ADRIANNA Jill Ellis’s most
FRANCH
valuable players.
ALYSSA As reserve goalkeepers,
NAEHER neither HARRIS, 33, nor
The only national
For 12 years Hope FRANCH, 28, is likely to teamer to start
Solo, perhaps the play unless something every meaningful
best goalkeeper in awful happens—in
women’s history, which case either game this year,
has been the U.S.’s would come in with the 5' 1" Dunn will
final line of defense. plenty of confidence.
Before that: mostly Harris, the No. 2,
begin at left back
12 years of Briana overcame an Adderall but is abundantly
Scurry. It’s been addiction as a teen to versatile. Don’t be
almost a quarter become the NWSL’s
century since 2016 Goalkeeper of the surprised if she
anyone else started Year. Broadcasters are plays, too, in the
a World Cup game in bound to mention her
net. Naeher, 31, can’t engagement to U.S.
midfield or up top;
match Solo in drama teammate Ali Krieger. as a forward she
(or gamesmanship), Franch set an NWSL helped the North
but she is composed, record in ’17 with 11
soft-spoken and a clean sheets and was
Carolina Courage
win the NWSL in ’ 18.
 KELLEY ABBY
O’HARA DAHLKEMPER
Ellis wants her The 26-year-old
fullbacks to bomb centerback is skilled
forward (while and powerful, and she
protecting the back, can distribute over long
EMILY SONNE T T TIERNA DAVIDSON ALI KRIEGER natch), and O’Hara, 30, distances. Dahlkemper
will excel at both from led UCLA to its only
A “glue” player, SONNETT, 25, serves different roles the right side—if she NCAA title, in 2013, then
for club (Portland Thorns) and country. Her work as has overcome injuries overcame sepsis in her
a centerback landed her on the NWSL’s 2018 Best XI, to her left hamstring right leg that had her
but her opportunity in France will be on the right. . . . and right ankle. bedridden for six weeks.
DAVIDSON—at 20, the youngest member of the
USWNT—adds depth and versatility along the back. The
No. 1 pick of the ’19 NWSL draft after three years at
Stanford, she proved herself with two 90-minute outings
for the injured Becky Sauerbrunn at the SheBelieves Cup
in February and March. . . . KRIEGER, 34, had not been
on the U.S. roster for two years until an April call-up. She
could be used as stay-at-home sub for Kelley O’Hara, a
converted winger who loves to get involved in the attack.

BECKY SAUERBRUNN
She is a fixture in the middle, a calming
presence who led the stingy D in
2015, when the U.S. ceded only three
goals. At 33, Sauerbrunn brings the
leadership of three World Cups and
nearly 160 caps. Her positioning and
distribution will be pivotal, but not
her scoring. In all her international
matches she has never bagged a goal.

46 SPORT S ILLUS TR ATED J U N E 3 –1 0 , 2 0 1 9

 M
I
D
F
I
E
L
D
E
R
S

JULIE
ERTZ
Four years ago, as
Julie Johnston, she
was one half of
the U.S.’s dominant
centerback duo,
with Sauerbrunn. ROSE SAMANTHA
Now, at 27, the wife LAVELLE MEWIS
of Eagles tight end Whenever she’s on Known by
the field—whether teammates as
Zach Ertz is one of with the USWNT or “six feet of fun,”
the world’s most the Washington Spirit, Mewis plays with
dominant central where she was the the agility of a
No. 1 pick in 2017—this much smaller
mids. Dropping back 24-year-old star is one player while posing
to cover, bounding of the most exciting a constant threat
players to watch, on set pieces
forward in attack, dribbling through and long-range
converting traffic at full speed shots. She’ll
set-piece service— while displaying back up Ertz
technical skill and as a defensive
Ertz’s myriad trickery. Lavelle midfielder in
contributions will be key Ellis’s 4-3-3 and
to this sub in to help
earned her U.S. team far preserve a
Female POY in 2017. past ’19. win or draw.
 LINDSEY HORAN
Up, still, goes Horan’s star. The first
American women’s player to bypass F
college for Europe, she got her start at
PSG—there would be plenty of personal O
symmetry if she were to lift the Cup trophy R
in Lyon—and was the NWSL MVP after
helping the Thorns to the 2018 final. At 25, W
the central midfielder is already one of the
U.S.’s most-well-rounded players.
A
R
D
S

BRIAN

A surprise inclusion
in Ellis’s roster, Brian,
26, made just one
USWNT appearance
in 2019 while dealing
with nagging knee,
groin, back and
hamstring injuries. As
in the men’s futsal the youngest member
scene and a technical of the ’15 squad she
played a key role in
central midfield.

48 SPORT S ILLUS TR ATED J U N E 3 –1 0 , 2 0 1 9

TOBIN
HEATH
A two-time World
Cup vet and one
of the sport’s best
players, Heath,
30, dazzles with
Brazilian-like flair,
pace and finishing.
Recovered from
ankle injuries,
Tobinha is a sure
starter at right wing
and, as a scorer and
passer, the fulcrum
of the U.S. attack.

MEGAN
RAPINOE
At 33, a few years
removed from a
torn right ACL, she’s
still playing some
of her best soccer
as she enters World
Cup number 3.
Rapinoe takes the
bulk of the U.S. free
kicks and is a threat
anywhere in the
attacking third—but
her leadership may
matter the most.
 CHRISTEN
PRESS

JESSICA
MCDONALD
CARLI LLOYD MALLORY PUGH When opposing defenses
The two-time FIFA By the time she was have been dealing with
Women’s World Player 19, Pugh had already Morgan, Rapinoe and
of the Year still has an been named the top Heath all game, the last
unparalleled work ethic, recruit in her college player they’ll want to
as she showed abroad class, bailed on UCLA see come on is a well-
recently with Man City to go pro (now with the rested PRESS—at 30
and back home with Sky Spirit), played in three a constant threat to
Blue FC. But the hero world championship sneak behind the back
and centerpiece of the events and, in 2015, line with her pace. . . .
2015 U.S. team is 36, earned the title of MCDONALD, 30,
making her the oldest U.S. Soccer Young shuttled around the
player on the roster. Female POY. At 21 she’s NWSL and contemplated
Lloyd will be used as heading into her first retirement before
the 35-year-old Abby World Cup, where she’s finding a home with the
Wambach was four poised to be a breakout Courage. Her energy
years ago, as an energy star, rotating in on the alone could get her some
injection off the bench. front line. run in France.

ALEX MORGAN
For someone who has already scored over 100 goals, a feat matched by only
six other Americans, it’s surprising to think: This might be the World Cup where
Morgan, 29, really shines. Four years ago she was coming off a left-knee injury
heading into the tournament and began each of the first two games on the bench.
The Orlando Pride striker will be hoping to top the one goal she scored in Canada.
 W O M E N ’ S

2 0 1 9

MINU T E GUIDE Whether you’re up on every World Cup roster

and kit—France’s polka-dotted home whites:
Ooh, la la!—or you’re the type to check in
quadrennially, you’ll want to know these basics

PLOTLINES FOR FRANCE The stories that will dominate 31 days in Juin and Juillet
No country has held the
men’s and women’s
titles simultaneously. One
year after the French men
prevailed, Les Bleues have a
winnable group and
abundant confidence after
beating the U.S. 3–1 in
January. Those teams would
meet again on June 28, in the
quarters, if each won out.
Notably M.I.A.: U.S.
goalkeeper Hope Solo
(who’s on the outs with the
team) and forward Sydney
Leroux-Dwyer (pregnant);
Germany’s ’15 Golden Boot
winner, Celia Sasic (retired
at 27); and Norway’s ’18
Ballon d’Or winner, Ada
Hegerberg (protesting
gender disparities).
Of debuting nations
Chile, Jamaica,
Scotland and South Africa,
you’ll hear the most about
the first Caribbean team in
the tournament. The Reggae
Girlz are being backed by
Bob Marley’s daughter
Cedella, after the Jamaican
federation cut women’s
funding nine years ago.
Much will be made
of FIFA’s doubling
the Cup payout from 2015 to
$30 million (with the
winners getting $4M)—but
that’s peanuts compared to
the men’s pool of $400M.
There’s been progress in
gender equality, but
players’ unions are far from
satisfied.
. . . On that note, U.S.
players filed a
gender-discrimination
lawsuit against their own
federation in March. Could it
distract, as a similar dispute 
did the 1995 squad? Or is this
just the platform they need 
to finally get their grievances
addressed?
—LAKEN LITMAN

sides) is a New York native who has

lived across the Pacific since 1986.
After finishing his playing career
Japan, the runner-up from four years ago, has deep ties to the U.S.— with the Japanese club Hitachi,
but it’s not all about avenging defeat in the last World Cup BY GRANT WAHL Tom Byer stuck around and became
a technical-skills coach, leading
grassroots clinics across the country
FEW COUNTRIES have seen a bigger for kids from four to 12. Noticing
transformation in their Women’s that his new homeland tended not to
World Cup fortunes over the past produce players of overwhelming size,
I T S U O IN O U Y E /A P/SH U T T ERS T O C K

few decades than Japan, which got he landed upon a sort of mantra: “If
obliterated at the first tournament, you want to be a good soccer player
in 1991 but went on to win the whole in Japan,” he says, “you start with a
thing in 2011. One of the central technical foundation.” Byer scaled
figures in that rise to soccer power up, opening his own soccer schools—
(both on the women’s and the men’s today there are around 150—and in
 C2 AUS T R A L I
BR A Z IL A C1

2 C HI
TEAMS TO RW
A YA NA
B3 HOW
NO AY AUS T
WATCH N OR W R ALI
A IT’LL
ALL GO

3
DE

JA
DOWN

L AN

PA N
ZE A
Who could stand in the AU

D2
D ST
AN

NE W
R
way of a fourth U.S. Cup

GL

AL
EN
A ND

IA

JAP
win? These challengers

E NGL
D1

AN

CANAD
E NGL A ND

A
E1
GE R M A N Y
US A
USA
FRANCE

A3
F R A NC E

K OR E A
Les Bleues have a rep of crumbling
under tight scrutiny—hello,

SOU T H
FR AN

MAN
A1

hosts!—but Eugenie Le Sommer & Co.

are strong enough to buck that trend.

GE R
CE

NY
SA

MA
U

R
GE
SCO

1
YB
TL A

AN
ND

RM
D3

GE
DS
ENGLAND US A
ER L AN
US NE T H F2
From Steph Houghton to Jill Scott AF N
1 E DE
to Fran Kirby, there’s talent on a SW
balanced side that has improved in S P A IN B D S E2 SI’s Grant Wahl sizes up the
*One of four third-place 2 NE T HE R L A N
every step of the qualifying cycle. teams to advance 24-team field and sees the Stars and
PRO JEC T ED GROUP S TA NDINGS Stripes waving after the final

1. FRANCE 1. GERMANY 1. AUSTRALIA 1. ENGLAND 1. CANADA 1. USA

The biggest question for the 2016 2. NORWAY 2. SPAIN 2. BRAZIL 2. JAPAN 2. NETHERLANDS 2. SWEDEN
Olympic champions is on the bench. 3. SOUTH KOREA* 3. CHINA* 3. ITALY 3. SCOTLAND* 3. NEW ZEALAND* 3. THAILAND
Martina Voss-Tecklenburg took the 4. NIGERIA 4. SOUTH AFRICA 4. JAMAICA 4. ARGENTINA 4. CAMEROON 4. CHILE
coaching gig only in February.
(EN G L A N D); T F - IM AG E S /G E T T Y IM AG E S (G ERM A N Y ); M AT T K IN G /G E T T Y IM AG E S (AUS T R A L I A);

1998 began hosting a skills segment Today, Japanese players are known
S Y LVA IN L EF E V RE /G E T T Y IM AG E S (F R A N C E); A L E X L I V E SE Y/ DA N EH O USE /G E T T Y IM AG E S

on Japan’s most popular children’s as some of the most fundamentally

F R A N C K FIF E /A F P/G E T T Y IM AG E S (JA PA N); MI C H A EL C I AG LO/G E T T Y IM AG E S (US A)

AUSTRALIA TV program, Oha Suta. Tom-san, as sound in the world, and it’s not a
The dangerous Sam Kerr leads one he’s known, appeared on the show for stretch to suggest Byer influenced
of the most experienced teams in 14 years and had a major influence the women’s team that’s heading
the field, but this one, too, comes in
on a host of Japanese national team to France as a serious contender to
with a newly appointed coach.
stars, from former women’s captain upset the U.S. Which is just one way
Aya Miyama (who started cohosting his story has come full circle. Last
the TV segment with Byer a few years week Byer, 58, was back in America
after winning the 2011 World Cup) to bringing his youth program to the
current men’s captain Shinji Kagawa. development academy of MLS’s
“He’s a maestro at developing kids,” Houston Dynamo.
Winner in 2011, runner-up in ’15, says Yoshika Matsubara, who was
Japan eyes a third straight final on Japan’s 1996 Olympic team. “It’s For more on Byer and Japanese
with a fine blend of experience and almost like he’s more of a father figure soccer, catch the latest episode of
youth, led by captain Saki Kumagai. than a coach.” Exploring Planet Fútbol at SI.TV
 BY GR ANT
WAHL

ILLUS TR ATION BY
NOA H M ACMILL A N

HOW DO YOU start a national team? In the

case of the U.S. women’s soccer team, it began
with a letter sent to 17 players in 1985. The U.S.
Soccer Federation had been invited to send
a squad to an international women’s tourna-
ment in Italy known as the Mundialito (the
“little World Cup,” even though it had nothing
to do with FIFA, which wouldn’t stage an of-
ficial Women’s World Cup for years). Michelle

A TEAM
Akers, a hard-ass midfielder who’d played col-
legiately at Central Florida, was one of the 17
who received the letter asking her to attend a
three-day training camp on Long Island with
the chance to go to Italy. “At first I had no idea
what the national team was,” Akers says, “but
I said yes right away because I was going to be
playing soccer somewhere with a lot of people
and thought it would be great fun.” But the real story of United States women’s soccer dominance
Thanks to Title IX, the landmark 1972 legisla-
tion that created equal university scholarship Women’s World Cup, in 1991. And the real story of that team
opportunities for women, soccer programs had
sprung up on campuses around the country. But
a U.S. national team for women? That was new in

54
 W O M E N ’ S

M IS BORN
begins with the squad that went to the first
and that tournament, well, it’s complicated 2 0 1 9
 U S A

W W C

’85. Mike Ryan, a gruff college coach who lived in the Seattle area, was don’t play sports.’ I denied
the first U.S. women’s manager. Born in Ireland, he knew the significance it all the way through high
of representing one’s country in the world’s most popular sport, and school because it wasn’t
during his team’s initial training sessions at Long Island University’s the cool thing to do.”
Post campus—which took place right next to a cheerleading camp—he Women’s sports may
quickly grew frustrated by his players’ lack of seriousness. Finally, he not have been fashionable
stopped practice and issued an unusual demand. “He made us stand everywhere, but Jennings
there,” Akers says, “and sing the national anthem.” And so they did. had still been playing soc-
Everything about the USWNT’s first tournament was unusual. For cer most of her life, which
example: the uniforms. They were hand-me-downs made for men, not meant that by the mid-
women. On the night before the team left for Italy, players and staff 1980s she and women like
members stayed up late doing emergency cutting and sewing to make her were part of a rapidly
them wearable. And when the U.S. took the field? They played four growing U.S. talent pool.
games against vastly more experienced teams like Denmark, Italy and But beyond college there
England. The results: three losses, one tie, zero wins. had been no women’s
The Americans were naive in the international game, and their op- national team program
ponents took advantage of it. “It was like they were playing against to hone that talent. Now,
little kids in a way,” Akers says now, “because we were like, ‘Wait a finally, there was.
minute. That’s so unfair. You’re grabbing my shirt or grabbing my
crotch,’ or, ‘You’re kicking me,’ or, ‘You just fouled the crap out of me,’ OW DO you
and the referees just kept saying, ‘Play on.’ We got our asses kicked.” start a Women’s World Cup? First, a
There’s a misconception—even in the American soccer community— quick history lesson. Women have
that the U.S. had a head start on the rest of the world in the women’s been playing soccer since at least the 19th cen-
game and dominated as a result. But that’s not really true. The USWNT tury. Jean Williams, the author of several books
played in four international tournaments in the late 1980s and didn’t on the subject, points out that an 1869 issue of
win any of them. But Title IX did have a major impact on the U.S.’s rise. Harper’s Bazaar included an image of women
As Caitlin Murray, the author of a book called The National Team, notes, playing (below). Matches between England and
in ’74, right after Title IX was passed, there were around 100,000 girls Scotland began in 1881, and much like the base-
registered to play soccer with the U.S. Youth Soccer Association. Today ball games in A League of Their Own, there were
that number is in the millions, not least because so much scholarship women’s soccer games in England that drew
money is available to female athletes. more than 50,000 paying fans during and after
Title IX also changed cultural attitudes toward women playing sports, World War I. But soon after, English soccer’s
but it was a slow process in some areas. When national team forward governing body, the Football Association,
Carin Jennings (later Gabarra) competed in high school soccer in banned the women’s game, arguing that it was
California in the early 1980s, she had to deal with a societal stigma. “It unsuitable for the participants and could pos-
was not accepted to be a female athlete at all,” she says. “And every day sibly threaten their ability to bear children.
I’d go to school, someone would ask me about sports, and I’d say, ‘Oh, I Similar bans on women’s soccer were also

AUGUST 1869
Harper’s Bazaar publishes an ink sketch, “The Girls
A timeline of of the Period—Playing Ball,” depicting fashionably
dressed young ladies having a kick-about.

PROGRESS 1880 1900 1920

(and regress) in 1921

The women’s game is banned in
women’s soccer England on the grounds that it’s
BY LAKEN LITMAN unhealthy. The ban lasts 50 years.

56 SPORT S ILLUS TR ATED J U N E 3 –1 0 , 2 0 1 9

 P R E V I E W

1 9 9 1 T E A M

FIFA couldn’t be bothered to organize a women’s world championship.

By 1986 a Norwegian federation member named Ellen Wille had
seen enough. So at the FIFA Congress in Mexico City she addressed
the nearly 100% male gathering. Wille says she was nervous. The only
other women were translators. And that’s the way it had always been.
“It was the first time a woman spoke at a FIFA Congress,” Wille says.
The men Wille was addressing weren’t exactly known as feminists.
The FIFA president was João Havelange, a Brazilian who’d been in charge
since 1974 but had never pushed for a women’s global tournament. His
right-hand man, FIFA’s secretary general, was a middle-aged Swiss man
named Sepp Blatter—the same Blatter who
would go on to be FIFA president from ’98
KICK START until 2015, when he resigned in the wake of
Akers and the rest a U.S. investigation into global corruption
of the U.S. team ran
roughshod over Germany that would produce dozens of indictments
in the semifinals of the and convictions of officials across seven
first Women’s World Cup, countries. Blatter is now 83 years old, and
winning 5–2. when he was growing up in Switzerland,
the idea of women’s soccer was foreign to
him. “Football was the macho game, and
imposed by the all-male-led federations of Ger- it was definitely not a game for girls,” he says now.
O RI G IN A L LY A PPE A RED IN H A RPER ’S BA Z A A R, AU G US T 1869 (SK E T C H); T O M M Y C H EN G /A F P/

many, Brazil and other countries. But by the late Blatter had plenty of cringe-inducing moments over the years speak-
1960s, as women’s-rights movements gained ing about the women’s game. As FIFA president in 2004, he said in an
steam, unsanctioned teams were starting to interview that women’s players should wear “tighter shorts” to increase
G E T T Y IM AG E S (A K ERS); C H A RL E S TA SN A D I /A P/SH U T T ERS T O C K (NIXO N)

spread, especially in Europe. With FIFA and its
member nations staying out of women’s soccer,
an unofficial world championship backed by the
Italian beverage company Martini & Rossi took
place in Italy in ’70 and again in Mexico in ’71.
More than 100,000 people filled Estadio Azteca
to see Denmark win its second straight title by
beating the host country. National federations in
England, France, Germany and elsewhere ended
their bans in the early ’70s, which brought about
official recognition from FIFA. But that actually
made things worse. For two decades after the
first official international women’s game in ’71,
their appeal. When asked if he regrets that statement today, he says,
“No. I said they should be feminine, but then the good people from
the press, they said I said they should be sexy. I would never say that.
The future is feminine. So please look like a woman. Easy.”
And yet Blatter, as crazy as it sounds, is one of the most impor-
tant figures in the history of women’s soccer. He’s also one of its big-
gest disappointments. Which is to say: It’s complicated. At the 1986
FIFA Congress, when the president opened up the floor for ques-
tions and comments, Wille stepped to the microphone and made
herself heard. She spent 10 minutes addressing the room, saying that
FIFA needed to organize a Women’s World Cup. Havelange’s
response, rather than answering her directly, was to refer
the issue to his top deputy. So all eyes turned to Blatter.

JUNE 23, 1972

President Richard Nixon signs Title IX,
banning sex-based discrimination in
federally aided activities.

1970 1975 1980 1985

JULY 1970 OCTOBER 1984
Denmark wins the first (unofficial, non-FIFA-sponsored) The Dallas Sting wins the first FIFA women’s world
women’s world championship in a field of eight teams, tourney, in China. No U.S. team, men’s or women’s,
beating host Italy 2–0. They repeat a year later. had previously won a major international event.
 U S A

W W C

“First of all, I was a little surprised by the reaction of the president,”
Blatter says. “This was the moment when I had been challenged by a
lady for women’s football. But then I was a very happy man, because
I said, ‘O.K., madame, I will accept the challenge. You will see. We
will go for the organization of a Women’s World Cup.’ ” Without Wille,
who knows how long it would have taken FIFA to act? But it was a
reckoning that came far later in soccer than in other sports. Women’s
volleyball and women’s basketball, for instance, had official world
championships in the early 1950s. Why did it take FIFA 20 years
after the first official women’s soccer game to organize a World Cup?
“Because FIFA was sleeping, that’s all,” Blatter says. “Let’s say you
can blame me because I was technical director of FIFA [in the ’70s],
but I had other problems.”
But even the first Women’s World
Cup was complicated. For starters,
FIFA didn’t use the term World Cup
because it was concerned the event HOW CAN YOU NOT TURN TO YOUR PEOPLE AT FIFA AND SAY,
wouldn’t be a success. So the official
name was the First World Cham-
‘WE ARE TOTALLY MISSING THIS MARKET,’ ”
pionship For Women’s Football for FOUDY SAYS. “YOU’RE GOING TO REAP THE REWARDS.
the M&M’s Cup. The indignities
didn’t end there. FIFA nearly de-
cided to use a smaller ball before
reconsidering. But the organizers did change one of the fundamental
aspects of the sport, making games 80 minutes long instead of 90. Says
Blatter, “It was the impression at that time, from the physical point of
view, that ladies maybe are not as much prepared as men, and could
play only 40 minutes [per half].” Yet to save money, FIFA forced teams
to play their group-stage games every other day. (Men’s teams at the
1990 World Cup had at least four days between games, as remains the
standard today for both genders.)
Blatter takes pride in his role helping to create the Women’s World
Cup and in the slogan he first used in 1995: The future of football is
feminine. For her part, former USWNT captain Julie Foudy feels con-
flicted about his role in the women’s game. “He was such an easy target
for us with the things he would say,” Foudy says. “Maybe behind the
scenes he did more than we’ve given him credit for, but. . . . ”
For Foudy, beyond Blatter’s Mad Men–era
comments, there was a deeper problem with
FIFA. Under his 17-year presidency it didn’t
invest in women’s soccer and grow the game
the way it could have. “How can you not turn
to your people at FIFA and say, ‘We are totally
missing this market. We are not tapping into
it’?” Foudy says. “If you put millions of dollars
into women’s soccer, you’re going to reap the
rewards of that because it’s a totally untapped
market, as we’re now seeing finally, which to
me is inexcusable. If you’re Sepp Blatter, you
wield the power.”
OW DO you build a powerhouse? The
U.S. women’s national team went
from embarrassing in 1985 to con-
tenders to win the first Women’s World Cup in
’91. The transformation started in ’86 with the
coaching hire of Anson Dorrance, who had led
North Carolina to four of the first five women’s
collegiate titles and took on the U.S. gig as a
second job. When he was hired, his bosses told
him the aim was just to be better than Canada.
But by the ’86 Mundialito he had already sur-
passed that goal. “All of the sudden we discov-
ered we could probably compete with a lot of
these European teams,” Dorrance says. “Now,

AUGUST 1985 JUNE 1988

U.S. Soccer selects its Testing the idea of a women’s World Cup,
first official women’s FIFA holds an invitational event in China.
national team. Its success sets up World Cup ’91.

1985 1990

MAY 1986 NOVEMBER 1991

Norway’s Ellen Wille, the first female to The U.S. women beat Norway 2–1 to win
address a FIFA Congress, calls on the mostly that World Cup, in China. The USWNT will
male outfit to promote women’s soccer. win again in ’99 and 2015.

58 SPORT S ILLUS TR ATED J U N E 3 –1 0 , 2 0 1 9


were we overwhelming and dominant? Well,
not really, but we were certainly competitive.”
A year after getting zero wins in four games
at the first Mundialito, the U.S. team under Dor-
rance beat China, Brazil and Japan to make it to
the final, where the Americans fell 1–0 to host
Italy. Dorrance brought a tougher mentality, an
obsession with fitness and a high-pressing style
that he had used at Carolina. And perhaps most
important, he tapped into the Title IX talent
pool. It started with a fearsome front three led
by his captain, the freakishly competitive April
Heinrichs, who had played for him at UNC.
More than any other player, Heinrichs was a
culture changer. She made no apologies about
doing everything possible to gain an advantage
and just win, baby. “She was like a shark with
blood in the water,” Dorrance says. “One of the
biggest adjustments for a woman coming into
a competitive environment is she comes with a
cultural expectation of genuflecting to everyone
P R E V I E W
1 9 9 1 T E A M
around her. And this was not Heinrichs. She competed from the first
second of practice until the end.”
Says Heinrichs, “He really gave me permission to be me. He tells
stories about how players would come into his office and say, ‘How are
you going to manage April?’ And he jokes, ‘We’re going to clone her.’ ”
Also on Dorrance’s front line was a towering figure with a flowing
mane of hair: Michelle Akers. She was one of only two players from
the 1985 debacle whom Dorrance kept on the national team long-term.
“Akers set the bar,” Dorrance says. “She was a player without a weak-
ness.” Her U.S. teammate Shannon Higgins (now Higgins-Cirovski)
recalls a collegiate game when her UNC team played against Akers’s
Central Florida: “Michelle went up and headed a ball, and she basically
came down with her teeth right on top of Lori Henry’s head and lost
her two front teeth right in Lori’s head. She just kept playing the game.”
Early on, Dorrance added another force to his front three with Jen-
nings. She was a pigeon-toed dribbling master who had starred at UC
Santa Barbara. “Jennings would basically run through teams,” says
Foudy. “We called her Crazy Legs because she was like a Gumby, like
her legs would turn in ways that you never knew they should go.”
Dorrance was also fearless when it came to giving chances to young
players. In 1986 he got a call from a friend who said he needed to fly
halfway across the country to see a special player. “I said,
‘What’s her name?’ ” Dorrance recalls. “He says, ‘Mia Hamm.’
T O M M Y C H EN G /A F P/G E T T Y IM AG E S (C EL EB R AT I O N); DAV ID E . K LU T H O (H A M M)
And I said, ‘How old is she?’ And he said, ‘She’s 14.’ I just started
laughing on the phone and said, ‘John, you mean you want
me to fly to Dallas, Texas, to look at a 14-year-old for the full
national team?’ And he said, ‘Yes.’ ” It’s a story that’s a classic
in the annals of sports. Dorrance didn’t want to be told which
player was Hamm. He wanted to see if he could pick her out
on his own. “It took me three seconds,” he says, “because on
the kickoff this short-haired brunette is shot out of a cannon,
just like on a rocket ship. I could see her raw athleticism.”
A year later in the summer of 1987, an unusual set of cir-
cumstances meant Dorrance’s U.S. senior team played in the
same tournament as the U.S. Under-19 team, which had Hamm,
Foudy, Kristine Lilly, Joy Biefeld (later Fawcett) and Linda
Hamilton. The teens held their own against the veterans. “That
AUGUST 1996
Women’s soccer debuts at the Olympics
in Atlanta, with Mia Hamm and the U.S.
beating China 2–1 in the final for gold.
2000
APRIL 2001
WUSA, the first female pro soccer league
in the United States, kicks off with eight
teams . . . and folds two years later.
 U S A
W W C
gave me a reason to make the decision to completely
revamp the U.S. senior national team,” Dorrance
says. Out went several experienced players. In came
the five youngsters, all of whom would end up being
starters at the ’91 World Cup.
Dorrance’s national team was coming together. He
had assembled most of its core, and the culture it was FOR MORE ON THE ’91 CUP TEAM
creating was unstoppable. The U.S. beat powerhouse Listen to Throwback,
Norway for the first time in 1987 and defeated West SI’s new sports-history
Germany in ’88. But progress wasn’t a straight line podcast, free on Apple
Podcasts, Spotify or SI.com
upward. In ’88, when FIFA organized a World Cup
dress rehearsal in China, the U.S. tied Sweden and
Czechoslovakia and went out in the quarterfinals to
eventual champion Norway.
The travel and the competitions were special. Yet for the players it
was a huge financial and personal sacrifice. U.S. Soccer didn’t give them
any money other than a meager $10 a day while traveling. Jennings
took a series of nine-to-five jobs that she had to quit whenever she left
for a new trip. And Higgins, who was making just $7,000 a year as
a collegiate assistant coach, would end up retiring from the sport at
age 23 after the 1991 World Cup final to make ends meet.
In those days the women’s team would see U.S. Soccer’s boys’ youth
national teams receiving better travel accommodations. And the fed-
eration rarely issued any gear that looked official. When Foudy finally
did get something, she was not only grateful, but also thrilled. “We
had these windbreakers, and amazingly they happened to be the colors
of the United States, because usually they were like white or purple
or something random,” Foudy says. “And this one was a navy-blue
windbreaker with red stripes on the sleeves, and it said USA on it.
And they’re like, ‘You get to keep it.’ I was like, ‘What? I get to keep
this!? Are you kidding me?’ ”
At the regional World Cup qualifying tournament in early 1991, the
U.S. outscored its opponents 49–0, and by the time the Americans
headed to China, their confidence was peaking. No player had a stronger
mentality than Akers. “It’s just like the sun was coming up tomorrow,
the sky is blue and we would win,” she says. “It just was that simple.”
Yet there remained skeptics. Dorrance still remembers a column in Soc-
MAY 2013
FIFA, following a historic election,
adds three women (the first ever)
to its executive committee.
2010 2015
OCTOBER 2014
Forty-plus players file (and later drop) a
lawsuit against FIFA over its decision to play
the ’15 Women’s World Cup on artificial turf.
60 SPORT S ILLUS TR ATED J U N E 3 –1 0 , 2 0 1 9
cer America that said the U.S.
team was headed for trouble.
“You know, if we had any
t houghts of w inning t he
World Cup, we should just
lay them aside because this
was different,” he says. “This
was going to be something
completely different than we
would ever experience, and
the American team was never
going to be prepared for this
event because our culture
doesn’t understand how to
win these events, and blah blah blah. . . . ”
The U.S. went on to win the first world cham-
pionship by an American soccer team with a
2–1 victory in the final against Norway. Akers
scored both goals, giving her 10 for the tourna-
ment. After FIFA determined that the event had
been a success, it decided to stage the Women’s
World Cup every four years thereafter—and it
retroactively dubbed the 1991 edition a “World
Cup.” The USWNT players would continue fight-
ing for better treatment from U.S. Soccer in the
years ahead, both before and after their cultural-
breakthrough victory at the ’99 World Cup.
This March, the current U.S. women’s play-
ers filed a gender discrimination suit against
U.S. Soccer, citing inequality with the men’s
team on issues like pay and training conditions.
J US T IN ED M O N DS /G E T T Y IM AG E S
Their battle wouldn’t be possible without their
predecessors. “Our fight was for ‘equitable,’
their fight is for ‘equal,’ ” says Foudy. “It’s the
logical progression. Players around the world
have to stand up to enact change, and unless
they stand up, change isn’t happening.” ±
MARCH 2019
Twenty-eight members of the USWNT
file a class action suit against U.S.
Soccer, alleging gender discrimination.
2020
© Center on Addiction / Partnership for Drug-Free Kids

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T OO

S
O
O
N
?
 A STEADY DRIZZLE fell on Portland on the evening
of March 27. By six o’clock traffic had snarled. It wasn’t
much of a night for a preseason soccer friendly—still,
some 2,000 diehards ventured out to watch the local
pro women’s team take on the U.S.’s U-23 squad.
The first half proved uneventful. The Portland Thorns
were missing Tobin Heath and Lindsey Horan, both
senior national team stars. As the second half began,
a new player came on for the Thorns. Unlisted in the
program and smaller than most of her peers, number
42 wore bright red cleats and a high bun. Appearing
tentative, she lost the ball a few times, won it back once
and came off early to huddle with trainers, thoroughly
gassed. Which made sense. After all, she was only 13.
Thirteen is when most girls go through seventh grade.
When puberty arrives, with its blooms of acne and social
anxiety. When the world begins to feel incredibly small. In
the case of Olivia Moultrie, it’s also when she signed a six-
B Y CHRIS figure deal with Nike, becoming the youngest pro women’s
BALL ARD soccer player in the history of such things, moving with her
family to Portland to train with the Thorns, the dominant
franchise in the National Women’s Soccer League.
No precedent exists. Horan and Mallory Pugh (another
PHOTOGR APH BY
JON ATH A N FERRE Y national teamer) skipped college to go pro, but they were
both 18 and came up through youth leagues. Olivia did

W O M E N ’ S
Thirteen-year-old OLIVIA MOULTRIE already has an
unprecedented place in the pros, a Nike commercial
and a shoe deal. So what does that tell us about women’s
soccer, youth sports and parenting? In many ways, it
depends how everything plays out 2 0 1 9

63
 U S A

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not. By seven she had a personal coach. At 10 she became

the youngest girl ever to train full-time with boys in the U.S.
Soccer Development Academy; at 11, the youngest to accept
a scholarship offer, from powerhouse North Carolina. Her
parents, K.C. and Jessica, installed a turf field in their backyard
and homeschooled Olivia so she could train eight hours a day.
K.C. tagged social media posts about his daughter #witness
and last September, The New York Times quoted him saying,
“I tell her all the time, ‘Nobody cares that you’re the best at
12. If you’re not the best at 17 or 18, nobody’s going to care.’ ”
Now, as Olivia’s age-group peers catch rides to tournaments
and muddle through middle school, she wears a GPS tracker
and practices with the likes of Canadian striker Christine Sin-
clair, who at 35 is nearly triple her age. Nine Thorns players
will suit up at the women’s World Cup; Olivia hopes to join
them in four years. She’s already more famous than some of
them. She appeared in a Nike ad during this year’s Oscars
and, according to her dad, is regularly stopped for autographs.
She has more than 100,000 followers on Instagram, where
one of her videos ends, “I’m not talented. I’m obsessed.”
If you’ve already begun forming an opinion here, you’re
not alone. Most people have, for Olivia’s story overlaps with
so many broader conversations, from the madness of youth
sports to the future of women’s soccer, from gender equity
to the never-ending (and ever-subjective) debate about how THORN IN HER SIDE under George W. Bush, he is
we should raise our kids and who gets to tell us how to do it. Moultrie gets action a regular, involved presence
Where you come down on these issues, and what Olivia’s these days with at the team’s facility, trailed
groundbreaking path might mean—well, that depends on Portland’s academy by his dog, Diego. He un-
your perspective. team; since her arrival derstands that the Thorns’
in February she has four
success is tied to the health
goals in six starts.
OOK MATE, we understand how this can appear,” of the league, and women’s
says Gavin Wilkinson. It’s 10 a.m. on a recent week- soccer at large, so it’s in their
day, and the 45-year-old general manager of the Thorns and interest to help domestic competitors. Mean-
MLS’s Timbers has been on the phone trying to wrangle the arrival of while, they worry about overseas threats. The
Brian Fernandez, from Liga MX in Mexico. A former New Zealand women’s teams of Atlético Madrid and Barce-
national team defender himself, Wilkinson fires off emails at a standing lona drew 60,000 fans for a recent game. Clubs
desk and offers kombucha on tap. such as Olympique Lyon, in France, offer salaries
He’s in a unique position. When the NWSL launched in 2013, it dwarfing the NWSL’s $46,200 max; last year
endeavored to avoid the mistakes of the two previous pro women’s the Thorns lost two players to Europe. The U.S.
leagues—poor management, meager investment, lack of a holistic plan. has long held women’s soccer preeminence, but
So far, results have been mixed. Average NWSL attendance recently that’s changing.
surpassed 6,000 for the first time. Still, some teams play in high school All of which, Wilkinson contends, is impor-
stadiums to sparse crowds. Last summer news stories detailed depressing tant context to consider before you judge his
conditions at the New Jersey–based Sky Blue FC. Port-a-potties for locker team for taking on a 13-year-old. Yes, it can
rooms. Players cleaning their own jerseys. Unreimbursed medical bills. sound bizarre once you start drawing analogies.
The Thorns are outliers. Under owner Merritt Paulson they operate Imagine the Warriors inviting a seventh-grade
in concert with the Timbers, sharing training facilities, resources and Steph Curry to train at every practice. But maybe,
Providence Park, which just saw an $85 million renovation. Portland Wilkinson suggests, this is a necessary experi-
GA B RIEL M AY B ERRY

wins (two NWSL titles), draws fans (17,000, on average) and turns the ment. “It’s about changing the perception of the
league’s largest profit. Paulson treats the franchise as both a business and sport,” he says. “We don’t need to change the
a passion. A Harvard M.B.A. whose father was secretary of the treasury perception of the national team—every young

64 SPORT S ILLUS TR ATED J U N E 3 –1 0 , 2 0 1 9


I DON’T
THINK THAT WE’RE
AT A POSITION IN
WOMEN’S SOCCER,”
SAYS RAPINOE,
“TO HAVE THE
SYSTEMS AND
STRUCTURES SET
UP TO FACILITATE
THE GROWTH OF
SUCH A
YOUNG
PLAYER
IN THE
PROFESSIONAL
ENVIRONMENT.
girl aspires to be part of that. But there needs
to be a stepping stone.” Besides, he says, “There
aren’t too many out there like Olivia.”
O, HOW good is she? That’s the first
question most people ask. And few are
better judges of soccer talent than North
Carolina women’s coach Anson Dorrance, who’s
won 21 NCAA titles and coached 59 future na-
tional teamers, including Heath and Mia Hamm.
Dorrance first heard of Olivia in 2017, when
she was 11. A coach in California called, said
Anson had to see this crazy-good girl. In time
he would learn her backstory: how Jessica had
been a defender for South Carolina and K.C.
had played basketball for NAIA Montana State
Northern. How they raised three daughters in
Canyon Country, Calif., chronicling vacations and
first days of school on a family blog. How in their
firstborn they saw glimpses of greatness. (“All
of a sudden she is dominating,” Jessica blogged
when Olivia was five. “She has figured out how to
be competitive and sweet!”) How Olivia started
playing against boys. How K.C. left his job in
pharmaceuticals to focus on Olivia’s development.
At first, though, all Dorrance knew was that
she was “ridiculously young.” Then he watched
P R E V I E W
O L I V I A M O U L T R I E
her at a camp and saw a girl with a preternatural ability to control the
ball, read space and create scoring opportunities. Someone who could
probably already make his college team. “A little technical and tactical
wizard!” says Dorrance, who believed Olivia had the potential to be “Tobin
Heath–esque.” So he offered her a scholarship, even knowing, as he says,
“we’d be excoriated at every turn.” She accepted. (And he was right.)
The potential payoff was worth it, even if it would be years before
Dorrance knew for sure. That’s the thing about banking on a preteen.
“You never know what her final athletic platform is going to look like,”
says Dorrance. “She still has to traverse puberty.”
HINK BACK to 13. Did you have a life plan? A passion?
In 2012, Horan gave up her own UNC offer to play for Paris
Saint-Germain. She says she’d do it again—“absolutely”—but she
was also 18 at the time. Would she have been ready to face pros at 13?
“Hell, no. At that age, there’s no way I was ready.”
She’s not alone. “How would I have fared?” wonders Horan’s U.S. team-
mate Megan Rapinoe. “Terrible! I wouldn’t have fared, period. I wasn’t,
physically, anywhere near being able to keep up.” Rapinoe wishes Olivia
well. She’s rooting for her. But: “I don’t think she’s anywhere near the level
to be on or train with a professional team. I don’t think we’re at a position
in women’s soccer to have the systems and structures set up to facilitate
the growth of such a young player in the professional environment.”
Abby Wambach, 38, who scored more international goals for the U.S.
than any other man or woman, developed faster than most. Still, she says,
“I wasn’t ready at that age.” Then again, she understands the world is
changing. “Who am I to say, ‘If I were Olivia, I would go to college’? It’s
not my place to judge. It’s my place to create as many opportunities as
possible and welcome any unique ways in which players can find their way.”
For the Moultries, college was always the plan. Until Olivia kept im-
proving. The U-14 national team called. Nike and Adidas sent free gear.
Spencer Wadsworth, the agent who reps Heath and Horan at Wasserman
Media Group, reached out. He’d seen Moultrie’s clips on YouTube—the
ones little girls now mimic, of Olivia with the ball magnetized to her
feet, launching benders—and so he met with the Moultries. He invited
Olivia to pickup games in Playa Vista with Stu Holden and Steve Nash.
Like Dorrance, Wadsworth saw a tiny Tobin Heath. And he was all in,
despite her age. “My boss thought I was crazy,” says Wadsworth. “I was
like, You have to see her play, see her mentality. We can push the limits.”
So they did. With Wadsworth’s help, a 12-year-old Olivia spent a week
apiece training at Barcelona, Bayern Munich, Lyon and PSG, all clubs
that offered the prospect of good money and a first-team debut by 16.
That is, if Olivia proved eligible. FIFA stipulates that an international
player be 18, unless his or her family can prove they moved for reasons
unrelated to soccer. Jessica runs an essential-oils business. They could
set up anywhere. It might work. . . . Still, it was a risk.
Another option: the Thorns. Wilkinson and Wadsworth had been
talking for a year. Olivia visited and met Portland’s staff, each side
evaluating the other. The NWSL, though, presented its own downside.
Technically, Olivia couldn’t play or be paid until she was 18. But she
could train with some of the world’s best, work out with the Timbers’
 U S A

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youth teams and play in friendlies and development academy games.

In February 2019, Olivia gave up her Tar Heels scholarship and college
eligibility. She signed a deal with Wasserman and soon after became
the youngest female team athlete inked by Nike. According to sources
with knowledge of the arrangement, it is an incentive-laden, multiyear
contract that includes guaranteed money and could earn Moultrie mil-
lions. (Nike declined to comment.) As such, it passes Dorrance’s test:
“I tell girls that if they give up a scholarship, which is worth about
$300,000, they need to have an option that is worth more.”
The announcement made national news. The Thorns and Wadsworth
fielded a deluge of interview requests, from GMA to CNN, and turned
them down, instructing the Moultries not to speak to the press (they
did not make Olivia available for this story), even as the Nike deal and
the historic (and public) nature of the Thorns partnership thrust them
squarely into the public eye.

OR EVERY Michael Phelps and Tara Lipinski,

world champions as teens, there exist many
more young athletes like Freddy Adu, a soccer PARENTS ASK ME,” SAYS PIERCE, “ ‘SHOULD I BE
phenom who fell short of outsized expectations. Other PAYING FOR A PRIVATE COACH? SHOULD I BUILD A FIELD IN
times the path veers sharply. Marv Marinovich raised MY YARD? OR THEY’RE LOOKING FOR ME TO TELL THEM
his son to be the perfect QB; instead, Todd was out of
the NFL by 23, struggling for years with addiction.
OLIVIA’S PARENTS ARE CRAZY.
None of this is simple cause-and-effect, of course.
Every life is messy, complicated. Regardless, once
the bar is set, it tends to say there. “Extraordinary
achievement, though adults have rarely cared to admit it, takes a toll,” run to beat a defender. It takes a minute to notice
writes Ann Hulbert in Off the Charts, her book about child prodigies. “It Olivia. She blends in for the most part: quick, agile,
demands an intensity that rarely makes kids conventionally popular or intense, forever hunched. Tall for 13—she’s 5' 1"—if
socially comfortable.” Such talent can also prove impossible to manage. smaller than an adult. She passes to Sinclair, who’s
“Prodigies offer reminders writ large that children, in the end, flout our close to breaking Wambach’s international goals
best and worst intentions.” record. “Yeah, Sinc!” Olivia chirps, the same as
Few can relate to Olivia’s situation as well as Michelle Wie, who her teammates.
in 2000, at age 10, became the youngest golfer to qualify for a USGA It’s all a bit surreal. Consider the Warriors
amateur championship. “I didn’t feel like I was 10,” Wie says. “I was analogy and what this must be like for Sin-
brave, confident.” Two years later she qualified for her first LPGA event clair. Hey, KD: Today you’re paired with the
and, with much fanfare, began competing against men. At 15 she turned seventh-grader.
pro, signing a Nike deal. Since then, Wie has won only one major and When the Thorns begin a scrimmage, Olivia
struggled with injuries. She prefers not to generalize but does offer one sits out. It’s not that she can’t hold her own,
bit of advice to Olivia: “The thing my parents did extremely well was coach Mark Parsons later explains—“she’s an
keep everything as normal as possible. Golf was almost secondary.” For absolute Energizer bunny who wants to train
Wie that meant private school and, later, college. (She graduated from eight hours a day”—but that the team is doing
Stanford.) “I wanted to be a professional, but they realized there was a its best to adjust pro periodization schedules
whole other side to me as a child. You have to be a well-rounded person.” to a 13-year-old. “There’s no blueprint for this.”
She pauses. “As much as sports seem like everything, they aren’t.” It’s been a lot of trial and error. “Week one
CO U R T E S Y O F M O U LT RIE FA MILY (2)

she came in like a spitfire. It was like, This

T’S A WARM spring afternoon and the Thorns are practicing at
a 24,000-square-foot facility in Beaverton, Ore., near Nike head-
quarters. Pine and fir trees ring two immaculate fields. Beyond,
two-story houses sprout satellite dishes. Swoosh logos are prevalent.
On one pitch players ping a ball to a teammate, get it back, then make a
13-year-old is middle of the pack! Then, week
two”—Parsons makes a whoosh noise—“she was
clinging for dear life.” So the team adjusted her
load. “And, boom, week three she was back up.”
Initially the Thorns planned out five weeks for

66 SPORT S ILLUS TR ATED J U N E 3 –1 0 , 2 0 1 9

 P R E V I E W

O L I V I A M O U L T R I E

moment.” But she allows this could change.

SWEET CHILD “We recognize the situation in Portland ac-
At three (near left), celerates the conversation, but we want to
Moultrie stood out among make sure we have the right environments
the Santa Clarita, Calif., for players”—reading between the lines: not
Little Kickers; by seven, like Sky Blue FC—“if we’re going to start
she was playing two years bringing in minors.” It will be interesting
up, trucking opponents
to see how it plays out. Some around the
with Golden State FC.
Thorns and the Moultries believe she’ll be
ready and able to play by 14.
For now, she lives a compartmentalized life. She wakes up, eats a
healthy breakfast (her parents limit sugar) and gets in an hour of work
on a 50 -×30-yard backyard turf field. (The Moultries also put in a half-
court hoops blacktop for their middle daughter.) Next: schoolwork for
a few hours at the kitchen table or her desk, the curriculum set by an
independent-study teacher. (Report cards are sent to the team.) By lunch
she’s at the facility, eating with Thorns players. She sits in on meetings,
goes through practice and, if the team lets her, stays after to do extra work.
Then: home, shower and head to one of her sisters’ soccer or basketball
practices, or maybe work on free kicks for an hour. As for the diversions
that consume most 13-year-olds, K.C. says Olivia mainly steers clear. She
might watch TV while doing her homework, but mostly she consumes
highlights or games. Her social media feed is soccercentric.
Interactions with teammates are limited outside of training, though
Horan says she took Olivia out for coffee once. “I told her to text me if she
wanted to get away from her dad or whatever. Then I realized she doesn’t
Olivia, then eight. Now they’re at six months. A drink coffee, so maybe I brought her to the wrong place.” Like most, Horan
color-coded team schedule includes an OM tab praises Olivia’s maturity and focus. “She’s very confident—not in a bad
plotting Olivia’s daily itinerary: practices with way, but to be open and have fun. At 13, I was the shyest individual and
the Thorns, games with the U-17 team and so on, would never want to step on anyone’s toes or be annoying. People can
with mandatory rest periods, which she hates. take it how they want. But certain things about her I think are so cool,
The team dedicated one assistant, Rich Gunney, because I wish I had that [confidence] at a young age.”
to monitor Olivia and meet with her weekly. She
sits with Parsons monthly. Wilkinson huddles NYONE WHO’S shepherded a daughter through youth soccer
with Olivia’s parents every month or two. is familiar with the evolution. At first girls run wildly, clumping
In other ways Olivia is treated the same as around the ball, giggling and taking careful note of any passing
everyone else. Like all Thorns she wears a GPS dogs. (Or maybe that’s just my kids.) For the most part, dads or moms do
tracker during practices and games. Three cam- the coaching. Dandelions and Bumblebees are popular team names, and
eras film her every move in training. Wilkinson the postgame snack is of utmost importance. Cartwheels are rampant.
can track hydration levels (down to urine den- Next: The game takes shape. Passes connect. Faster and bigger kids
sity), maximum speed, total distance. . . . Players start to dominate. Wow, it actually looks like soccer out there! Parent-
have begun wearing sensors in their shorts, for coaches get more serious, or maybe real instructors come in. The best
monitoring muscle firing and fatigue. players gravitate to travel teams. Fall through spring, the game provides
For now, Olivia is with the team but not of the a steady drumbeat; one practice a week becomes two. Pressure builds to
team. The fact that she can play only in friendlies up commitments, to go year-round and choose soccer over other sports.
and preseason games is a point of contention. Show enough potential and a kid ends up trying out for a program
Wadsworth suggests that no hard-and-fast league like the Thorns’ Development Academy, now in its fourth year. There
rule exists, noting that Adu played at 14 in MLS. are analogs all over, a jumble of acronyms—ECNL, ODP—with feeder
NWSL president Amanda Duffy says, though, systems and promises of college showcases, where kids end up in front
“Through our college draft rules and foreign play- of someone like Mike Smith, the Thorns’ academy director. A fit man
er limits, we do have age restrictions. It’s 18 at the with nervy energy, intense eyes and short, gelled hair, Smith asks girls in
 U S A

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his opening talk: How many hours per week do you spend with a ball? walked 30 minutes every day to the train, then
Five, some say. Eight. And so on. rode 45 minutes and walked to practice. Eventu-
If it really takes 10,000 hours to master something, Smith asks, how ally, the Thorns offered a roster spot. Elated, she
many hours do you think that is, from kindergarten to high school se- moved into a team apartment, gained access to a
nior? As the girls (and parents) fight through the math, Smith answers. shared car and received an entry-level salary—not
Sixteen. And this, he tells them, is the key to success: internal motivation. a living wage but enough to pay the bills. In the
For Olivia, that’s not an issue. Not now. She’s an anomaly, though. offseason she plays in Australia, bringing her
The vast majority of girls are more like the seventh-grade daughter of annual total earnings to roughly $35,000. For
a friend of mine in Portland. She plays soccer and basketball and runs women’s soccer, this qualifies as a success story.
track. She considered trying out for the Development Academy until she It’s also why Olivia’s situation is so unusual and,
learned she’d have to give up hoops. Her father emailed: Couldn’t she to some, controversial.
do both? The response: Not really; it’s a serious commitment. Then again, it wouldn’t be if she were a boy.
It’s no surprise that kids and parents feel an urgency, heightened by Then she’d be compared to Alphonso Davies,
watching the ascent of someone like Olivia. “It’s comical,” says a parent who played for the Vancouver Whitecaps at 15.
of one of Moultrie’s U-17 teammates. “There’s this FOMO. Should I be Or Michael Owen, who at 12 was courted by
doing this with my kids? How can we get them there?” the top teams in England, where this type of
Holly Pierce played professionally and now coaches girls in Portland. thing is commonplace. She’d be looking at the
“Parents ask me about it,” she says. “ ‘Should I be paying for a private
coach? Should I build a field in my backyard?’ ” She pauses. “Or they’re
looking for me to tell them Olivia’s parents are crazy.” What’s missing,
Pierce says, is a focus on the fun. “I almost feel bad for kids who are
earmarked so young.” Wambach agrees, adding that playing high school
hoops made her better at soccer, not to mention happier.
Then there are the odds. “Ninety-nine percent of kids are not going
to be at that level, so what does that do to them?” asks Rapinoe “Are
you just setting them up for failure? I have so many parents asking,
‘What can I do to get my kid on the national team?’ And this sounds so
mean, but I’m like, ‘Your kid is 14 and clearly not going to play on the
national team. Not ever.’ There are 25 women, out of jillions of girls, on
the national team. It’s not like you’ve failed if you didn’t make it.” Her
voice rises. “It’s just selfish of these parents. Have a bit of self-awareness
and just allow your child to play. There are so many kids out there who
are disappointed or feel like they failed. And that’s bulls---.”
The experience is consuming. Elite teams run year-round, require
constant travel and can cost as much as $10,000 a year. The justification
is the prized college scholarship, but in reality, many are only partial.
Over a decade, parents may end up spending more than it’s worth.
Even then, the path forward in the sport is murky. A list of professions MLS minimum of $70,250, so the scholarship
that pay more than women’s soccer would include, well, most professions. question would be moot. If she were a boy, says
The minimum NWSL salary is $16,538. The max is $46,200, but most Pierce, “We’d be like, He’s amazing!”
fall well short of that. The elite few who also make the U.S. national But she’s not, which means that every step is
team can earn up to $100,000 or so. That rises for the fortunate handful more difficult and comes with more scrutiny.
who, like Olivia, find their way onto the payroll of a Nike or Adidas.
The rest are like Thorns midfielder Celeste Boureille, who discovered HAT ABOUT the parents? That’s
soccer at 11, played at Cal and then took an unpaid gig on the Thorns’ the other unavoidable question
training team. That isn’t unusual. Because the supply of talented women’s with Olivia, even though, really,
players vastly outstrips demand, and NWSL budgets are threadbare, Port- it’s not specific to the Moultries. They’re just
land regularly trains players who aren’t on its roster, in hopes they might stand-ins for our feelings about when and how
J O N AT H A N F ERRE Y

develop. (This is essentially what the team is doing with Olivia.) Some to support—or push—our kids. When to make
prospects stay for years, working as travel agents or teachers on the side. our desires theirs, and vice versa.
When Boureille arrived she stayed with a host family in the suburbs. She “I can only assume her parents are making

68 SPORT S ILLUS TR ATED J U N E 3 –1 0 , 2 0 1 9


the best decisions for her,” says Wambach.”
“People have opinions,” says Parsons, “but
that’s not your business. That’s their business.”
“I hope she did this on her own,” says Horan.
“I hope parents look at this and know it’s a path
and an opportunity, but not to force it.”
Back around Portland, on an unseasonably
scorching spring day, soccer parents huddle along
the shady sideline of a U-17 Thorns Academy
game. Olivia is starting at the number 10 posi-
tion; she’s the primary offensive playmaker. She
is vocal, confident. Early on she beats a defender
and drills a shot from 25 yards that goes just high
off the crossbar, eliciting oohs from the crowd.
Later she uses a series of ball fakes to beat
the same girl—older, larger, tasked with mark-
ing the prodigy—and breaks into space. Before
PORTLANDIA
Thorns practice
means exposure
to top talent: Nine
teammates will play
in this summer’s
World Cup.
Olivia can play a through ball, though, the girl
takes her down from behind, a professional foul.
Olivia pops up, pissed. “Leave it!” says the ref,
sprinting over and showing the tackler a yellow
card. Academy coach Laura Schott is pleased.
“I love that competitive fire!”
Olivia sends a handful of nice balls down the
wing and, in the second half, bends a free kick
around the wall from 25 yards as the goalie
stands frozen. Her third goal in four games
is a thing of beauty. Professional-level. But
she also flags in the final 15 minutes of each
half, her motor slowing. In these moments
she transforms back into a kid, tired and hot,
P R E V I E W
O L I V I A M O U L T R I E
watching the world go by, looking like she’d love to jump into a pool.
Near one end line, back from the action, sit K.C. and Jessica, joined
intermittently by their two younger daughters. As parents, they defy some
expectations. They are neither loud nor overbearing, which can’t be said
for one parent—grandparent? uncle?—who spends much of the game at
the midline, hollering, berating and generally making an ass of himself.
K.C. wears Nike shorts, a Nike shirt and a Nike hat. He’s built like
a point guard 10 years removed from the game. He’s talkative and
passionate, whapping my shoulder to make his points. He says he’s
heard it all. He’s been compared to Richard Williams and LaVar Ball,
which he hates. This isn’t about him, he says. If Olivia were a boy, no
one would care about her dad. He’d love for critics to spend a day with
his daughter and see how much she loves this, how dedicated she is to
her goal. They’d understand that this is her dream, not his. That she
isn’t going to open any floodgates, because there’s no one like her. That
it’s a matter of when, not if, she becomes the best player in the world.
“In a perfect world, this is going to be this huge win-win for every-
body,” K.C. says. “But she still has to keep improving and prove she can
help the team win—not just that she’s the best decision maker or the
best technical player. For us, all eyes are on the prize. If she becomes
what she wants, then all that matters is that we put her in the best posi-
tion to succeed. Ultimately, when she steps on the field, that’s all Liv.”
N THE MONTHS and years to come, the ripples from Olivia’s
decision will fan out. Maybe they’ll turn into waves. Maybe they’ll
dissipate. Parsons and the Thorns have planned out 12 months
“with the binoculars.” Beyond that? It’s entirely possible Moultrie will
never play for Portland. Parsons and Wilkinson are O.K. with this. They
view this project as many things: a branding opportunity, a pitch to
future talent, a publicity push, a broadside against the European teams
and an important test case. Says Parsons, “We’re going to learn a lot.”
That’s a soccer conversation, though. Listening to everyone weigh in
on Moultrie, one can’t help but wonder about the rest of it, like how (and
if) this will impact larger ideas about girls, boys and sports. About the
value we place on excellence and the cost it incurs. About the tension
between what is human—to dream, to be a kid doing cartwheels, to be
a good parent, to instill the values that undergird team sports—and the
power of external expectations and corporate franchises competing on
a global stage. Olivia might say she has a dream, but she’s also a brand.
On this day she’s still 13 and hot and tired. Her game ends tied 2–2.
Later she and K.C. will watch the film together, freeze-framing as they go.
Meanwhile, I debrief with my daughters, 10 and 12, and two friends
who came along to watch. All of them play soccer, though not in the
way Olivia does. Still, they are fascinated by her. You can have a real job
at 13?! She plays against Tobin Heath?! She gets free Nike stuff?!
They’re also a bit disappointed by the game. Maybe they expected
Olivia to score nine goals or bury a volley from midfield. Maybe they
thought it would all be so obvious, a blinking light above her head an-
nouncing her awesomeness. But, of course, it wasn’t. It was just a soc-
cer game. And it turned out Olivia’s not superhuman. She’s just a girl.
Like them, but different. ±
T THE TRAIL BLAZERS had one last shot to save their season,
and only two realistic options. Damian Lillard and CJ McCol­
lum are among the most elusive scorers in the league, with
moves not easily predicted and intentions not easily pinned
down. No matter the direction of the final inbounds pass
with 3.3 seconds left, the ball would ultimately find one of
those two. All the Warriors had to do to end the series in
Game 4 of the Western Conference finals—and punch their
ticket to a fifth straight NBA Finals—was cover both without
the slightest lapse.
Shooting guard Klay Thompson, a second­team All­Defense
selection, was tasked with shadowing Lillard, as he had
throughout the night. Against McCollum, Golden State went
with a less conventional choice: Draymond Green. Most bigs
would be out of their depth tracking a slippery combo guard
for a final shot, but Green isn’t most bigs. Even calling the
6' 7" 230­pounder one is to accept a positional spectrum
that doesn’t apply. Over the course of this playoff run he had
covered 6' 6" combo guard Shai Gilgeous­Alexander, spot­up
guard Patrick Beverley and stretch four Danilo Gallinari of
the Clippers; small­ball big PJ Tucker and lob­threat center
Clint Capela of the Rockets; and point forward Evan Turner
and athletic wing Maurice Harkless of the Blazers. The War­
riors hadn’t cared what position Green guarded then, and
wouldn’t now. “When you know who the biggest threats are
at the end of a game,” Golden State coach Steve Kerr says,
“you put Draymond on one of those threats.”
Green started the play with McCollum but also perfectly
executed a switch, disrupted an attempted screen and jammed
up a cut to the basket. All Portland could muster was a hard
SP OR T S IL L US T R AT ED • JUNE 3 –10 , 20 19

sprint for Lillard to the corner and a turnaround heave that

never had a chance. Green may not have defended the shot,
but he certainly forced it.
Even a cursory inspection of the playoffs would find them
covered with Green’s fingerprints. It was his catch­all defense
that ended L.A.’s first­round charade, and his playmaking
alongside Stephen Curry that dispatched Houston in the
second. As the Blazers were swept out, they felt his impact.
“Watching him on defense, I mean, it’s incredible,” said
center Meyers Leonard. “His reads, his communication, his
72

weakside defense, blocking shots, steals. . . .”

The Warriors are constantly asked to measure their pres­
 “WHEN YOU KNOW WHO THE
BIGGEST THREATS ARE AT THE
END OF A GAME,” KERR SAYS,
“YOU PUT DRAYMOND ON ONE
OF THOSE THREATS.”

ent against their past. Was

this win the most satisfy-
ing? The most fun? Has
Curry ever been more dan-
gerous? They have learned
to sidestep the premise:
Five years of setting re­
cords and winning titles
comes w it h too ma ny
high­water marks to single
one out. Mention Green,
however, and the superla­
tives come unprompted.
“Just phenomenal,” says
Kerr. “He’s playing as well
as he’s ever played.”
T he only players in
NBA history to make it to
S TRUT TING HIS S TUFF the Finals while averag­
No Durant, no problem. ing as many points (13.6
In the West finals against per game), rebounds (9.9)
Portland, Green averaged
and assists (8.2) during
16.5 points and closed out
the sweep with back-to- the playoffs as Green are
back triple doubles. Wilt Chamberlain, Magic
Joh n s on a nd L e Br on
James. Reaching those
marks required Green to nearly double his scoring output
(7.4) from an underwhelming regular season while boost­
ing his all­around production and efficiency. “This is what
you play for,” the 29­year­old Green says. “This is what you
SP OR T S IL L US T R AT ED • JUNE 3 –10 , 20 19

train for, to be at your best at this time of year, to try to win

a championship. When you look at it from that standpoint,
which is the way I look at it, it makes it a lot easier to step
up to that challenge, because you’re playing for something
A N D RE W D. B ERN S T EIN / N BA E /G E T T Y IM AG E S (2)

so much bigger than to win that game.”

Keeping perspective is a skill, perhaps Green’s best. With
Kevin Durant sidelined by a right­calf strain, Golden State
needs Green at full bore to keep defenses on their heels. He
has to attack without pressing—scoring enough to pull at­
tention away from Curry and Thompson without disrupting
73

the offense. “If I’m wide open and Klay is half open, I think
it’s still a better shot if I give the ball to Klay,” Green says.
 NBA FINALS

There is no divorcing the competitor “[GREEN] RELIEVES HERE IS no greater tes­

from the contradictions. A player as
analytical as Green can strive to make
SO MUCH PRESSURE T tament to Green’s influ­
ence than the fact that a
the right play only to lash out at a team­
FOR ME AND STEPH,” defense might choose
mate or retaliate against an opponent. THOMPSON SAYS. “HIS not to force the ball out of Curry’s
A certain amount of collateral damage ABILITY TO MAKE hands on a pick­and­roll with Green,
comes with being a confrontational per­ PLAYS OUT OF THE PICK- preferring instead to try their luck
sonality in a passive­aggressive league. with the greatest shooter in the
AND-ROLL IS PROBABLY
“There’s gonna be a couple times a year known universe. The threat of Green
where he snaps and goes overboard,” THE BEST EVER.” rolling downhill, four­on­three, is
Kerr says. “That’s a small price to pay too frightening. Stopping his roll
for getting the intelligence and the com­ means allowing him the lob to
petitiveness that he brings.” Kevon Looney or Andre Iguodala.
When opponents test Green by leav­ Hugging in from the edges leaves
ing him open at the three­point line, he reads the situation as open a shooter. Given room, Draymond will make the correct
multiple choice. Rather than shoot—and indulge a weakness— decision with destructive frequency. It’s the weight of that
why not drive straight at the rim to force a rotation? Or why counterbalance that keeps the defense from tilting too far
not run toward Curry or Thompson for a dribble handoff and toward Curry, allowing him to shoot 16% better (by effective
send the defense into a frenzy? Part of what makes Green field goal percentage) when sharing the court with Green.
so effective is that he knows exactly who he is, and exactly “He relieves so much pressure for me and Steph, being able
how fortunate. “He’s self­aware enough to know and admit to play off the ball,” Thompson says. “His ability to make
that if he wasn’t playing with Steph and Klay, he wouldn’t be plays out of the pick­and­roll is probably the best ever. So he
nearly as good offensively,” Kerr says. For a player so mind­ makes us go, especially when you push that pace.” And it’s
ful of his own limitations to be as confident (or arrogant?) Green who puts the Warriors in gear. During the playoffs,
as Green is should unnerve everyone he plays against—the they have played seven possessions faster per 48 minutes
Raptors included. Even now, with a dynasty in full swing, with Green in the game—roughly the difference between
he must know something they don’t. the fastest and slowest teams in the league in the regular

COOL DA DDY nothing more indelible—or

more crazy—than the sight
of 25-year-old backup
All it took for Toronto’s Fred VanVleet to find point guard Fred VanVleet
his stroke—and reassert himself as a Finals rediscovering his touch
when it mattered most.
threat—was becoming a father b y A ndre w Sh a rp
To review: The Raptors
trailed the Bucks 2–1 in the
YEARS FROM this franchise had known. Eastern Conference finals
SP OR T S IL L US T R AT ED • JUNE 3 –10 , 20 19
over the Bucks, VanVleet
missed 10 of his 11 shots.
Then two things
happened. First, on
May 20, VanVleet spent
an off-day rushing from
Toronto to Rockford, Ill.,
for the birth of his first
child, Fred Jr. He stayed

now, when
Canadians
explain how the Raptors
made the NBA Finals,
they will begin with Kawhi
Leonard, the superstar
forward whose arrival last
summer transformed the
team. They will also praise
Kyle Lowry, the All-Star
74
And there will surely be
fond words for Masai Ujiri,
the executive who put
the final pieces together,
drafting forward Pascal
Siakam, gambling heavily
to acquire Leonard and
picking up center Marc
Gasol in midseason.
But to the people who
after winning Game 3 in
double overtime. At that
point, through 15 playoff
appearances, VanVleet
was 20 of 78 from the
field (25.6%). In the
previous round, against
the 76ers, he had played
just 16.8 minutes per
game, down from 27.5 in
there for roughly 24 hours
before flying back to
Toronto for Game 4.
“Anytime you have a
kid, it’s a life-changing
experience,” VanVleet said.
But fatherhood proved
to be game-changing as
well. Over the final three
games of the series,

point guard who anchored just lived through Toronto’s the regular season. Even in VanVleet made 14 of his
the most successful era postseason run, there was the series-saving OT win next 17 three-pointers;
 among players with three franchise-altering VanVleet to keep this are heavy underdogs
at least 15 attempts, wins for the Raptors. run going. The Raptors regardless, but the sudden
that was the highest “It’s a hell of a story, become a different team and vital contributions of
percentage across three man,” he said after the when he’s hitting shots. a 6-foot backup during
games in playoff history. Raptors advanced. “What Swarming Leonard the conference finals
He averaged 16.0 points this franchise has been becomes harder, and were a reminder that
in 32.1 minutes, providing through, what this city has Lowry kick-outs become playoff basketball works in
firepower to a team that been through in terms of more dangerous. VanVleet mysterious ways.
had looked thin against its basketball growth. . . . can provide a depth Whatever happens in
M A RK B L IN C H / N BA E /G E T T Y IM AG E S

the Sixers. The stretch Back-to-back games [we advantage against the the Finals, all players can
also included a 90-minute were] down double digits. top-heavy Warriors, and learn from the three-point
drive from Milwaukee to Fighting back. Clawing. if both teams go small, plan VanVleet developed
Rockford for another 24- Total team effort. That’s his shooting and energy in taking down the Bucks:
hour baby visit, a handful the way you want to do it.” can help Toronto match “No sleep. Have a lot of
of much-needed naps and Toronto will need Golden State. The Raptors babies. And let it fly.”
 NBA FINALS

BACK T O
season. Portland never found an answer for Green ripping
a rebound and leading the charge up the floor. There is so

THE FUTURE
much pressure to quickly locate Curry and Thompson in
transition that lanes to the basket go unattended. “There’s
not a lot of big guys that can stay in front of him full­steam
ahead in transition,” Curry says.
“I just try to take it upon myself to do my part and also Seven-footers hoisting threes? Positionless
try to create a pace that I know we can be successful at,”
lineups? The NBA’s maddest scientist
Green says. “I know when we get the game at our pace, not
many teams can play with us.” foresaw it all years ago B Y C HR I S B A L L A R D
This instinct may seem small, particularly in the com­
plicated tapestry of a series. It isn’t. Some veterans need
years to learn the magnitude of a playoff possession. It’s
easy to let one slip—to miss a box­out, get hung up on a FOUR DECADES coach’s signature became
screen or jog through a cut—and jeopardize a season in the ago, an NBA head a series of run-and-gun,
process. So Green is sprinting the floor off a made basket, coach dreamed centerless lineups—relying
on the off chance that a defender might slide a few feet in up an idea he thought on his best five players,
his direction. The margins can be that thin. Six of Golden would give his team an regardless of size—and
State’s eight wins against Houston and Portland came by edge: the bank pass. He a fondness for oversized
two possessions or fewer. How many of those games were envisioned his guards playmakers. The latter
swung because Green treated a random play in the second drawing the defense and dated back to his first job,
quarter as if it were the most important moment of his life? then firing the ball off the with the Bucks, where he
“That’s my mind­set going into a game,” Green says. glass to a waiting big man. entrusted forward Paul
“It’s the playoffs. If you can’t raise the level now, why do It would be brilliant. So the Pressey to handle the ball.
you do this?” team dutifully practiced Wrote William Barnard of
Maybe the question is best answered with a bit of his the move in training camp. the AP in February 1985:
own wisdom. In the lead­up to the 2018 draft, Green—who Only they kept screwing “[The coach] and Pressey
sat in on the Warriors’ predraft process from workouts to up the angle, or the force, added a new term to
the war room—shared a simple idea with the front office: or the timing. Often, they the NBA lexicon: point
There are 82­game players, and there are 16­game players. couldn’t even hit the forward.”
Already, the adage has spread around the league, a fasci­ backboard. Finally, the The coach, as you’ve
nating extension of Draymond’s legacy. The messenger just coach gave up. perhaps deduced, was
happened to be the perfect avatar. It was one among many Don Nelson. To this day
“He’s a better 16­game player than an 82­game player,” experiments. Exploiting his name elicits varied
Kerr says. “It’s because one of his biggest strengths is his the era’s illegal defense reactions, making it
competitive energy. His defensive awareness, when you rules, he instructed two challenging to assess his
combine it with the energy that comes with a playoff game, nonscorers to link arms work. Though he retired
it elevates his game to incredible heights.” The reality, near half-court, marooning as the league’s winningest
however, is that the bulk of NBA basketball isn’t played at the help defense on coach, Nellie’s reputation
Green’s competitive wavelength. isolation plays. He gave never kept pace with his
“In the 82­game season, it’s more suited to the skill guys— his 7' 7" center the green victory total. He captured
SP OR T S IL L US T R AT ED • JUNE 3 –10 , 20 19

the guys who are great shooters or whatever, guys who rack light to shoot threes. three Coach of the Year
up big numbers,” Kerr says. “And that’s not Draymond. He He double-teamed not awards but never a ring
gets triple doubles, and that’s the one statistical thing that just big men but guards. (though he won five as a
jumps out about him, the array of boxes that he checks. But Facing Shaquille O’Neal forward with the Celtics).
during the 82­game season, he gets a little bored and he and lacking an effective Rarely does his name arise
can’t rely on skill, so he gets a little frustrated at times.” counterweight—did one during conversations
For months on end, the Warriors could only play in exist?—he became the about the historic greats;
games of nominal importance, none especially reward­ first to direct his players he didn’t gain entry to
ing or challenging. Green looked at times injured, slow, to foul Shaq off the ball the Hall of Fame until two
agitated, or disinterested. Some wondered if his athletic and make him hit free years after retiring.
76

decline had already come. Then, in the fire of the playoffs, throws. (“Coward!” O’Neal And yet, watching these
he was born again. ± responded.) But the NBA playoffs, one keeps

seeing echoes of Nellie. In
Denver, where the Nuggets
run their offense through
a towering point-center.
In Milwaukee, where a
6' 11" playmaker anchored
the Bucks’ “positionless
motion” offense. His
legacy lives on in Golden
State, of course, but
we’ve also seen traces in
Boston, Houston and the
R O C K Y W ID N ER / N BA E /G E T T Y IM AG E S ( T O P); N OA H G R A H A M / N BA E /G E T T Y IM AG E S
Warriors’ Finals opponent,
where 7' 1" Marc Gasol has
taken more three-pointers
than two-pointers in the
postseason. Recently,
when I asked Bucks coach
Mike Budenholzer about
one of his more creative
lineups, he responded, “I
channeled my inner Nellie.”
Bud’s not alone. In many
respects the modern NBA
now resembles a world
predicted by Nelson, full of
point-giants and
pace-and-space
tactics. It’s almost
as if he’s become
the Philip K. Dick of
basketball minds,
his concepts
endlessly exhumed
and adapted.
Perhaps it’s time for a
reassessment.
In 1962, a Cal professor
named Thomas Kuhn
published a landmark
book called The Structure
of Scientific Revolutions.
Kuhn argued against the
common view that science
progressed incrementally,
building on accepted
knowledge, saying instead
that progress was driven
by revolutionary events.
Those anomalies could
change the existing
paradigm (the book led to
HAPP Y WARRIOR
In his (slightly)
less chill days,
Nelson (left in
February and
above in ’07)
led the Dubs to
422 wins.
the widespread use of the
phrase “paradigm shift”).
To Kuhn, Nelson would
represent one of those
intellectual anomalies, and
an incredibly persistent
one. During his 31 seasons
on the sideline, Nellie
repeatedly questioned
basic basketball
assumptions. To win you
need a big man on the
block. Centers should
stay in the paint. Players
need to fit rigid positions.
As Nelson once explained
to the San Francisco
Chronicle, “I had spent my
whole life asking, ‘Why are
point guards expected to
only pass, why are small
forwards expected to only
score and why are centers
expected to only post up?’ ”
For his efforts,
Nelson was alternately
celebrated and derided.
“Mad scientist” is
both a pejorative and a
compliment, after all.
When Nellie gave Manute
Bol the green light to
shoot threes in 1988,
Bol proceeded to jack up
nearly 100 of them—no
small feat considering
entire teams took less
than 250 per season
back then. Granted, Bol
only made 20, but he
appreciated the concept,
even if others didn’t.
“Some friends told me
that when we play the
Lakers, the announcer for
L.A. said, ‘Doesn’t Nellie
know he shouldn’t shoot
that? He has no business
shooting from out there,’ ”
Bol told the Los Angeles
Times in 1989. “But
[Nelson] said, ‘If you think
it’s a good shot, take it.’ ”
When Nelson became
obsessed with Dirk
Nowitzki, touting the
skinny German as a lock
for Rookie of the Year in
SP OR T S IL L US T R AT ED • JUNE 3 –10 , 20 19
Dallas in 1998 and giving
him a similar green light
from deep, the coach was
mocked. (It didn’t help
that Dirk shot 20% on
threes that first year.) That
bet paid off, of course;
Nowitzki eventually helped
inspire a generation of
towering marksmen.
77
Nellie’s small-ball
iterations fared better
 NB A P L AY O F F S

in the public eye, none
more beloved—or
better-named—than
the Run TMC Warriors of
the early 1990s, which
featured the namesake
trio of Tim Hardaway,
Mitch Richmond and
Chris Mullin, alongside
Sarunas Marciulionis and
Rod Higgins, not one taller
than 6' 7". Fifteen years
later, Nellie reincarnated
the lineup, again in Golden
State, only this time
with Baron Davis, Matt
Barnes, Monta Ellis, Jason
Richardson, Stephen
Jackson and Al Harrington
(the tallest at 6' 9"). A
2007 New York Times
story, written by a young
sportswriter named Lee
Jenkins, described it:
around the perimeter of
their practice court.
Plenty of Nellie’s ideas
feel familiar now. This
year’s second-round
Rockets-Warriors series
was a battle of the smalls,
with Houston often at its
best with 6' 6" PJ Tucker
as their center in a micro
lineup. In Milwaukee, Brook
Lopez is essentially a far
more effective version
of Manute (at least
offensively), sinking to
protect the rim on defense
and bombing away on
offense, shattering the
record for three-point
takes (512) and makes
(187) by a center this
season. And with Kevin
Durant out, the Warriors
relied even more upon
forward or big—based on POWER OF THREE
who surrounds them in Like Curry (left), Bol
lineups. In previous years (far right) hoisted treys,
the system deemed blazing a trail for today’s
bigs such as Gasol.
Giannis Antetokounmpo
a forward. This season,
even though he has been
the primary ballhandler,
he was classified as a
big much of the time. “I
haven’t figured out what
to do,” says Falk. “In the
past we’ve called them
point forwards, but really,
they’re all basketball
players and you’re trying
to slot them into the roles
they do best.”
Of course, Nellie wasn’t
the only one dreaming of
interchangeable players,
and he freely admits to
borrowing and adapting
from others himself. It’s

FANS MAY NOT ALWAYS REMEMBER ALL NELLIE DID, BUT

COACHES DON’T FORGET. IN 2010, PAT RILEY CALLED HIM
“THE GREATEST INNOVATOR IN THE HISTORY OF THE GAME.”

“While other teams
may be spending their
practice time working
on intricate plays, the
Warriors are working
Steph Curry, a man
originally drafted by a
besotted Nellie.
Perhaps foremost
among Nelson’s realized
also important to note
that this isn’t a cause-
and-effect situation.
Myriad coaches, from
George Karl to Mike
greater success, by
others. He gave us the We
Believe Warriors, who won
one (very entertaining)
playoff series. Steve

R O C K Y WID N ER / N BA E /G E T T Y IM AG E S (C U RRY ); M A RK B L IN C H / N BA E /G E T T Y IM AG E S (GA S O L)

on their spacing. . . . By
spreading the floor, Golden
State forces the defense
to cover the perimeter,
SP OR T S IL L US T R AT ED • JUNE 3 –10 , 20 19
dreams is the positionless D’Antoni and down the Kerr gave us the Dynasty
trend, exemplified best line, contributed to the Warriors, upgraded at
by the Bucks. The game game’s evolution, as did most every small-ball
evolved so dramatically trends like globalization, position.

allowing Davis to drive
into the paint. The defense
can try to collapse to stop
Davis, but then he can kick
the ball out for an open
three-pointer.”
The passage could
be lifted out of the
current pace-and-space,
Sprawlball era, when
78
that the concept of
positions is increasingly
irrelevant. Ben Falk,
a former Sixers VP of
basketball strategy who
now runs the website
Cleaning the Glass,
originally developed an
automated program for
his site to assign players
analytics and a succession
of singular players like
LeBron, the ultimate point
forward. Rather, what sets
Nelson apart is the sheer
number of things he tried,
and how many of them
now seem prescient. In
some respects, he’s like
the songwriter whose
Innovators often take a
public beating, depending
on how elegant their
innovations appear. Sam
Hinkie got run out of town
in Philly; then the league
freaked out, teams copied
him and now the Sixers
are a force. D’Antoni was
hailed when he concocted

teams like the Bucks tape one of five slots—point, creations are invariably the Seven Seconds or Less
five “stand here” boxes combo (guard), wing, covered better, and with offense because it was

glorious to watch. Now he’s
bemoaned for his Harden-
centric system, as it can
render the most graceful
of sports tedious to watch.
Still, D’Antoni is merely
exploiting his team’s
strengths while minimizing
its weaknesses.
That’s what Nelson
says he was always
doing: making the best
of the situation, even if it
occasionally seemed he
purposefully created the
weaknesses. (Just look at
the big men the Warriors
drafted over the years: Les
Jepsen. Clifford Rozier.)
Still, necessity—or at least
the appearance of it—is
the mother of invention.
Fans may not always
remember all Nellie did,
S T E V E L IP O F SK Y
but coaches don’t forget.
When the Chronicle wrote
about Nellie in 2010,
near the end, Pat Riley
called him “the greatest
innovator in the history of
the game.” Added Larry
Brown: “Forever, people
in this league will be doing
what Nellie did first, and it
will never get old.”
Ideas might not age, but
coaches do.
Most choose to do so
differently than Nellie,
however. They take an
announcing gig. Or sign on
as a well-compensated
“special consultant.”
Maybe run a clinic or, at
worst, get a car dealership.
Nellie? After leaving
the Warriors in 2010, he
headed back to his home
in Maui and fell off the
basketball map. In ’13, I
visited him at his home
in Paia. He greeted me in
flip-flops, looking trim and
tan, and led the way to the
patio to smoke stogies—
he’d cut out beer—and
watch the waves, his two
dogs lounging nearby.
Later, once he figured out
the DVR, we watched a
Warriors-Grizzlies game.
He cackled a lot, praised
Andre Iguodala and cursed
David Lee.
He took life at its own
pace. Long afternoons.
Shuffleboard out back
of the bistro he owned.
And, best of all, poker
games in his upstairs man
cave. There, he and his
buddies—including Woody
Harrelson, Owen Wilson
and Willie Nelson—would
get magnificently stoned
and play deep into the
night. Once, he told me,
a beloved regular, Greg
Booth, passed away right
there during the game,
his aorta giving out. The
coroner was late arriving,
and the group looked to
Nellie, who said, “He’d
want you to play on.” So
they’d finished the game
that night, stepping
around Booth’s body to
get to the veranda for a
smoke. “Poor bastard,”
Nellie told me, “but he
went out doing what he
loved.”
One gets the impression
that’s how Nellie intends to
go, too. In his case, though,
it would be something
other than hoops. “I have
no interest in returning,”
he told me then.
He kept his word. The
next the world saw of him,
he was inducting Steve
Nash into the Hall of Fame
in 2018. Then, this spring,
he returned to Oracle
to fete the We Believe
Warriors. He wore a black
T-shirt under a black
blazer, accented by gold
chain, silver beard and
matching shoulder-length
silver locks. He smiled and
joked and espoused the
virtues of the OG/Hindu
Kush varietal he now
grows, “Nellie Kush.” Life,
he told us, was good.
Nellie just turned 79,
and his retirement to date
has mirrored his coaching
career, marked by one
animating question: Why
not? Why not go live in
Maui and breathe the
salt air? Why not put Dirk
on Muggsy and, later,
Stephen Jackson on
Dirk? Why not bring a Bud
Light to the postgame
presser? Why not try
things just to see what
happens?
This was always his
strength: a willingness to
put back-of-the-napkin
flights of fancy into
motion, consequences be
damned. He encouraged
others to do the same.
When young coaches or
assistants asked him for
advice, Nellie would say
the same thing every time:
“You can’t be somebody
else; you gotta be
yourself.”
Nelson lived that
SP OR T S IL L US T R AT ED • JUNE 3 –10 , 20 19
credo, and the game is
better for it. He may not
have directly caused the
game to evolve—though
he no doubt had a hand
in it. Thirty years ago,
had you wanted to look
into a crystal ball and see
the future of basketball,
you could have. It was
79
right there, in Nellie’s
playbook. ±
 PH I L E S P O SI T O PAT R ICE BE R GE R ON B OB PL AGE R

BA
MICHA EL FA R BER
BY TH E
WITH SPECIAL REPORTING BY
A LEX PR EWITT
LONG
WAY
JA DE N S CH WA RTZ
THE STANLEY CUP
2019 trail is often referred to
STANLEY CUP as a marathon and not a
sprint, a trope as tired as
the Bruins were of having
to wait for 10 days for the
finals to start. Marathons
a re done in t wo-plus
hours or six, depending,
and runners might hit the
wall. In the playoffs the
wall—like the jackhammer Blues—hits back.
This year’s finals offer a riot of hockey color from Boston, fea-
turing a rapscallion with a Warrior Alpha DX stick instead of a
BB gun in winger Brad Marchand, erudite captain Zdeno Chara,
practically perfect Patrice Bergeron and bulletproof goalie Tuukka
Rask—that’s two u’s, two k’s and no rebounds. While the Blues
might not have a Marchand-like pest, they do have an earworm,
the bouncy 1980s pop song, “Gloria,” which they blast every time
poised rookie goalie Jordan Binnington backstops another win.
There are multiple dimensions to these finals, unlike the last time
the Bruins and the Blues played for the Stanley Cup, in 1970, when
everything was neatly captured in two dimensions, thanks to an
enterprising newspaper photographer with a Nikon F camera.
Consider his picture. There soars the nonpareil Bobby Orr,
horizontal. His stick is in his right hand while his left reaches
for the Boston Garden rafters in celebration of his Cup-winning
goal. Now shift your focus. The puck just outside the crease is at
the feet of Glenn Hall, Mr. Goalie, the man who once played 502
consecutive games without a mask. There, centered in the back-
ground, is Noël Picard. He was a jovial but sturdy defenseman—“a
one-man wrecking crew,” Scotty Bowman, St. Louis’s coach in
the late 1960s, calls him—who an instant earlier had wrapped his
blade around Orr’s left ankle, launching Orr into the stratosphere
of the imagination. Hoist by his own Picard, if you will.
The oft-told story of Ray Lussier’s shot is as fascinating as
the shot Orr tucked through Hall’s five-hole. Lussier worked for
the Boston Record-American. His assigned stool for the overtime
period was near the Boston net, but he cadged a photo slot at
the opposite end, in the Bruins’ attacking zone, because a Globe
shooter had retired to a concession stand before the extra period

CK
SP OR T S IL L US T R AT ED • JUNE 3 –10 , 20 19

Forty-nine years ago Boston and St. Louis faced

off for the Stanley Cup in a forgettable series
—except for one indelible photograph. Now, the
Bruins are finals regulars; it’s been a much rockier
return trip to the NHL’s biggest stage for the
81

good-but-never-great (until now?) Blues

 S TA NL E Y CUP F IN A L S
to slake his thirst on a 90° Mother’s Day afternoon. Pinching
from the right point, Orr whipped the puck to center Derek
Sanderson behind the net and continued skating toward
the goal. Taking a return pass, number 4 ended Game 4,
40 seconds into overtime. Lussier fired off three frames.
The photograph splashed in his newspaper 36 hours later
was the third.
“My dad never revealed the name of the Globe photog-
rapher, out of respect for a comrade,” Randy Lussier says.
“He took it to his grave.”
Like college students and aggressive drivers, the photo is
omnipresent in Boston. It is around the corner from the dress-
ing room at the Bruins practice facility, prominently featured in
a time line of the franchise’s history. A billboard-sized version
looms in the concourse on the fifth floor of TD Garden, one of
many Boston-related exhibits at the arena’s Sports Museum.
“If we had it any smaller, people would question us,” curator
Richard Johnson says. “Bobby was a household deity. And that
picture is the secular talisman, the touchstone.”
There are four framed prints across the street at The Fours,
the 43-year-old pub whose name needs no explanation: An
autographed copy behind the host station, two above dining
booths and another next to the upstairs women’s bathroom.
Peter Colton, owner and manager for three decades, was
finishing eighth grade in Boston’s Hyde Park neighborhood
when Orr turned the Garden into Kitty Hawk. “That’s when
people fell in love with the Bruins,” Colton says. “They never
get tired of looking at it. Brings them back to a good time.”
And, naturally, the photo is displayed in Matt Grzelcyk’s
boyhood home in nearby Charlestown. The Bruins defense-
man is straight Boston. His dad, John, has worked on the
Garden’s changeover crew for 51 years, including the night
of Game 4. Today a cluster of old Grzelcyk family snaps is
situated on a side table in the dining room, reminders of
family beach vacations and such. But they all yield pride of
place to Lussier’s photo. “That one is out for display,” Grzelcyk
says. “I don’t know if I could name a friend who doesn’t have
it. . . . Growing up in Boston, I think it means everything.”
So gaze again at the 22-year-old Orr. His flight is the link
between Stanley Cup finals nearly a half century apart, but
it also is the last taut strand of hockey’s frayed innocence.
SP OR T S IL L US T R AT ED • JUNE 3 –10 , 20 19
He soars for eternity wearing a look of rapture and amaze-
ment, hockey’s Peter Pan. But when he landed splat on the
ice on May 10, 1970, it was the St. Louis Blues who found
themselves the NHL’s Lost Boys.
HE BLUES began life as a real estate play. When
T the Original Six doubled to 12 teams for the 1967–
68 season, St. Louis was offered a conditional
franchise, ahead of Baltimore, if a suitable owner
and arena could be found.
82
Arthur Wirtz would see to that.
Wirtz owned the Chicago Blackhawks. He also owned the
St. Louis Arena, which, through his staunch self-interested
support of the city some 300 miles south, was destined to
again become an NHL barn in the literal sense. (The arena
was built in 1929 for the National Dairy Show and housed
the woebegone St. Louis Eagles in ’34–35.) To secure a
franchise, Sid Salomon Jr. and his son would have to pay $4
million—double the expansion fee and more than $31.5 mil-
lion in 2019 dollars—to take the dilapidated building off
Wirtz’s hands.
Sold! Not that St. Louisians initially were. Shoved into the
newly created West Division with their expansion brethren—
PHOTO FINISH
The still of Orr’s
series-winning
goal from 1970
against the Blues
remains the most
iconic image in
NHL history.
and playing an unbalanced schedule that limited home games
against established NHL teams—the Blues averaged fewer
than 9,000 fans the first season. Of course the consolation
(E SP OSI T O); S T E V E BA B IN E AU/ N H L I /G E T T Y IM AG E S (B ER G ER O N); B RU C E
prize was a plausible path to a Stanley Cup finals; the West
B EN N E T T/G E T T Y IM AG E S (PL AG ER); DAV ID E . K LU T H O (S C H WA R T Z)
Division winner just had to beat the other new clubs. The
PRE V I O US SPRE A D : B RU C E B EN N E T T S T U D I OS /G E T T Y IM AG E S
Blues reached the finals in their first three years.
Those were rollicking teams, brimming at times with
distinguished last-call legends such as Hall, Jacques Plante,
Dickie Moore and Doug Harvey, and buttressed by Red
Berenson, a nifty center who had been a Rangers spare part.
The Blues also boasted a murder of Plagers, the beloved
fraternal gong show of Bill, Bob and Barclay, plus Picard,
whose thumping of the Flyers’ Claude Laforge in the 1968
playoffs planted the seed for the Broad Street Bullies. “Noth-
ing compared to our intrasquad games,” says Cliff Fletcher,
the Blues assistant general manager who would go on to
 manage three NHL teams. “You’d have two Plagers on one
side and another Plager and Picard on the other. There
wasn’t a safe place on the ice.” The Canadiens swept the
surprisingly competitive Blues in the 1968 and ’69 finals,
but Orr, Phil Esposito and the powerhouse Bruins toyed
with St. Louis in 1970. The NHL expanded again the fol-
lowing season, Chicago shifted to the Blues’ division, and
a mostly promising start morphed into what would become
the dubious distinction of the NHL’s longest active Stanley
Cup drought: 51 years.
This might be more discomfiting were the futility not
“THAT’S WHEN PEOPLE FELL IN
LOVE WITH THE BRUINS,” COLTON
SAYS OF THE PHOTO. “THEY NEVER
GET TIRED OF LOOKING AT IT.”
shared with the oft-mocked Maple Leafs, winners of 13 Cups
R AY LUSSIER / B OS T O N H ER A L D A M ERI C A N /A P
but none since 1967. There is a qualitative difference be-
tween the two: Toronto failures tended to be clown-car
crashes. St. Louis was just another team, a flyover franchise. any real adversity that year and clearly didn’t know how to
Other than ’77, when they were on the brink of insolvency
and saved by civic white knight Ralston Purina, and ’83,
when they were on the brink of moving to Saskatoon and
ownership skipped the draft, forfeiting all the team’s picks, first period of Game 7, Sharks winger Owen Nolan, two
the Blues generally have been solid citizens. St. Louis
squandered the Brett Hull years in the early ’90s and the
Chris Pronger–Al MacInnis era a decade later—but it did
make the playoffs for 25 straight seasons between ’80 and
2004, close to Boston’s record 29.
“Players in St. Louis got away with a lot of stuff compared
to, say, players in Toronto or Montreal,” says Kelly Chase,
who had 1,497 of his career 2,017 penalty minutes in his
eight seasons with the Blues. He is now an ambassador for
the team after 18 years as a radio analyst. “Not the same
pressure, the same level of accountability. St. Louis appreci-
ates effort as much as the results. Work hard, give a damn
about the city, and sometimes that seems
to be enough.”
“They were always making one more
little deal just to make the playoffs, never
showing long-term vision,” says Pronger,
who played nine seasons of his 18-year
Hall of Fame career on the Blues’ defense.
He still lives in St. Louis. “They thought
like a small market, concentrating on cash
flow. . . . See, this is a traditional town.
On Thursday nights you go to the same
restaurant. You still hang out with your
grade school friends. And it was almost
a tradition the Blues would find a way to
lose. You’d always hear that a player would
have to leave St. Louis to win a Cup.”
T here were close ca lls. In 1986,
St. Louis lost Game 7 to Calgar y in
the Campbell Conference finals. In ’91,
after a four-for-two swap that brought
defenseman Garth Butcher and center
Dan Quinn from Vancouver, the Blues
lost the Presidents’ Trophy by a point to
Chicago and fell to the North Stars in the
second round. But no failures were more
heartbreaking than the pratfalls at the
turn of the millennium, when St. Louis
coughed up two Stanley Cup fur balls.
The Presidents’ Trophy Blues beat San
Jose in their opening game of the 2000
SP OR T S IL L US T R AT ED • JUNE 3 –10 , 20 19
playoffs and were leading Game 2 when
defenseman Marc Bergevin grabbed the
puck in the slot and, like a second base-
man making a backhand shovel to the shortstop to start a
double play, inexplicably flipped it past his own goalie, the
stunned Roman Turek, to tie the score. “We hadn’t faced
deal with it,” Pronger says. “That goal rattled us. We went
from, Everything is positive and we can do no wrong, to
suddenly, We can do no right.” As time was expiring in the
83
strides inside the red line, unleashed a shot that handcuffed
 S TA NL E Y CUP F IN A L S
Turek and gave the Sharks a two-goal lead. The Blues lost.
Turek was better the following spring. At first, anyway.
The Blues had traded center Craig Conroy to Calgary for
Cory Stillman in March—“Conroy was an important guy in
the room, an offensive player who had sacrificed himself for
the team to become a great checker,” Chase says—but the
deadline swap barely warranted a footnote after St. Louis
eliminated the Sharks in six and swept Dallas to reach the
conference final. Therein lay the problem. That quick se-
ries left the Blues with nine days off before the next round
against Colorado. “I learned later from some of our Czech and
Slovak guys that Roman liked his beer,” Pronger says. “So
now we’re in the conference final, and he figures
it’s getting serious. He’d have a couple of beers to
relax, to reduce the stress, but during the layoff
it seems like he changed up his routine. He went
cold turkey.” And Turek surely played like one.
The teetotaling tender was giving up goals that
were softer than oatmeal, paddle down, essentially
using his stick as a ramp that allowed pucks to
all but scurry into the net. The Blues dominated
play but were out in five.
In the most Blues-ian of moments, St. Louis—
home of the Budweiser Clydesdales, the mecca
of Michelob—squandered a shot at the Stanley
Cup because of a problem with a goalie drinking
beer. He stopped.
ELCOME TO June 2019. The Blues no
W longer cry in their beer. After abusing San
Jose in the Western Conference finals with
feral checking, solid goaltending and a
second playoff hat trick from Jaden Schwartz,
Chase says, “they’ve moved out of the cold, gotten
rid of the smell that they can’t win.”
The man with the chiseled face who helped air out the
musty franchise is coach Craig Berube, who replaced
Mike Yeo last November. Berube’s relevant NHL numbers:
1,054 career games, 61 goals, 241 fights and 3,149 penalty
minutes. That’s 1,000 games the hard way.
SP OR T S IL L US T R AT ED • JUNE 3 –10 , 20 19
Of course Berube always had been a hard guy. On a
hot summer day in 1983, a series of boxing matches were
held to raise money for the Ladies Auxiliary in Williams
Lake, B.C., where the 18-year-old Berube was playing
for the Mustangs of the Peace-Cariboo Junior Hockey
League. The event was called So You Think You’re Tough.
Berube fought three times and won the $1,000 top prize,
whipping men twice his age, according to former coach
John Van Horlick. Frustrated after Berube landed several
consecutive punches, a tough-guy biker type resorted to
84
“street-fighting tactics,” Horlick recalls, and began kick-
ing Berube, who hopped out of the ring. Once emotions
cooled, Berube told his coach, “Well, I might as well get
back in,” and pummeled the fellow. Like Ray Lussier’s
photo, Berube is black-and-white.
“Since December we’ve basically been playing what
amounts to playoff games. We’ve been hardened,” says
general manager Doug A rmstrong, whose team had
the league’s worst record on Jan. 2. “And one thing I’ve
seen from Craig is that in a Gen X or Gen Z world,
hockey players still respond to old-school ways from a
coach—things like directness without condescension
and accountability. The social aspects are different with
millennials, but at the rink they
“GL ORIA” DAY S
The 1980s pop
song has become
a part of the
entire Blues’
ethos, down
to the T-shirts
worn by players
like defenseman
Robert Bortuzzo.
“THEY’VE MOVED OUT OF THE
COLD,” CHASE SAYS OF THE
BLUES, “GOTTEN RID OF THE
SMELL THAT THEY CAN’T WIN.”
respond how NHL players have for years and years.”
Like in Bobby Orr’s day.
The 1970 final is just a reference point in the continuum
of the game to many of the Blues, none of whom were born
when Orr retired in ’78. But Flying Bobby matters, the
game’s most famous image. You didn’t have to be there in
the steamy Garden that day because a photographer with
a Nikon and a sense of the moment was.
“To get a rematch with Boston all these years later is
pretty cool,” says Rob Ramage, a defenseman who played
on the team that was almost shanghaied to Saskatchewan.
He, like many who wore the Blue Note on their chests,
CO U R T E S Y O F T H E S T. LO U IS B LU E S
also lives in St. Louis. “One Saturday, maybe ’96 or ’97,
we had an alumni game here against the Bruins. Esposito
and [Ken] Hodge were playing. I think [linemate Wayne]
Cashman, too. I can tell you it was a bigger deal for us than
our fans because we knew the history.” Ramage pauses.
“We felt the history.” ±
  Rocky Bleier   Bryce Fisher   Greg Gadson 

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 He eats PB&Js by the dozens
his father—who’s now his coach—a
pencil-thin sophomore shooting
 B Y L. JON
WERTHEIM

PHOTOGR APH BY
SIMON BRUTY

WEIGHT
A ND

SEE

and takes jumpers by the thousands as part of a grand experiment started by

decade ago. But will all of this effort be enough to propel record-setting but
guard
ANTOINE DAVIS from Detroit Mercy to the NBA?

Uncrustables, they’re called: premade, prepackaged peanut

butter and jelly sandwiches that come 18 to a box. Each one
packs 320 calories, 17 grams of fat and enough sugar to give
a large horse diabetes. There is, of course, no accounting
for taste, but these snacks will not be winning any James
Beard Awards. Yet Uncrustables figure prominently in the
locker, diet and future of Antoine Davis.
You’ve heard of the “freshman 15,” the weight first-year col-
lege students often pack on unintentionally after months of
dining hall food and late-night pizza runs? Adding 15 pounds
is Davis’s goal. By the time his sophomore season at Detroit
Mercy starts in the fall, he wants—desperately—to augment
his 6-foot frame. So he is eating enough Uncrustables and
other snacks to bulk up a body that gets lost in a sweatshirt.
“I like them O.K.,” Davis says of the sandwiches, in a voice
that barely registers above a whisper. “But when I see that
they help me add weight, I like them more.”

87
 Playing at 155 pounds, Davis dazzled as a freshman. While
he received only a small fraction of the attention of Duke
behemoth Zion Williamson, the shooting ( . . . and shooting
and shooting . . . ) guard averaged 26.1 points, third-highest
in Division I. (Williamson put up 22.6.) Davis’s 132 three-
pointers surpassed the freshman record of 122 set in 2006–07
by the comparably sized Stephen Curry of Davidson. He was
also the first freshman to be named to the All-Horizon League
team since a Butler forward a decade ago, Gordon Hayward.
Davis is a playmaker who can beat the defense off the
dribble. But truly, he is a shooter. His release is blindingly
quick, his range hard to quantify. Last season he connected
on 38.0% from deep, hitting multiple threes from the t of the
Titans’ half-court logo, 26 feet out. “They were good shots,”
he asserts. “Even at my age [20], I’ve noticed that opinions
are changing about that. It’s like Damian Lillard. If you
prove you can make it, distance doesn’t matter as much.”
His shooting has made Davis both a minor cult figure
and a YouTube sensation. And while his season ended in
early March, his range and accuracy have remained on
vivid display each day since then at 8,295-seat Calihan Hall.
Positioned in front of a machine that feeds him basketballs—
AirPods in his ears, eyes on the target, braids bouncing
with each release—Davis orbits
the court. Almost invariably,
the ball snaps the net. On this SHOOTING S TAR
day he went through a typical Antoine left Houston
shooting workout, hoisting for the chance to play
for Mike (below),
5,000 jumpers. At different then broke Curry’s
intervals, he makes 32, 37 and 11-year-old mark for
29 consecutive three-pointers. three-pointers by a
Told of this later, Davis smiles freshman.
and shrugs. His high is 101.
Davis is a realist. He recog-
nizes that, as the three has become the most important N SEPT. 10, 2000, Bob Knight was fired as Indi-
shot in basketball, the NBA will accommodate an accurate,
if undersized, marksman with a hair-trigger release, able
O ana’s basketball coach after 29 seasons and three
national titles, completing one of the great down-
to create his own shot. Curry is the most obvious example. falls in sports. What was already a convulsive period
But the Sons of Steph now include the Hawks’ Trae Young in Bloomington only intensified when the school admin-
(6' 2", 180 pounds) and Purdue’s Carsen Edwards (6-feet, istrators offered the job to one of his assistants. Mike Davis
200), a potential first-round pick in the draft on June 20. was everything Knight wasn’t. Young. Warm. Inexperienced.
SP OR T S IL L US T R AT ED • JUNE 3 –10 , 20 19

Why, Davis wonders, can’t he be the next?
But he also knows this: It’s not going to happen if he’s a
buck fifty-five, a Smart car among SUVs. How are you going
to manage screens when you weigh roughly half a Zion?
How are you to defend another shooting guard when you’re
spotting him 50 pounds? “I have to get bigger, no doubt,”
Black. Knight even offered to pay Davis’s $95,000 salary
if he declined the job in solidarity. A few days before his
40th birthday, Davis refused Knight’s offer and became
the Hoosiers’ first African-American head coach in any
sport.
For Davis, it was, at once, a dream job and a no-win job.
MI C H A EL HI C K E Y/G E T T Y IM AG E S

says Davis. “That’s the challenge.”
He’s attacking that task this summer by working out and
eating everything that isn’t a mushroom or a stalk of broc-
coli. If he succeeds—both in helping to rebuild the Titans’
88
He ran a clean program. He recruited capably. In 2002 he
led the Hoosiers to the NCAA championship game, where
they lost to Maryland 62–54. His in-game coaching could
be shaky, but, beyond that, in many precincts, he commit-

program and in playing professionally—he’ll write one of ted the unpardonable sin of not being Bob Knight. Indiana
the great basketball family redemption stories. dismissed him after six seasons.

Since then, Davis’s career trajectory has not exactly been
upward. He spent six years leading Alabama-Birmingham,
taking the team to the NCAA tournament or the NIT in
four of them, before he was fired. Davis then went to Texas
Southern and was there six seasons as well, going 115–89.
“I wish I had started small and built up to a job like Indi-
ana,” Davis says with trademark candor. “Instead it was
the other way around.”
But while he was coaching, Davis was moonlighting on
what was equally a science project and a behavioral research
experiment. Shortly after it came out in 2009, Davis read
The Talent Code by Daniel Coyle, which makes the case
that greatness is not a divine gift but rather the result of
relentless practice.
Davis thought he could apply Coyle’s doctrines, add some
of his own beliefs and turn his youngest son into a prodigy.
It wasn’t that Antoine loved basketball or was naturally
“Most kids have size and strength, get drafted on that, and have to build skills,” says Mike Jr.
ANTOINE HAS THE SKILLS
“
gifted. But Mike—himself a creature of routine who starts
each day with 500 pushups and a cold shower—had a vision
and designed a training program for Antoine, predicated
on some intriguing principles:
• Size and speed are overrated. “It’s all about the skills and
technique,” says Mike. “Too many young athletes are the
biggest or the fastest and we confuse that for being the best.
C A RLOS OS O RI O/A P/SH U T T ERS T O C K
One day, you won’t be the biggest and then the question
becomes, How skilled are you?”
• Passion is overrated. “Being passionate about your busi-
ness is great,” says Davis. “But how good is your business
model? That’s more important to whether you make it or not.”
• Repetition is everything. “With Antoine,” says Davis, “it
A N T O INE D AV I S
was about getting to the point where shooting a basketball
came as naturally as tying his shoe.”
Antoine was 12 when he started training, though it took
him a few years to warm up to the idea. Fortunately, Mike
had a lab partner, as it were: John Lucas, whom he coached in
the 1990s when they were both with the CBA’s Wichita Falls
Texans. When Davis took the job at Texas Southern, in
Houston, he reconnected with Lucas, who lived nearby. An
impossible-not-to-like basketball/life coach, Lucas took par-
ticular interest in Antoine. Lucas’s own son, John Lucas III,
was 5' 11" and weighed 166 pounds, but he made the NBA
and played for six teams between 2005–06 and ’16–17.
Paid a monthly fee to work with Antoine, Lucas put him
through a daily battery of shooting, conditioning and ball-
handling drills. During the summer, when NBA players
gravitate to Lucas’s facilities to work out, he invited Antoine
to play in the pickup games. Suddenly, the 14-year-old was
running full-court with JaVale McGee, Thaddeus Young and
DeAndre Jordan. And damn if the kid didn’t hold his own.
“When DeAndre Jordan is telling you to shoot, you shoot,”
says Antoine. “And you better make it.”
In part to continue the partnership with Lucas, the Davis
family decided to home-school Antoine, who played on a
high school team called the Homeschool Christian Youth
Association. While he scored 23.0 points a game as a junior,
most of the recruiting services overlooked him; he didn’t rank
among the top 300 prospects in the country. But Houston
coach Kelvin Sampson (who had succeeded Mike Davis at
Indiana, incidentally) noticed the hometown star and of-
fered Antoine a scholarship. Happy to stay local, Antoine
signed a letter of intent in November 2018.
Last June, Detroit Mercy (formerly the University of
. build
Now he needs to
size and strength.”
Detroit) offered Mike Davis the top job. The Titans were
SP OR T S IL L US T R AT ED • JUNE 3 –10 , 20 19
coming off consecutive eight-win seasons. A commuter
school nestled in a threadbare neighborhood of a struggling
city, the program has a considerable basketball history.
But “Spencer Haywood once played here,” or “Dick Vitale
once coached here,” is not much of a recruiting pitch for
kids born in 2001.
Yet Davis reckoned that if he could rebuild Detroit Mercy
he could, at 58, rebuild his career as well. And the process
could be accelerated if he could rely on the skills of the
sharpshooter who lived under his roof. “It was Antoine’s
89
choice,” says Mike. Part of his pitch: He would pay Antoine’s
tuition, so if his son wanted to transfer he would, under
 A N T O INE D AV I S

NCAA rules, be considered a walk-on and wouldn’t have
to sit out a year.
Antoine chose to join his dad, and Sampson let him out of his
commitment. “I just kept thinking how much fun it would be
do this as a family,” he says. “It just seemed like the right move.”
When the Davis clan arrived in Detroit, the team was
down to four players. Mike signed 10 during the first two
weeks of August, holding open tryouts, combing the NCAA
transfer portal and searching for fifth-year seniors eager to
play for one more season.
He did, however, have one of MANY A HURDLE
the most skilled freshmen in To lift the Titans and
the country. In his first game reach the next level,
SP OR T S IL L US T R AT ED • JUNE 3 –10 , 20 19
And there’s this: “It was weird calling him ‘Coach,’ but also
weird calling him ‘Dad’ so I mostly just said, ‘Hey.’ ” When
situations became tense, Antoine had a middleman in his
brother Mike Jr., 34, a Titans assistant coach who lives in
the same downtown apartment complex as Antoine.
Mike Jr., who played for his father at UAB, wishes he had
been a “project” too, but harbors no bitterness. “We didn’t
have the knowledge back then,” he says. “We would shoot 500
shots and think it was a hard workout. ’Toine does 5,000.”
After the season Mike Sr. had his video coordinator, Will
Finch, compile a sizzle reel of each of Antoine’s 132 three-
pointers. Early on in the footage, multiple defenders converge
on Antoine, who is often shooting over four arms. “You
wonder how ’Toine would do,” Mike says to himself, “if he
wasn’t getting double-teamed every time.”
As the clips—and thus the season—progress, defenders
are playing Antoine with increasing physicality. They nudge
him as he pops off picks and screens. They bump his hip
as he shoots. They don’t give him space to land after he
releases. Of the top 50 scorers in D-I, Antoine was 45th
in free throws attempted: the price you pay for weighing
155. NBA scouts who sat in the stands arrived at the same
conclusion. As one from a Western Conference team puts it,
“Great scorer. Great kid. Good handle. Needs to be bigger.”
So it is that for all the thousands of jumpers he hoists each
day, the bulk of Davis’s work—pardon the pun—happens
away from the court. It’s the time spent in the weight room,
where he lifts four times a week. It’s the time he spends
swigging protein shakes. Most of all, it’s the time he spends
chewing and swallowing.
“We’re doing this in reverse,” says Mike Jr. “Most kids
have size and strength, get drafted on that, and have to
build skills. Antoine has the skills. Now he needs to build
size and strength. I know which position I’d rather be in!”
Nick Wilson, Detroit Mercy’s director of strength and con-
ditioning, is overseeing Operation 170, as the quest for
Antoine’s target weight is known. “But it’s basically, eat,
eat and eat some more,” says Wilson. “Later in the summer,
we’ll get a daily calorie count, probably 4,000 to 5,000. But
right now, I tell Antoine, ‘You’re eating to put on size, not
to not be hungry.’ For most people it’s a neat problem to

Davis needs to add

Antoine dropped 32 points on have. Eat constantly and the more you put on, the better.”
muscle and 15 pounds.
Western Michigan, then fol- Antoine’s weekly trip to the scale in the Detroit Mercy
lowed with 30 against Temple. weight room has become an anticipated event, attracting
And the scoring bursts con- a ring of teammates, friends and, of course, Dad/Coach/
tinued through the season. In a win over Wright State, Hey. By early May he was up to 162, having added almost
Davis had 48, making 10 of 15 threes. (At one point, the a pound a week since the season ended.
score was Wright State 45, Antoine Davis 43.) In the finale, The kid is already getting sick of peanut butter and jelly.
Davis erupted for 30 points against Northern Kentucky, the Tired of the chocolate milk he’s been encouraged to drink
conference champ. by the tankard. Weary of the pancakes for breakfast, the
While Detroit Mercy finished 11–20, Houston made the pizza for lunch and even the steaks for dinner. But if all this
SIM O N B RU T Y
90

NCAA tournament. Antoine has no regrets. The hardest helps Antoine Davis resurrect his dad’s career and take his
part? “[My dad] probably got on me more than others.” own game to the next level, it will be worth the weight. ±
 Pearl, childhood cancer survivor; and Arnold, leukemia survivor.

Lori, breast cancer survivor.

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 THE ORIGIN STORY

It turned relievers into stars,

reengineered pitching staffs and
altered the way fans view the game.
S
RISE AND

A
THE SAVE fundamentally changed
baseball—and it was just as divisive
50 years ago as it is today
BY
EMMA
BACCELLIERI

BY AND large, baseball’s counting stats define tangible events

FA L L

V
that look exactly as they sound. Anyone can see a home run,
a walk, an RBI. There might be some fuzziness around the
edges—you can quibble with the logic behind the awarding of
a pitching win—but the criteria are still straightforward. These
numbers are clear, or as clear as they can be. They’re the build-
ing blocks of both the game and the box score.
And then there’s the save.
More an interpretative definition of an act than an act itself,
and only possible under specific criteria, the save has not simply
measured relievers’ performances. It’s shaped them. After Major
League Baseball officially recognized the statistic in 1969, the
save began to influence teams’ approach to relief pitching—“one
case of baseball statistics actually changing strategy,” as Alan
Schwarz wrote in his history of the sport’s stats, The Numbers

OF THE
Game. It created an entirely new standard by which to judge
relievers, and, in turn, a new motivation for teams to pay them.
SP OR T S IL L US T R AT ED • JUNE 3 –10 , 20 19

E
Fifty years after its birth, the save has helped make millionaires
and revolutionized relief.
Which makes it all the more remarkable is that the save
was born after more than a decade of trial and error, by
way of a battle between baseball writers and teams, out of a
sea of competing definitions. It introduced an arbitrariness
previously unseen in mainstream baseball statistics. And it,
quite literally, changed the game.

T O P R O W: DA N R O S E N S T R AU C H / D I G I TA L F I R S T/ CO N T R A CO S TA T I M E S / G E T T Y I M A G E S (E C K E R S L E Y ); J O H N
I A CO N O (J E S S E O R O S CO); F O C U S O N S P O R T/ G E T T Y I M A G E S (S U T T E R); S E CO N D R O W: J O H N I ACO N O (G O S S A G E);
H E R B S C H A R F M A N ( W I L H E L M); A P/ S H U T T E R S T O C K (F I N G E R S); T H I R D R O W: A L T I E L E M A N S (J O N AT H A N
92

PA P E L B O N); H E I N Z K L U E T M E I E R (R I V E R A); F R A N K O ’ B R I E N / T H E B O S T O N G L O B E / G E T T Y I M A G E S (R E D
S OX B U L L P E N C A R); F O U R T H R O W: S E A N M . H A F F E Y/ S A N D I E G O U N I O N T R I B U N E / G E T T Y I M AG E S ( T R E V O R
H O F F M A N); R I C H P I L L I N G / M L B P H O T O S / G E T T Y I M A G E S (D A N Q U I S E N B E R R Y )
 5 0 Y E A R S O F T HE S AV E
O THE extent that most baseball fans know anything
T about the birth of the save designation, they know
this: Jerome Holtzman, a beat writer for the Chicago
Sun-Times covering the Cubs, invented the stat in
1959, and baseball adopted it as an official statistic in ’69.
This version isn’t wrong—but it is incomplete, just one piece
of a saga that included years of dramatic rule changes and
briefly threw the scorekeeping system into chaos. “What
is a save?” was not first asked by Holtzman in ’59, and it
certainly was not last answered by MLB in ’69.
In a general sense, “save” has been used to describe a
quality effort by a reliever for just about as long as baseball
has had relievers—which is to say,
just about as long as modern base-
ball has existed. The first recorded
mention of the term was in 1907;
it appears in Ty Cobb’s ’15 memoir.
But a “save” was only a loose idea
rather than a statistic, and a “re-
liever” was typically just a starter
entering a game between his regu-
larly scheduled appearances. This
changed over the decades, and by
the late ’30s it was not unusual to
see a dedicated full-time reliever.
Yet as they grew more popular, it
became clear that there was no ad- FACE FORWARD
equate way to measure their work. In measuring the worth of a reliever
Enter baseball’s first full-time like Face (opposite), Roth (left) came up
statistician, Allan Roth. Brook- with an early version of the save stat.
ly n Dodgers president Branch
Rickey, sensing an opportunity
to gain an edge with a dedicated mathematician in the
front office, had hired him in the 1940s. In ’51, Roth
set about tracking the team’s relievers, and he came up
with the first formal definition of the save: Any nonwin-
ning relief pitcher who finished a winning game would
be credited with, no matter how large his lead. If the
team won, and he finished the game, he’d earn a save.
The system was imperfect—had a reliever “saved” any-
thing if he entered with a double-digit lead?—but the basic
concept began to spread to other teams, to reporters, and
SP OR T S IL L US T R AT ED • JUNE 3 –10 , 20 19
to pitchers themselves. From the beginning, the metric was
N U M B E R E D D AY S
Looking back at notable moments in the history of the save
1960S
’60 ’63
Sportswriter The BBWA
Jerome proposes a
Holtzman save stat that
begins tracking is approved for
94
the save. a trial run.
linked to a reliever’s earning potential. “Saves are my bread
and butter,” Cubs reliever Don Elston told The Sporting News
in 1959. “What else can a relief pitcher talk about when he
sits down to discuss salary with the front office?”
Before long, the save made its first major evolution. In
1960, the stat had a new formula, a new architect, and a
new principle to prove.
Holtzman had spent the 1959 season watching Elston and
teammate Bill Henry, and he suspected that they were among
the best relievers in baseball. However, a different pitcher was
getting the attention: Pirates reliever Elroy Face, who had
gone 18–1 and been rewarded with a seventh-place finish for
NL MVP. There was just one problem,
Holtzman figured: Face hadn’t been
that good.
“Everybody thought he was great,”
Holtzman, who died in 2008, told
Sports Illustrated in 1992. “But
when a relief pitcher gets a win,
that’s not good, unless he came into
a tie game. Face would come in the
eighth inning and give up the tying
run. Then Pittsburgh would come
back to win in the ninth.” (In five of
his wins, Face entered with a lead
and left without one.)
H A R O L D F I L A N /A P/ S H U T T E R S T O C K (R O T H); C H I C A G O C U B S (H O LT Z M A N); D I A M O N D I M A G E S / G E T T Y
So Holtzman set out to create his
own definition for the save, with crite-
ria much stingier than Roth’s. In order
to be eligible, a reliever had to face
the potential tying or winning run, or
pitch one or more perfect frames with
I M A G E S (S I N G E R); F O C U S O N S P O R T/ G E T T Y I M A G E S (M A R S H A L L)
a two-run lead. If neither of those situations applied, there
was no save opportunity. In 1960, Holtzman began using this
formula to track his version of the stat around the game, and
a leaderboard was regularly published in The Sporting News.
Soon, the save was everywhere. Fans heard the term from
managers, players, reporters. It just wasn’t always clear what
they meant. Holtzman’s definition was popular, but there
were teams who evaluated their relievers with a system
like Roth’s, and there were those who used a formula in
between. Johnny Keane, who managed the Cardinals and
the Yankees, ignored these definitions and concocted his
1970S
’69 ’74
Save becomes A fulltime
an official reliever, Mike
stat; L.A.’s Bill Marshall,
Singer (left) wins Cy Young
for first time.
gets the first.
 “THERE’S NO WAY A PITCHER CAN SHOW WHAT KIND OF YEAR HE’S HAD. . . . ”
SAID HILLER. “SOME SAVES ARE IMPORTANT. SOME ARE RIDICULOUS.”

own—he kept a little black book in the dugout, saying that wasn’t so eager. Roth’s Dodgers liked their existing formula,
he made a note “if a pitcher does a good job in protecting and so did several of their fellow clubs. They didn’t want to
A R T R I C K E R B Y/ L I F E P I C T U R E C O L L E C T I O N / G E T T Y I M A G E S ( F A C E ) ; M L B P H O T O S / G E T T Y I M A G E S (G O S S A G E ) ;
RONALD C. MODRA /SPORTS IMAGERY/GETT Y IMAGES (SUTTER); RON VESELY/MLB PHOTOS/GETT Y IMAGES (LA RUSSA)

the lead,” even if he did not close out the ninth.
The situation led to plenty of questions about statistical
rigor, but it led to philosophical reflection too. What was
a save supposed to measure? A box score had never before
had to grapple with questions like these.
The Baseball Writers Association of America decided it
had to take action.
In 1963, the BBWAA convened a committee to propose
an official save statistic, ultimately settling on the original
formula from Holtzman, with one tweak—if a reliever had
two or more perfect innings with a three-run lead, he could
qualify for a save too.
The BBWAA realized that teams with other statistical
formulas might not be thrilled about making the switch, so
it didn’t ask for the formula to be implemented right away.
Instead, the committee suggested, baseball should use this
system for a trial period of one year. If teams wanted to
propose changes afterwards, they could do so; then, the save
might become official. The American League’s clubs took
a vote and agreed to try it. The National League, however,
change their record books.
HE NL’S decision received a wave of bad press—
T writers put the league on blast for blocking the
statistic, and the little number caused a big head-
ache. “This issue has been blown completely out
of proportion,” NL publicity chief Dave Grote griped to The
Sporting News in May 1964, a month after the season had
begun.
Proportional or not, the criticism worked. The NL bowed
to the pressure and decided to use the standardized save
system for the rest of the 1964 season. The BBWAA had
exactly what it wanted: both leagues’ cooperation to track
saves under a standard system for the season. But it didn’t
end as the writers had hoped. After ’64’s trial period, teams
did not move to endorse the save as an official statistic
and would not touch it for several years—even as the save
continued to spread, in media coverage and salary nego-
tiations and casual conversation. After ’68’s Year of the
Pitcher, however, baseball found plenty to change about

’75 ’79 ’82 ’85 ’88

The modern Bruce Sutter Rollie Fingers For the first Tony La
save rule is put (right) is first becomes first time, the Russa (left)
in place; Goose pitcher used pitcher to Hall of Fame uses closer
Gossage leads 75% of time in reach 300 elects a closer: primarily in
MLB with 26. save situations. saves. Hoyt Wilhelm. ninth inning.
 5 0 Y E A R S O F T HE S AV E E XERCISING
OP TIONS
Joe Maddon has
already used 12
different pitches in
pitching. The Playing Rules committee shrunk the strike save situations.
zone and lowered the mound, and, from the scoring rules
committee, there was one more announcement: for ’69, the
save would be an official statistic. It wasn’t the BBWAA’s
originally proposed formula, though. It wasn’t Holtzman’s,
either. Instead, it was Roth’s. The committee was working on
its own, without a proposal from the BBWAA, and so they
did not have to cater to the writers’ definition. If a reliever
entered with a lead, finished with a lead, and could not be
credited with the win, he’d earn a save.
After Detroit’s John Hiller set a record with 38 saves
in 1973, he criticized the metric: “There’s no way a relief
pitcher can show what kind of year he’s had. . . . Some saves
are very important. Some are ridiculous.”
For 1974, the scoring rules committee decided to change.
To earn a save, a reliever would henceforth have to face the
potential tying or winning run, or pitch at least three perfect
innings to preserve a lead. It was closer to the definition
that had originally been proposed in ’64. This didn’t mean
that it was widely embraced, however. Writers were upset
that a drastic change had been made so quickly, without
outside consultation, and relievers were frustrated that their
core stat had been made so difficult to earn. “The baseball
scoring rules committee, in its infinite wisdom, has changed
the definition of a ‘save’ for relief pitchers without doing any
research whatever,” snipped The Sporting News.
Unsurprisingly, saves plummeted. In 1973, 42% of games
ended in a save. After the switch in ’74, the rate fell to 27%.
It was maddening for relievers, confusing for fans, and
embarrassing for the rules committee. For 1975, the BBWAA
formally proposed another change to the statistic, requesting
the third official save formula in three years. Its Goldilocks
solution was more reasonable than ’74’s, less generous than
’69’s. A pitcher would be credited with a save when:
• He was the finishing pitcher;
• He was not the winning pitcher;
• And he met one of three conditions: a) he entered the game
with a lead of no more than three runs and pitched for at
least one inning; b) he entered the game with the potential
tying run either on base, at bat, or on deck; or c) he pitched
effectively for at least three innings.
SP OR T S IL L US T R AT ED • JUNE 3 –10 , 20 19

The committee took this one seriously, and it was approved.

Baseball finally had its save—not Roth’s, not Holtzman’s,
but something entirely different—and this one stuck, albeit
not always smoothly.
Look no further than one of the first relievers to issue
a verdict. “It’s not only about sports writers and fans who
don’t understand what relief pitching’s all about,” fumed
1974 NL saves leader and Cy Young winner Mike Marshall.
“The lords of baseball obviously don’t understand either—
the ones who make the rules.” Decades later, this version
96

of the save is still here, and so, too, is the debate over just
who understands how well it really works.
 STATE OF THE SAVE

C L O S IN G
T IME
As data dictates the way managers use their
bullpens, teams are devaluing the proven closer and
turning to a committee approach. Suddenly the signature
relief stat isn’t what it used to be
BY
TOM VER DUCCI

ON THE afternoon of June 13, 1973, in the seventh inning

of a game between the Indians and Rangers in Cleveland,
Texas manager Whitey Herzog turned to a 22-year-old right-
hander with a 3–14 career record named Don Stanhouse.
With Texas clinging to a 3–1 lead, Stanhouse recorded the
last nine outs of the game and earned his first major league
save. The team that season would go on to a Rangers-record
105 losses and set the record for the most pitchers with a
save, but no matter: Stanhouse was so excited over record-
ing a save that, according to the book Seasons in Hell, on
the team’s commercial flight to Baltimore after the game
he “prowled the aisles, autographing paper napkins and
stuffing them into the shirt pockets of various passengers
who had no idea who Stanhouse was or what convention
he and his bizarre cronies were headed to.”
Such prestige associated with the save is withering. From
SP OR T S IL L US T R AT ED • JUNE 3 –10 , 20 19

Austin Adams to Kyle Zimmer, Dakota Hudson to Montana

DuRapau, Kyle Bird to Brad Hand, Colten Brewer to Tony
Sipp, Jake Jewell to Ryan Dull, and Kyle Crick to Tony Wat-
son, major league teams are using more relievers than ever
before. This year more relief pitchers appeared in a game
before Memorial Day than did in the entire 1998 season.
This expanding inventory of arms applies even to what’s
thought of as the highest leverage of circumstances: the save.
Over the past four seasons, as analytics became main-
S T EPH EN G REEN

stream and pitching development exploded, more teams

97

have de-emphasized the “proven closer” in favor of draw-

ing from the volume of relievers to close games. In 2015,
 5 0 Y E A R S O F T HE S AV E

a record 21 closers saved 30 games or more. That number

fell to 16 in ’16 and to 11 in each of the next two years.
Meanwhile, the number of pitchers who secured at least
one save has increased every year for the past five seasons,
hitting a record 165 last season, including 43 with 10 saves
or more, another record.
“Early in my career you felt that having a proven closer
was a position you needed to fill going into a season,” says
Twins general manager Thad Levine, who has been an ex-
ecutive in the big leagues since 1999. “It was like having a
second baseman. You needed a closer, or else the thinking
was you were not going to compete deep into the season.
“As the game has evolved teams have become much more
creative. Teams that have aspirations for the playoffs don’t
necessarily think, ‘We need a closer.’ ”
The Twins are one of those many teams. Minnesota went
to spring training with no pitcher with more career saves
than the 24 of Blake Parker, who had been nontendered by
the Angels. The Twins signed Parker, 33, to a one-year, $1.8
million contract, eschewing the active saves leader, seven-
time All-Star Craig Kimbrel, who remains unsigned. (The
Twins are among several teams monitoring Kimbrel, who
is likely to sign shortly after the June 3 draft, when teams
no longer will lose a draft pick for signing the free agent.)
Minnesota put its pitching staff in the hands of a rookie ARM’S LENGTH the best rate in the ma-
manager, Rocco Baldelli, 37, who had been major league Managers such as Baldelli jors. “We’re employing
field coordinator with the Rays, and a rookie pitching coach, (opposite) stretch closers the best pitcher to match

DY L A N B U E L L / G E T T Y I M AG E S (H A D E R); S PX / D I A M O N D I M A G E S / G E T T Y I M A G E S ( T H I G P E N);
out for more than an
Wes Johnson, 47, the first major league pitching coach hired up according to the situa-
inning, giving rise to the

directly from college coaching. “We had five guys on the
roster who had some experience in the ninth, but no one who
was a bona-fide closer,” Levine says. “But when you marry
that up with a very creative pitching coach and a manager
who may have come from one of the most creative shops in
baseball, we felt confident in how this staff would manage
a 12- to 13-man pitching staff, especially a field staff that
is very willing to work with our advanced analytics team.”
Through 50 games, Minnesota stormed to the best record
in baseball with the help of a deep, diversified bullpen. The
Twins used eight relievers in save situations, with four
of them picking up saves. The righthanded Parker (eight
saves) and lefthanded Taylor Rogers (four) are the most
favored save choices for Baldelli. Their combined ERA is 1.23.
SP OR T S IL L US T R AT ED • JUNE 3 –10 , 20 19
O T T O G R E U L E J R / G E T T Y I M A G E S (S M I T H); S T E P H E N D U N N / G E T T Y I M A G E S (G AG N E)
likes of Hader (above). tion,” Levine says. “We’re
not valuing the save. We
have not been attentive to
saves. Our pitchers have really embraced it. ”
Only the Astros’ bullpen (three losses), which uses Ro-
berto Osuna as a classic closer, has been more difficult to
beat than the Twins’ bullpen (five). Among other teams who
are winning without a Proven Closer are the Phillies (five),
Rays (five), Red Sox (four) and Cubs (three).
“I always thought it was ridiculous that we managed to
a stat,” says one GM, recalling how teams used one pitcher
based on the definition of a save. “It still exists in a way, but
we’re getting away from that.”
Says Cubs GM Jed Hoyer, “The one-inning closer still has

Minnesota relievers have converted 88% of save chances, a ton of value, but in general teams seem to be looking for

’90 ’92 ’93 ’03

Bobby Thigpen At 37, Dennis Lee Smith Eric Gagne
notches a Eckersley (left) sets the converts
record 57 becomes oldest alltime saves record 84th-
saves; 41 in just to notch 50 record with straight save
98

a single inning. saves. his 358th. opportunity.

 guys like [Josh] Hader and [Jordan] Hicks who can come
in earlier and you just let them go.”
Four years ago teams would build a bullpen from the
back with clearly defined roles: the ninth inning closer, the
eighth-inning setup man and the seventh-inning setup man.
The abundance of quality pitchers and the
detailed information teams use to identify
the best pitcher-batter matchups blew up
that convention. Need a ground ball from
a righthanded hitter? For the Twins, the
sinker from the lefthanded Rogers fits the
bill. Need to neutralize a lefty? Trevor May is
the answer. Want to shut down righthanded
power? The fastball/slider combination of
Ryne Harper works well. Need one pitcher
for a run of right- and lefthanded hitters?
“WE’RE EMPLOYING THE BEST PITCHER BASED ON THE
MATCHUP,” SAYS THE TWINS’ LEVINE. “WE’RE NOT VALUING THE
SAVE. AND OUR PITCHERS HAVE REALLY EMBRACED IT.”
The fastball-curve-split menu from Parker makes him ef-
fective against hitters from either side.
When Phillies manager Gabe Kapler held his first spring
training last year, one of his earliest meetings involved tell-
E D Z U R G A / G E T T Y I M A G E S (B A L D E L L I); S T E P H E N D U N N / G E T T Y I M A G E S (R O D R I G U E Z );
ing his relief pitchers that they should be ready to pitch in
different situations, not in defined spots in the game.“My
job is to use them in the best possible scenario,” Kapler says.
J O H N I ACO N O (R I V E R A); R O D M A R / M L B P H O T O S / G E T T Y I M AG E S (D I A Z)
“And if you are the player, why wouldn’t you want to be used
in the situation where you have the best chance to succeed?
NFORMATION DICTATES relief pitcher usage
I more than ever. Teams consider how the stuff and
pitch paths of pitchers match up against the ten-
dencies and swing paths of hitters. The traditional
motivator of same-sidedness—lefties on lefties and righties
on righties—has become less determinative.
Using “micro matchups” has shown to be more effective
in save situations than the traditional Proven Closer method.
This season batters are hitting just .224 in save situations,
2010S
’05 ’08 ’11
Closer B.J. Francisco With 602
Ryan signs $47 Rodríguez career saves,
million deal, (left) sets Mariano
largest ever for saves record Rivera sets all-
a reliever. with 62. time mark.
the second lowest since the save stat was defined in 1969.
Gone too are the days of singular, larger-than-life person-
alities in the role. Closers, it seems, are everywhere. Until
2016, there had never been a season in which 40 pitchers
collected 10 or more saves. It has happened each season
since. One hundred eighty-nine pitchers
have saved 30 games in a season since 1969.
Almost half of them, 86, did so only once.
Closing has become so fungible that
not since Brian Wilson of the 2010 Giants
has a team’s Opening Day closer secured
the last out of the World Series. Four of
the past five relievers to close the World
Series were primarily or occasional start-
ers: Madison Bumgarner of the ’14 Giants,
Mike Montgomery of the ’16 Cubs, Charlie
Morton of the ’17 Astros and Chris Sale of the ’18 Red Sox.
The lone pure reliever in that run was Wade Davis of the
2015 Royals. Davis began the year as manager Ned Yost’s
eighth inning setup man but replaced Proven Closer Greg
Holland when Holland was injured. Including the postseason,
Yost used Davis 22 times in a save opportunity—19 times for
exactly three outs—and the Royals won every one of them.
This year Yost is enduring one of those Seasons in Hell.
He has tried six pitchers in 13 save opportunities. They have
blown eight of those 13 opportunities, a 38% save percentage
that threatens the 1974 Angels’ mark of 41% as the all-time
low in the half century of the save. From Brad Boxberger to
Richard Lovelady and Jake Diekman to Glenn Sparkman,
Royals relievers are convincing Yost that having a Proven
Closer like Davis is the way to go, modern convention be
damned. “Give me the one guy to close,” Yost said. “It just
sets everybody up in their proper place.” The way things
are trending, however, Yost may very well be the last man
standing in a rapidly changing game. ±
2016 ’18
For the first Edwin Díaz
time, 40 (left) is one
pitchers collect of just three
10 or more hurlers with 40
saves. or more saves.
“BA NA NA REPU
A WA R OVER A
OR SOME
THAT WAS THE PERCEPTION, A
EL SALVADOR FACED OFF IN WORLD
BATTLEFIELD IN THE SUMMER OF 1969.
WERE SOME NOT-SO-SPORTING

THE SOC

BY
MICHAEL MCKNIGHT
 BLICS HAVING
SOCCER GA ME
THING . . .Ó
A T LEAST, WHEN HONDURAS AND
CUP QUALIFICATION AND ON THE
FIFTY YEARS LATER, IT’S CLEAR THERE
UNTRUTHS TO THE LEGEND OF

CER WA R

ILLUS TR ATIONS BY
THE SPORTING PRESS
 IN SALVADOR, DEATH
STILL PATROLS. THE
BLOOD OF DEAD
PEASANTS HAS NOT
DRIED, TIME DOES
NOT DRY IT, RAIN
DOES NOT ERASE IT
FROM THE ROADS.

I
—Pablo Neruda

IT R A INED hard in Mexico City on June 27, 1969, the night

the national teams of Honduras and El Salvador played for
the chance to become the first Central American side to
participate in a World Cup. It was the second-most-important
conflict being waged between those two countries at that
moment—and by far measure.
The first half at Estadio Azteca was played calmly, con-
sidering what was at stake. Players displayed none of the
fervent nationalism that had been stoked by their respective
governments back home, none of the animosity that had
exacted a grave human toll already and would turn even
worse in the days ahead. “On the field, we respected each keeper Jaime Varela’s ungloved left hand, inside the far post.
other,” says Salvador Mariona, the now-75-year-old captain Back home, as Salvadorans danced beside their radios
of that El Salvador team. “Even today, the ones still alive celebrating the early 1–0 advantage, the armies of both na-
[from that Honduras team], we have a strong friendship.” tions—carrying the same weapons and wearing identical
El Salvador wore royal blue, trimmed in white; Hon- uniforms—stood poised across their jungled, 243-mile border.
duras wore white, trimmed in royal blue, the common
SP OR T S IL L US T R AT ED • JUNE 3 –10 , 20 19

colors of their national flags. The countries also shared the
same language, the same religion, with similar cultures—
commonalities that would only make it more difficult to
understand what followed two weeks later.
A few thousand soccer supporters, mostly Salvadoran,
made the 700-odd-mile trip northwest for the match, the
deciding contest in a three-game series. They joined Mexi-
can locals in filling about 15,000 of the lowest seats of a
stadium that held 100,000. In the eighth minute they all
watched El Salvador’s tall, loping striker, Juan Ramón (Mon)
102
A R L IE R T H AT month, the Honduran govern-
E ment had begun kicking Salvadorans out of its
country, hundreds at a time, then thousands, often
with a nudge from a military rifle. The reason:
They weren’t Honduran.
Central America, a thick rope of seven countries that links
North and South America, was not a stable place to begin
with. Even on a map, El Salvador, the smallest and most
densely populated of these nations, appears under pressure,
with the larger Guatemala and even larger Honduras (nearly

Martínez, receive the ball unmarked at the edge of the 51⁄2 times El Salvador’s size) pressing down on it from above,
18-yard box and rocket a left-footed shot under Honduran smushing it into the Pacific. Farmable land in El Salvador was

not only scarcer than in Honduras,
it was also controlled by a wealthy
elite that for nearly a century had
told the country’s poorest farmers
they weren’t welcome.
By the 1960s, some 300,000
Salvadoran peasant farmers—
campesinos—had relocated to Hon-
duras, where they could farm freely.
And in ’67 Honduras passed a land-
reform law that essentially asked
all those people to go back home.
The Salvadorans did not abide, so
in ’69, Honduran president Oscar
López Arellano, an impatient sort
who’d gained power six years earlier
by military coup, decided to force
them out. This unfolded as the two
nations were advancing through the
first round of CONCACAF qualify-
ing, past countries like Suriname and
Costa Rica, destined for one another.
In the days leading up to their first
head-to-head, in ’69, handbills ap-
peared throughout Honduras. The
first printed word was a slang term
for a Salvadoran.
Guanaco: If you believe yourself de-
cent, then have the decency to get out of
Honduras. If you are, as the majority
are, a thief, a drunkard, a lecher, crook
or ruffian, don’t stay in Honduras. Get
out or expect punishment.
The first wave of expulsions came
on June 2 as 500 Salvadoran families
were forcibly moved from Honduras to the other side of the
border. Game 1 would be played six days later, in the Hondu-
ran capital of Tegucigalpa, the home team winning 1–0. Fans
of both sides clashed in the streets before, during and after
the match, just as they did after El Salvador’s 3–0 victory
in Game 2, a week later in San Salvador.
H E S I T U AT I O N at the border—the increasing
T deportations and the lack of room for the deported—
deteriorated so dramatically that on the day of the
deciding third match, in Mexico City, the Salvadoran
government severed diplomatic relations with Honduras,
accusing its neighbors of “crimes which constitute genocide.”
Recalls Mariona, the Salvadoran captain: “We were focused
on qualifying, but we knew the conflict was there.”
Following the Martínez goal that drew first blood, Hondu-
ras looked disorganized. It didn’t have the fleet of attackers
El Salvador had—men like Martínez, Mario Monge and
THE SOCCER WA R
Mauricio (Pipo) Rodríguez, who could score from anywhere.
Honduras claimed only one player like that. It had brought
José Enrique Cardona onto the team just two weeks earlier,
shipping him home from Spain’s fabled Atlético Madrid
club. “He was on another level, as he had been playing in
Europe,” Mariona recalls of the man nicknamed la Coneja,
the Rabbit. “And that was reflected in the match.”
Eleven minutes after Martínez’s goal, the 5' 5" Cardona set
up beneath a crossing pass lofted into El Salvador’s penalty
area and executed a blind bicycle kick, smacking the ball
out of the air and driving it backward into the net. Goalie
Gualberto Fernández could only drop to all fours as the
scoreboard changed to read, el Salvador 1, honduras 1.
I T HIN H O U R S of the first expulsions, back in
W early June, Red Cross refugee centers on the Sal-
vadoran side of the border had been overwhelmed.
Local newspapers and radio stations seized on
this opportunity to defend their nation’s honor and demon-
ize their Honduran oppressors by claiming that the expul-
sions were murderous pogroms of mass rape and mutilation.
But the director of the Red Cross, Baltasar Llort Escalante,
said he saw no evidence of such atrocities at the refugee
centers or at Salvadoran hospitals. According to the defini-
tive 1981 book about the conflict, The War of the Dispossessed,
by Thomas P. Anderson, violent human rights abuses by
Honduran authorities “were isolated cases and not so wide-
spread as generally believed in El Salvador.”
Honduran newspapers like El Cronista, meanwhile, re-
ported “with unseemly glee” (Anderson’s words) on the
“cleansing of the alarming number of Salvadoran campesinos
who have infiltrated our soil” (the paper’s words).
“The media definitely fueled the fire at a time when people
in power needed that animosity to be inflamed,” says Dan
Hagedorn, who cowrote The 100 Hour War. Fearful of an
influx of returning squatters, El Salvador’s powerful landown-
ers threatened President Fidel Sánchez Hernández with a
coup if he didn’t attack his neighbors. Hernández’s Honduran
counterpart, López Arellano, needed the public to loathe
Salvadorans so he could forcibly remove them (and also to
distract his own people from his self-serving leadership).
SP OR T S IL L US T R AT ED • JUNE 3 –10 , 20 19
The site of the first match of the qualifying series, Es-
tadio Nacional, was turned into an internment camp for
Salvadorans. June in Central America means intermittent
rain and temperatures in the 80s. The venue had no roof,
limited facilities and, now, a throng of intimidated refugees.
A Human Rights Subcommittee within the Organization
of American States would later state that “the press and
radio bear an enormous responsibility” for the war that lay
ahead. Following El Salvador’s victory in Game 2, “Radio
Tegucigalpa spoke of ‘the enormous quantity of [Honduran]
103
vehicles destroyed [in El Salvador], of violated women and
sadistic beatings, of men brutally wounded by the crowds,’ ”
 THE SOCCER WA R
Anderson wrote. “El Cronista, as usual, outdid everyone
else, speaking . . . of hungry and thirsty Hondurans being
served urine and manure, of women stripped and violated
in the streets by Salvadoran mobs. Those of us who were
there saw nothing of the kind, but it was impossible to
intrude any rational statements into the Honduran press.”
Polish war journalist Ryszard Kapuscinski would later
tell his own stories of abuse, but their veracity was called
into question when he wrote that the restless Salvadoran
crowd had held up “portraits of the national heroine Amelia
Bolaños” before Game 2. Bolaños, according to Kapuscinski,
was a teenager who took her own life, using her father’s
pistol, moments after her beloved team lost Game 1. The
Amelia Bolaños story, shared in Kapuscinski’s 1991 book
The Soccer War, has since been debunked. No birth or death
records exist for such a person. The massive public funeral
that Kapuscinski said the Salvadoran team attended—it
never happened. The newspaper he cites as his main source,
El Nacional, appears to have been entirely made up.
Soccer War, has since become ubiquitous. Even those who
take issue with its accuracy use it. Anderson—student of
Central American politics and history professor at East-
ern Connecticut State University—was a devout enemy of
the term (until his death in 2017), and yet he employed it
throughout The War of the Dispossessed, even as his book
title tried to rename the conflict, even as he wrote on page
one that the conflict “was not over something as trivial as
football.” That handy label proved as irresistible to him as it
SP OR T S IL L US T R AT ED • JUNE 3 –10 , 20 19
has been for the rest of the world over the last half century.
The first hint that the beautiful game would be blamed for
the war came three days before the climactic match, when the
Salvadoran National Assembly put forth a resolution—which
members must have known was untrue—declaring it “lamen-
table” that Hondurans were retaliating against Salvadorans
as a “result of the recent international football games.”
The confusion was furthered by a brief UPI story that
appeared in American newspapers the morning after the
match. That report hinted at off-field tensions between the
104
two countries but did not cover their cause. The headline
dubbed the game the soccer ‘war.’
N LY A S IN G L E outburst marred the match in
O Mexico City, according to that UPI story: a brief
shout of “Murderers! Murderers!” from a bloc of
Salvadorans. One can only guess, but that chant
likely stemmed from media reports of slain Salvadorans in
Honduras, or from the confirmed atrocities committed by
the Mancha Brava, a Honduran vigilante group that doled
out death on behalf of the López Arellano government.
One of the most commonly repeated errors of the whole
ordeal is that FIFA had moved Game 3 to Mexico City be-
cause of the tension. The truth is that the rubber match
had been scheduled for a neutral site many months earlier.
The war was still more than two weeks away when Hon-
duras and El Salvador met in Mexico City, but by this time
saber rattling at the border had devolved into mortar fire
and skirmishes among ground troops that left handfuls of
casualties. “It was a coincidence that this was happening
while we were trying to qualify to the next round,” explains
Mariona, trying to dispel the countless references online
and in the foreign press to the soccer game that started a
war. “War was already brewing.”
In the 28th minute, with the score still knotted at one,
Mon Martínez found himself dribbling in space, with only
a single defender between him and the goal. The mercurial
striker, who would go on to play for the Indiana Tigers of
the American Soccer League, made it past his opponent,
outran another Honduran and ended up one-on-one with
Varela. Martínez’s right-footed blast made it 2–1, El Salvador.
Early in the second half, a long pass by Honduran mid-
fielder Donaldo Rosales was misjudged, then mishandled
by Fernández, the Salvadoran goalie. Rigoberto Gómez
pounced on the gift and booted it into an empty net for
the equalizer, 2–2.
E I T H E R M I L I T A R Y was particularly well
N equipped for war. Nonetheless, the Salvadoran
Air Force (FAS) began prepping a small fleet of
civilian Cessna planes for combat. They rigged
special seat straps and removed passenger-side doors, turn-
ing single-engine light aircraft into bombers: A pilot had
only to tilt the plane, release the strap on one of the football-
sized mortar rounds seated next to him and shove the shell
into the sky.
The Salvadorans also relied on the same P-51 Mus-
tangs that had escorted American bombers over Europe
 THE MARKETPLACE

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 THE SOCCER WA R

in World War II. This would be the last war, anywhere in

the world, in which prop planes were used. Here the Sal-
vadorans employed an eccentric American plane restorer
named Archie Baldocchi as a consultant. The 55-year-old
Californian had married a Salvadoran woman years earlier
and had fallen for her homeland, too. Baldocchi served the
war effort by retooling one of his prized Mustangs and
configuring other old warbirds for fresh fighting. He also
helped recruit a handful of American fighter pilots to the
cause—thrill seekers with spare time—promising them, on
behalf of the Salvadoran air force, $2,500 for each Honduran
plane they removed from the sky.
On the morning of July 14, FAS mechanics readied the
big American planes for battle and loaded ordnance onto
Cessnas, Pipers and other puddle jumpers. The plan was to
strike at sunset, then fly home under the cover of darkness.
“By 5:50 p.m.,” Hagedorn reports in his book, “31 Salva-
doran aircraft were on their way to their assigned targets.”

IVE MINUTES after Fernández’s adventurous net-

F minding allowed Honduras to tie the match, a
new goalie, Jorge Suárez, came on for El Salvador.
“The downpour converted the field into a skating
rink,” recalls Monge, now 80. The game was becoming
more physical, but the Mexican referee, Abel Aguilar Elizalde,
did not raise a single card the entire match. In the 75th
minute, following a hard tackle on Cardona, Elizalde blew
his whistle and jogged over to the scene, eager to continue
the game. But the Honduran goal machine stayed down,
curled in a ball of pain. Eventually he was carried off the
field. He would not return.
The Hondurans pressed forward without their star.
Suárez, the new Salvadoran goalie, made a point-blank
save of a shot that would have tilted the game in the 81st
minute. In the 88th he punched a free kick over the crossbar.
It was here, recalls Monge, that his teammates remem-
bered “the Salvadorans suffering in Honduras.” And this,
he says, “led us into a winning state of mind. We kept tell-
ing each other, ‘Tenemos que ganar, tenemos que ganar.’ ”
We have to win.
But first: Elizalde glanced at his wristwatch and gesticu-
SP OR T S IL L US T R AT ED • JUNE 3 –10 , 20 19
training was stunned by the words being inked across paper.
El Salvador’s air raid was messy and disorganized, fore-
shadowing the four-day confrontation that followed. In
rural Central America, everything turns pitch black when
the sun goes down, and the air war that dominated the
conflict was fought largely in this dark. Even in daylight,
the hostilities in July 1969 were typified by randomness
and indiscretion. “There were a lot of rounds fired, a lot of
bombs dropped,” says Hagedorn, five decades later, adding
that innocent civilians were often caught in this crossfire.
“All of a sudden their little campesino hooch would be de-
stroyed by a plane flying over, and they had no idea what
was happening.”
The rest of the world, meanwhile, was looking elsewhere.
To Vietnam. And to the heavens. As morning broke on the
second full day of conflict, July 16, Apollo 11 was launching

lated like an orchestra conductor. Ninety minutes would
not be enough time to decide the victor.
H O M A S P. A N D E R S O N was interviewing a
T government official in San Salvador when he heard
the “angry roar of internal combustion engines
in the sky,” followed by air-raid sirens. An hour
later the radio informed locals that their country had just
bombed Honduras.
Dan Hagedorn was at his desk near the Panama Canal
106
from Cape Kennedy, Fla., carrying Neil Armstrong, Buzz
Aldrin and Michael Collins to the moon. A classified CIA
report from that day passed along news that Honduran
authorities were still “rounding up all Salvadorans and
detaining them in the soccer stadium. A nationwide Hon-
duran radio network last night exhorted civilians in the
western highway area to grab machetes or other weapons
and move to the front to assist the army.”
But by then there was no need. Just two days later, at
10 p.m. on July 18, the two governments begrudgingly

when he heard the click-clack of a nearby teletype. The agreed to a cease-fire. Each side was down to its last bullets
23-year-old U.S. Army information specialist and historian-in- and bombs. “Each side,” says Hagedorn, “was exhausted.”
 H E M AT C H in Mexico City remained knotted
T as the first of two 15-minute extra periods trickled
away. With four minutes remaining, El Salvador’s
José Antonio Quintanilla won the ball in the center
circle and booted it forward, high and long. His teammate
Roberto Rivas chipped a back pass to Elmer Acevedo, who
crossed it toward the penalty area.
The Hondurans’ last defender didn’t see Pipo Rodríguez
(the Pipe, for his slim silhouette) slipping behind him, sprint-
ing toward the goal, and so he allowed Acevedo’s ball to float
right past his face, thinking his keeper would collect it. But
there was Pipo, baseball-sliding in with the toe of his right
boot, nudging the ball beneath Varela’s hands and into the
back of the net, 3–2. Photographers rushed the field. Rodrí-
guez lay on his back near the goalmouth. A teammate fell on
jogging, like toy soldiers in need of a windup, and sat on
the wet grass. Pipo came over and consoled several of them.
UPI’s “Soccer War” story noted that the match “ended in
embraces and handshakes by both teams.”
The editors of El Salvador’s La Prensa Gráfica chose not
to focus on the uplifting nature of the home team’s victory.
honduras eliminado, the front-page headline blared. In
essence: they lost—another editorial choice that served
to inflame tensions.
H E WA R didn’t start because of our games,”
T says Monge. “There was a political motive. It
just happened to be during the time of the
qualifiers.”
“I think we were used,” recalls Rodríguez, the hero.
“The government used us as their voice. It happened in
Honduras as well.”
Cristian Villalta, editor at the Salvadoran paper El Grafico,
explains: “This was two military dictatorships using the
games to exacerbate nationalism.” Calling it the Soccer War,
he adds, is “like saying World War II broke out because of
the artistic failure of Adolf Hitler in Vienna. It’s nonsense.”
And yet, sighs Mariona, “the press continues to make
the same mistake.”
That mistake has had a far-reaching impact. It muddied
the motivations behind a conflict whose final death toll
hovered between 2,000 and 3,000, the majority of victims
noncombatants. In 2001, retired U.S. diplomat Robert Ste-
ven told an oral historian, “It was a difficult job trying to
get anybody in Washington . . . to take [that conflict] at all
seriously. Everyone had the same reaction: Oh, it’s crazy
in Central America, banana republics having a war over a
soccer game or something.”
Not only have the causes of the conflict been wildly mis-
understood, but the war itself also resolved nothing. Many
Salvadorans stayed in Honduras. Military scuffles contin-
ued over the next decade. A peace pact wasn’t signed until
1980—and even that didn’t stick. The border remained in
dispute until ’92. Diplomatic relations finally resumed that
year, nearly a quarter century after the war “ended.” (The
two national teams didn’t play between 1970 and 1980.)
Over the last 50 years the region’s unchecked social im-
balances and broken
political machiner y
have allowed a new
scourge, gangs, to take
root. Migration to sur-
rounding countries has
continued to skyrocket.
More than two million
Salvadorans and Hondurans came to the U.S. in 2018—
almost 80 times the number that made the trip in 1970.
The soccer outcome, too, proved anticlimactic. El Salva-
dor’s victory over Haiti in the final CONCACAF qualifying
stage brought some measure of happiness and pride to
its citizens, but the team’s return to Mexico City for the
1970 World Cup merely provided a new flavor of chum for
the game’s larger, better-trained and better-funded soc-
cer federations. The Salvadoran players were destitute.
Mariona recalls that he and his teammates had to petition
their own federation, historically rife with corruption
and graft, for the 2,000 colones (roughly $230) that FIFA
awarded each participating player. Their World Cup results
in June 1970 reflected this lack of support: three games,
three shutout losses.
As for the war and the international confusion about
SP OR T S IL L US T R AT ED • JUNE 3 –10 , 20 19
what caused it, says Mariona, “it’s almost a forbidden topic
in El Salvador. Our biggest happiness was qualifying for
Mexico ’70.”
“As I recall that moment,” says Monge, remembering his
embrace of teammates in the rain, “I feel like I’m back in
the Azteca stadium. Both teams wanted to win, but we were
thinking about El Salvador and the conflicts at home. The
team looked toward the small group of Salvadorans that
had come to the game. They were singing and chanting. I
can still see my teammates crying. Crying out of happiness.”
107
Additional reporting by Rafael Trujillo
 quarterbacks, whose numbers are In Run to Daylight, which Lombardi
propelled by the evolution of the authored with journalist W.C. Heinz
modern passing game. He ranks in 1962, the coach wrote, “[Starr]
POINT AFTER just 77th in career passing yards was a top student at Alabama . . . and
and 67th in passer rating (80.5). But after looking at the movies that first

BART
those figures are overwhelmed by preseason, I came to the conclusion
Starr’s championship résumé. He that he did have the ability . . . what
started 10 postseason games, and he needed was confidence.’’

STARR Green Bay won nine of them. He

threw 15 touchdowns and just three
Together they prospered: From
1961 through ’67, Starr started all but

1934–2019 interceptions in the postseason, and

his postseason passer rating of 104.8
seven games and the Packers went
74-20-4. In the last of those seasons,
is the best in history. His enduring on New Year’s Eve in 1967, Starr’s
legacy is that he was at his best in the quarterback sneak gave the Packers
most important games. a 21–17 victory over the Cowboys
BY T IM L AY DEN
It’s likely that none of this would in the Ice Bowl, a game played in
have happened if Starr had not temperatures that reached –13 with a
crossed paths with Vince Lombardi, brutal windchill. It is one of the most
E HAD a cinematic football who was hired as the Packers’ famous touchdowns in NFL history.
H hero’s name, two short coach in 1959. Starr had come to Starr retired after the 1971 season.
syllables full of hard Green Bay as the 200th player His later life was by turns cruel and
consonants evoking crisp autumn selected in the 1956 draft, after an inspiring. He became the Packers’
afternoons, long touchdown passes undistinguished career at Alabama, coach in ’75, a legend brought
and a stadium full of unconditional and he’d been an occasional starter back to resurrect a franchise that
love. A name for a child born unto on three poor Packers teams that had floundered since Lombardi’s
greatness in America’s Game. But had a combined 8-27-1 record. But departure after that ’67 season. But
Bryan Bartlett Starr, known forever Lombardi saw something in Starr. Starr struggled: In his nine years the
as Bart, was nearly cast aside by Packers had four nonlosing seasons
football both in college and early in and made the playoffs only once.
his professional career. By dint of He was fired after the ’83 season.
tireless study and repetition—and After the death of his youngest son,
with the support of a legendary Bret, of a drug overdose five years
coach—he became one of the most later, he became involved in antidrug
successful NFL quarterbacks and advocacy.
carried that resolve through a long Starr suffered his first stroke on
and challenging life that rarely Sept. 2, 2014. Against long odds, he
offered him an easy path. learned to walk, with assistance, and
Starr died on May 26 at 85. He had to communicate. On Nov. 26, 2015,
struggled since two strokes and a he returned to Lambeau Field for
heart attack in 2014 diminished his the ceremony retiring Brett Favre’s
physical and intellectual self but not number 4; and in the fall of 2017,
his uncommon spirit. Starr will be he came back again, for a reunion
remembered and revered by Packers’ of the Ice Bowl Packers. He was
fans as the steady, on-field leader of helped through the tunnel and onto
the 1960s Green Bay dynasty that the grass that day, and the crowd
won five NFL championships and the roared its adoration, celebrating their
first two Super Bowls, in 1967 and ’68. quarterback, number 15 forever, and
N EIL L EIF ER

His lifetime statistics are modest promising in full throat that he will
in comparison to those of modern never be forgotten. ±

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