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Nos Audietis, Episode 316: Getting to know Spencer Richey
62 Plays5 years ago
Spencer Richey came up in the Seattle soccer scene just before the Seattle Sounders launched their academy. The goalkeeper played for Crossfire then moved to the United States residency program in Bradenton before coming back to Seattle to play for the University of Washington.
His time there coincided with the Huskies’ hiring of Jamie Clark and their subsequent rise to national prominence.
During his five years with UW — he added a year due to a medical red shirt — he helped the Huskies become one of the top college programs in the United States before getting drafted by the Vancouver Whitecaps.
Richey spent a couple years with the Whitecaps — even getting a MLS start — before going on loan to FC Cincinnati in the USL. He played well enough to make the jump with them to MLS and despite FCC bringing in a foreign goalkeeper to be the presumed starter, Richey would end up making 19 starts last year and opened this year as the starter again.
We caught up with Richey on Thursday in his Cincinnati home and talked about his rise up the American soccer ladder, his continued fondness for Seattle and his outlook for 2020.
This week's music: Perry Como - "Seattle", "RVIVR - "Ocean Song", Woody Guthrie - "Roll On Columbia", "Your Journey Begins" - OurMusicBox (Jay Man) (CC BY 4.0)
Thanks to James Woollard, Sounders Public Address Announcer, for doing our sponsor reads. You can follow him on Twitter at @BritVoxUS - if you’re looking for a British Voice to advertise your business or non-profit, please reach out to him.
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Transcript
Introduction to Full Pool Wines
00:00:00
Speaker
This episode of No Sadietes is sponsored by Full Pool Wines, a Seattle-based wine seller who recently released their first book, 36 Bottles of Wine. The ethos of the book, a highly curated look at wine categories that provide exceptional value right now, should be familiar to full pool readers. But there's loads of fresh content, and since it's not trying to sell any wine through the book, there's a bit more of a sass factor.
00:00:21
Speaker
And there's food. Lots of it. Fulpel's unique writing styles applied to recipes like leftover Thanksgiving, turkey, schmaltz-a-ball soup, and pregnancy nachos. This book can be purchased through Sasquatch Books.
Seattle Sounders FC Player Intros
00:00:32
Speaker
Hey, this is Christian Roldan. And Jordan Morris from the Seattle Sounders Football Club. And you're listening to... There's no study at this. Hey, Ocean! Let's go! Jordan Morris getting in behind Florian Youngford. Jordan Morris! Scores!
00:00:49
Speaker
And how's this for a save from Steph and Fry? Here come three deers through the middle to crowd it for Seattle. What do the Tigers dream of when they take a little Tigers in? It's the Sounders, M-N-S-Cup. I feel a lot better than Bob.
00:01:17
Speaker
The bluest skies you've ever seen are in Seattle And the hills the greenest green in Seattle
00:01:33
Speaker
Welcome back to another edition of Nos Arietes.
Spencer Richie's Soccer Journey
00:01:38
Speaker
We are joined by Seattle native Crossfire Academy alum, UW alum, and current FC Cincinnati goalkeeper Spencer Richie. We have never had you on the show. I feel bad about it, but welcome.
00:01:53
Speaker
No, thank you for having me. Better late than never. So I follow you guys from far out in the Midwest here. So it's fun finally coming on.
00:02:02
Speaker
Yeah. So you, your, your soccer journey has, uh, had up until now been pretty much concentrated in the Pacific Northwest. Your previous, uh, time was with the, uh, with wisdom of the Vancouver whitecaps. You, you played for their, their USL team. And then you, it looks like you went on a loan to FC Cincinnati at first in the USL, um, which that seems to have probably been your, your big breakthrough, right?
00:02:30
Speaker
Definitely. You know, I had a lot of momentum when I was at UW, you know, in terms of mock drafts and all Americans and all these things and I had a pretty severe leg break my senior year, which is
00:02:46
Speaker
Um, super unfortunate. Um, but that really, you know, I was able to come back medical red shirt, um, played on my wood, what was then my, um, fifth year, uh, senior season. And, and I wasn't very good to be honest. So it took me a while to kind of climb through, um, you know, the ranks to get back to, to being, you know, that sort of MLS quality. And I did.
Transition to FC Cincinnati
00:03:10
Speaker
So got drafted by Vancouver, spent two years on the USL team.
00:03:14
Speaker
earned a contract with the first team. And that following season, I was behind Ostead and then Morinovich towards the end of it. But I was able to make my debut that season. I was the number two behind Ostead.
00:03:31
Speaker
he got sent off one game fortunate for me. So, um, but then the following season, yeah, Carl Robinson, um, you know, and him and I were, had a pretty transparent, I'm kind of a no BS, uh, guy when it comes to, you know, I, I want it, I want it straight from the coaches. And, and he said, you know, I like, I like Marinovich, he's going to be my guy. Um, and it's up to you. You can be the number two, um, back him up, play some games with the, with the second team.
00:03:59
Speaker
Um, or there was this opportunity of going to Cincinnati on loan, which from afar was their previous season was that a crazy us open cup run, um, where they really exploded on the scene. And I had some ex teammates that were on the team, obviously Alan Koch. Um, he was the guy that drafted me to Vancouver. He was sort of head of college scouting. Um, and.
00:04:22
Speaker
And so to me, it was a no brainer, you know, I was ready. I had been, you know, playing whitecaps two games was good experience, but it wasn't real pressure. It wasn't, uh, you know, it wasn't anything I could put on tape and people say, wow, you know, that's, um, that, that performance or that season means something. So.
Goalkeeper Career Challenges
00:04:40
Speaker
That's why I wanted to get out and I wanted to, you know, go play at a top end second division team. And, um, Cincinnati worked out that way. It was a little bumpy at the start. I wasn't playing consistently. So, um, sort of had to win that job. Um, about halfway through the season, started playing full time and had a really good second half of the year. And.
00:04:59
Speaker
Then they went to the MLS and the rest was history of trade got finalized. That was by far the biggest break of my career and even not necessarily break, but that was my sink or swim moment. If I go there and I don't do well, then
00:05:18
Speaker
That's probably it for me having a chance to play in the MLS realistically. But fortunately it went well and was able to grab the starting spot last week, even though we had a pretty subpar season, but it's been a good two years nonetheless.
00:05:34
Speaker
Yeah, so you I was kind of curious about that, you know, go being a goalkeeper, being breaking into professional ranks as a goalkeeper is not like being, being any other position, really, you know, because it's like so many the goalkeepers have such long careers, you know, you know, Stephen Fry is in his mid 30s. And it's like, Oh, he might be around for another five years. And that's not like, that's not a position that you
00:05:59
Speaker
that you say that about at most places. And the number of goalkeepers that come right out of college, let's say, and walk right into a starting job is pretty small. How do you go about balancing that out where in your head like, I'm sure on one hand, you're like, I'm 25.
00:06:17
Speaker
I don't know how to, like, am I really going to stop doing this? But on the other hand, it's like, I need to get my break. I need to show people what I can do. Like, how do you mentally stay there and, you know, and like get to be 25 and, and, you know, you hadn't started a bunch of games in the last couple of years before that. And like, what's going through your head at that point? Yeah, I mean.
00:06:39
Speaker
It's something that, you know, goalkeeping, there are guys that in terms of outfield players that come out of the draft and they play straight away and that's kind of how it goes. It's funny, I was on a Zoom call with the UW Ben Soccer team a couple weeks ago. I think they've had some of the alumni guys on. And my joke to them is not everyone's going to have the Christian Roldan career, you know.
00:07:03
Speaker
He certainly had his fair share of adversity growing up and throughout high school and whatnot and not being well recruited, but once he started to develop and progress at UW, he's been in liftoff mode ever since and I couldn't be happier for him. That's not the case with most guys. Most guys, they
00:07:27
Speaker
Maybe they're having Alex Bono where he comes out. He starts playing young and maybe he isn't 100%. He doesn't have as much professional experience under his belt.
00:07:44
Speaker
And then later down the line, he loses a spot. I'm kind of on the other end of that, where I came out of college and I wasn't to say his level. And I had to go through that developmental process of really earning my confidence, earning my improvement with the game.
00:08:07
Speaker
You know, there's lots of different ways to make it. There's, you know, guys that come through academies, through college, guys that start straight away, guys that, you know, even Stefan Fry, who, in my opinion, is the best, who's been the best goalie in the MLS for the last couple of seasons. I mean, he went through early struggles in his career in Toronto, trying to claim the spot. And obviously, since he's been to Seattle, he's been nailed.
00:08:32
Speaker
It's definitely difficult you know it's something that you hear you always gotta be prepared for your opportunity and it cannot be more true when it comes to goal keeping cuz you know you don't know when you'll get it and when you get it you likely better play well or you might not get it again so.
FC Cincinnati's MLS Transition
00:08:50
Speaker
So what was that first season in Cincinnati like for you? I don't think it had been announced that they were going to MLS yet, but they had obviously enjoyed a ton of success the previous year. You guys were getting these huge crowds. It probably felt in some ways like you are already in MLS or at least in kind of some broad perspective kind of ways.
00:09:14
Speaker
For sure. It was a little bit the master plan of when I was speaking to them leading up to that season that
00:09:23
Speaker
they were pretty confident that they were going to be in the MLS immediately after my loan season. So that was definitely something that incentivized me to finalize that, you know, just open up the gate of one. Hopefully I'll be playing a bunch of games in front of 30,000 people. And, you know, it'll be really something that I can put on my resume for teams, whether it's Cincinnati coming into the MLS, Vancouver, the following season, having to make a decision about their starting goalkeeper.
00:09:53
Speaker
So that was an awesome experience. You know, it'd been my first time in my career that I really had played not necessarily games with pressure, because as you develop in your career, you know, pressure and what that means changes. But in terms of the professional levels, the first time I had played games consistently where it was an independent
00:10:12
Speaker
You know sometimes those two teams are more focused on development than winning games but Cincinnati was in win now mode and there were jobs on the line and and that was a you know, a massive massive experience for me and in ways I felt more pressure in that season than I felt in the MLS because as I mentioned before that was kind of mine now or never moment, you know, I've I've made it up to the MLS and now I'm going back down to the USL and
00:10:41
Speaker
you know my agent i spoke it over and you know we knew that there are some risk to it if it didn't go but i'm just felt like that was you know a leap of faith that i need to make and myself as a player if i wanted to get to the mls sooner rather than later.
Richie's MLS Debut Reflections
00:10:57
Speaker
And so when you guys went into MLS, it was, I assume you were kind of on the books at least as kind of the number two goalkeeper. I know the first game, you didn't necessarily start the first few games, but you did get your opportunity and you ended up making, you know, 20 odd starch or whatever last year, or I think you started over half the season in any way. Yeah.
00:11:20
Speaker
Um, what was, you know, what was that transition like? And what was your, you also, if I remember correctly, you came out of the, out of the gates, uh, gangbusters. Um, yeah. I mean, how, how was, how was that transition for you? Yeah. I mean, after we got that ass open in, uh, Seattle, we did pretty well for the next month or so. Um, but no, it was, you know, I, I knew, um, going back there.
00:11:49
Speaker
for the inaugural MLS season that, you know, the, the staff was straight up with me and they said, you know, we're going to, they're going to go get a goalkeeper, a number one, um, you know, some guy that is experienced that, um, you know, and me as a player, you know, it's easy to let go F you, but if I'm on the other side of things, you know, if I'm starting this franchise, um,
00:12:14
Speaker
Have I done enough leading up until that point for them to hand me the keys to the starting job? If I was putting an expansion team together and I have this one goalkeeper who's on senior minimum and I have the ability to go get another bigger
00:12:34
Speaker
more experienced goalkeeper, I probably would have done the same. Um, with that said, you know, my mentality going into that season was still, um, you know, I was the number one at this club last year. Um, you know, I think I wanted to try and use that to my advantage with, you know, being familiar with the club, um, and the people within it. And I wanted to use the confidence that I had from that previous season. And I want to roll it in, uh, in the pre-season and, you know,
00:13:00
Speaker
I was pretty certain, no matter how well I played, that he was going to get the first crack at playing time. And that's what they ended up deciding. But I certainly wanted to be nipping at his heels going into those games. So he ended up picking up a little injury after the Seattle game. And so from game two on,
00:13:23
Speaker
I, yeah, I was playing every game and I started out well. We drew it Atlanta played really well then. Then we, uh, won three, no, Atlanta at the time. Yeah, that's right. And then we, uh, yeah, we beat Portland at home and our home opener three, oh, which was an absolutely electric game. Um, and then it was kind of the rest was history from there, um, in terms of me playing. So unfortunately I picked up, uh, an injury towards the end of the season and had to miss the last 10 games or so. Um,
00:13:52
Speaker
But yeah, that's sort of how it went down. So your first MLS shutout ends up being against Portland. I don't know what your personal history is with that rivalry, but as a Seattle guy, did it feel special to get that first shutout against Portland?
00:14:12
Speaker
Oh, hell yeah. In terms of the rivalry with the Timbers as a club, I would say I don't have as much of that. To be fair, as a Seattle kid, I spent more time in the Portland developmental system playing for their PDL team than I did the Seattle system. I've bounced around a little bit in the Northwest.
00:14:40
Speaker
No, it's definitely something special. I feel like, you know, Seattle and Portland have always had a rivalry, you know, growing up, but we don't have, I don't know if we have outside of soccer, any sports teams that compete in the same.
00:14:53
Speaker
Well, there used to be the big Trailblazers Sonics rivalry. Yeah, you kind of grew up with. Absolutely. That was my favorite Seattle team growing up with or to be growing up with. So I've been missing that. But but no, it definitely made it a little bit more special.
00:15:12
Speaker
And so, despite, you know, on paper, it wasn't necessarily a outrageously successful season last year.
Personal Growth Despite Challenges
00:15:21
Speaker
But when you came back this year, you've started the first two games. I assume you're still kind of the number one. That must have been, at the very least, you weren't very, like, they didn't come in with the express goal of replacing you last offseason, despite all the
00:15:37
Speaker
the upheaval around the team and whatnot, that must have given you a certain level of confidence coming into this year. Yeah, no, most certainly. And I mean, it's not, it's no secret that, you know, we were poor last season, you know, especially defensively, we conceded a lot of goals, but, um,
00:15:55
Speaker
even with that, I truly did feel like I, I had a pretty good season, you know, and especially for it being my first season, um, in the MLS playing consistently. So I think that, you know, the management and the staff at this club has shown that, um, you know, that they have confidence in me. And, and at the end of the day, they made the decision come game one, that that was true. Um, you know, with all, uh, you know, all goalkeepers being healthy going into that, um,
00:16:24
Speaker
Yeah, there wasn't a ton of turnover with, you know, the whole roster for that matter. You know, goalkeeping then, I think they made a change with the number three of, of letting a guy go and bringing another guy in. But yeah, I mean, I'm certainly happy. We at least got, you know, those two games and before this pandemic hit to, you know, to, you know, both show them and to show the rest of the league, you know, who, who the number one is in Cincinnati.
00:16:52
Speaker
So kind of the front office and the coaching staff has undergone quite a bit of change in the time you've been there. Kind of like from a distance, it's almost like a head dizzying amount of change. You had switched GMs, so you're on your third or fourth head coach at this point. Have you actually had a chance to meet your new head coach?
00:17:14
Speaker
We met him on a Zoom call the other day, I think Tuesday morning. So that was pretty fun. It was honestly great hearing him speak. I feel like most people know him as a player and sort of the badass that he was. And so when you get on the call and you're expecting him to just like
00:17:33
Speaker
be in that same manner, but he, you know, he actually didn't come off that way. I'm sure if somebody sets him off on the training pitch that he'll, uh, he'll have no problem having to go with some guys, but, um,
00:17:46
Speaker
No, it was really cool to speak with him. Really cool to hear his philosophy on the game, how he likes to play, what formations. So I'm looking forward to it. To your point, it's been difficult for sure with the, if you count the two interim spells that Johan had, this will be our fifth head coach in a year and a half. So it's been a lot for sure. And then you can ask any player.
00:18:14
Speaker
you can try and control your control and for sure that's what you have to try and do but it's difficult to not let that kind of stuff affect you a little bit as well.
New Head Coach at FC Cincinnati
00:18:25
Speaker
So I'm looking forward to it. I know the rest of the guys are you know and hopefully when things get up and running again here you know we'll be in a good place.
00:18:34
Speaker
Yeah. And there was obviously with the head coach announcement, there was also this kind of mini Twitter uproar over the wrong picture. Did anyone give Yavstama a hard time about that, or has that been mentioned?
00:18:51
Speaker
He to be fair he's taken on pretty well he would he said that trade away when he was introducing himself you know this is what my face actually curious so no that was a bit of a bit of an oopsie by the club but,
00:19:07
Speaker
there's a conspiracy theory that they did it on purpose cause all of a sudden everybody in the whole world is talking about FC Cincinnati. Yeah. I mean, it's not easy to get FC Cincinnati trending on, on like, uh, certainly at least in North American Twitter, it was quite the, quite the thing.
00:19:24
Speaker
No, for sure. The goalie coach here, Jack Stern, is an English guy. He was saying that a bunch of his... He's got a bunch of connections in the Premier League and a bunch of his friends out there were messaging him about the post. Who knows? Maybe it's just putting Aussie Cincinnati on the map a little bit more. Exactly. You also have had a relatively new GM. How have things changed under him?
00:19:52
Speaker
Yeah, he's been good. I've enjoyed him. He's, I think that one thing that was maybe lacking a little bit before, um, was sort of an identity of how the club wanted to play. Um, you know, not necessarily the specifics of, you know, the formation, but an overall, um, you know, I think of when you think of a club like say Red Bull, you know, they, their identity is as clear as they, and you can,
00:20:19
Speaker
pull a guy from the academy and plug him into the first team. And, and he will, he's going to like the end up doing well. And they've certainly done their fair share of that. So I think that's the goal. Um, and Cincinnati is, you know, they want to develop a style of play, um, a team that likes to build out of the back of possession based team. Um, you know, and they want to start that, uh, in the academy. So, you know, down the line when it's a little bit more, uh, developed and mature that, that they can start to reap some of that fruit. Um,
00:20:48
Speaker
And that's something that Gerard has certainly done a good job of bringing to the club. So you guys like, um, the rest of the league have been getting back into training in the last, you know, last few weeks. It sounds like you may have actually gotten a little bit of a headstart on some of the other teams like Seattle and whatnot. Uh, you guys were able to get back into individual training. I think you said what, three weeks ago or so.
00:21:12
Speaker
Yeah, give or take. And so how is how has that been? And, you know, how are how do you feel like FC Cincinnati is is balancing kind of the inherent limitations and what is being allowed and with the idea that you need to build up at the same time?
Training During the Pandemic
00:21:29
Speaker
Yeah, honestly, I think they've done a like spot on. I wouldn't have, you know, said one way or the other. They need to do less. They need to do more and sort of the progression. It's hard because you
00:21:42
Speaker
A lot of these announcements of the stay home orders or facilities or fields being open, it's not that far in advance of when it happens. So part of it is you do need to be prepared and fit enough that if the MLS says, oh, we're going here or we're playing games here, that
00:22:00
Speaker
you know, physically and mentally, you need to be on distance to sort of that game, you know, that game fitness that guys got to have. So it's been good. Yeah, we've done individual training for three weeks now, only been gone Monday, Wednesday, Friday at the fields, and then Tuesday, Thursday, sort of like in that home strength power session. Definitely been a lot of fitness and those on field sessions, but
00:22:30
Speaker
exposed, at least for us goalkeepers, diving around, even if we're diving on still balls and whatnot to get your joints and your muscles react limited to that pre-season grind. It's been a productive few weeks for us.
00:22:48
Speaker
You gained maybe a little bit of Twitter notoriety, we'll say. You shared a video of yourself scoring kind of like an own, I guess you could call it an own goal, but kind of an elaborate ricochet off of like one of your training devices.
00:23:08
Speaker
which I thought was a very good sport of view to share, first of all. I felt like I had to, honestly. I mean, it was impressive. It's impressive. But I am kind of curious, though, do you think you learned anything from a like, I don't know, did you ever use a tool like that in the past? And is that something that may actually be useful going forward, regardless of, you know, what you're allowed to do?
00:23:32
Speaker
Yeah, I would say that maybe not that like what I was trying to do in that video is pretty hard because you're you have to play it into the net but really close to the post so that you get the appropriate angle of the misdirect or the redirection to come off.
00:23:52
Speaker
But it's difficult because you have to you have to hit it pretty hard to generate the power for the redirect but also. You have to get your foot in the ground after you strike it to get your feet sorted to be able to. I sort of jump and push to make the save so from that component probably best that you have a.
00:24:12
Speaker
Somebody else serving you those balls, but some of the the rebound You know, we have like These little quick goal. It's kind of like a box a board or that you can bounce the ball off and We're saying that we've actually enjoyed some of the stuff that we've been able to come up with with those Part of it is the pass to it has to be if you're doing some sort of combo first time second time playing into a mini goal and
00:24:39
Speaker
you know, the pass has to be really accurate and the pace of the pass has to be on point or you end up screwing yourself. You know, oftentimes when you're playing a pass into another person and that's a little bit this way, a little bit too hard, too soft. Um, you don't really get exposed for it. So, um, some of that distribution stuff, uh, was really having to focus on, um, you know, the, the accuracy and the pace of which you're passing the ball, um, has been pretty beneficial.
00:25:07
Speaker
And so do you, have you guys started moving into the next phase yet? I know that MLS just announced today that they're going to start allowing an expanded form of basically social distance training. Um, but have you moved into that yet? And do you know when, or do you know when you would be?
00:25:27
Speaker
We have not. I think I saw the MLS just announced it today. I think the hopeful plan from speaking to some of the guys at the club was for Monday that we'd be able to start doing that training in groups of like three or four. I'm not quite sure. So tomorrow is still an individual base session.
00:25:49
Speaker
I know there are some clubs in the league that even tomorrow they're starting the small group stuff, but Hopefully Monday, but we haven't heard anything yet. I think it's so much of it is You know county by county state by state I think there's a couple teams that aren't even back individual training yet. So yeah, I know I saw just that DC United today had their first
00:26:15
Speaker
like individual training session. And I think as of, at least as of yesterday, there was like Chicago, Chicago and maybe one other maybe.
00:26:25
Speaker
New York City, maybe, um, but there was, they just got back. Yeah. Um, I know it's, it's been, it's been piecemeal in terms of teams coming back.
Pandemic Challenges for Players
00:26:34
Speaker
Um, what has been the, the attitude among players that you've talked to as far as getting back to playing and, and, you know, there's obviously this Orlando plan that's been out in the media.
00:26:49
Speaker
For sure. I mean, I think, you know, all guys want to be back, you know, playing games, even these individual sessions, which is, you know, basically putting makeup on a fitness session is what it is. But, you know, even these sessions guys have, have enjoyed just being back out on the grass, you know, being able to see guys, even if it's from afar. So yeah, in terms of getting back to playing games, I mean, I know,
00:27:15
Speaker
guys want to do it. I mean, it's, it's why, it's why we play the game still, you know, to play, to play games and, and unfortunately to do so with, with a bunch of fans in, in the crowd. Um, that's what makes it really special. So, um, obviously this Orlando thing is, is, uh, been thrown around, you know, for a bit here. Um, I think, you know, what's hard about it is.
00:27:39
Speaker
So many guys have so many different personal situations, whether that's their family, their personal health, are they at higher risk, guys' financial situations, some guys are probably more willing to take.
00:27:56
Speaker
risks or time away from family You know some guys that have three four kids some guys have are single and have no, you know partner so That's by far the most difficult thing is to to weigh the risk and the reward Of all those different situations, you know and trying to make the best decision for the whole player pool and it seems like
00:28:23
Speaker
you know, anecdotally that that players and coaches and front office all want to get back to playing. But like, what that means is obviously very different from individual to individual and what level of risk they're willing to take. But from your perspective, what is the
00:28:42
Speaker
Like, I don't know, like, how do you in your own mind weigh those, those balances? Like, are you just, can you only focus on yourself or do you try to take this broader perspective of like, well, there are, you know, coaches who are going to be high risk and there's going to be players who are high risk, but at the same time, there's this counterweight here. I mean, it is, it's, it is incredibly complex. It really is. I mean, there's,
00:29:08
Speaker
you know there's certain guys that they don't want to go at all and maybe they're because they really are scared for their family or maybe they're.
00:29:18
Speaker
they're international, you know, and their wife doesn't have a driver's license, and they have three kids at home and daycares are closed. You know, maybe it's guys that are super injury prone, and they feel like it's not like an adequate build up to play these games for them to be physically in a good place. So the circumstances are endless that you have to consider. You know, I think that if it were to happen, it sounds like
00:29:48
Speaker
clubs will have to Step up to the plate a little bit and help people whose families are will have to stay in market But I mean it like I said, it's it's situation a situation, you know mine is different to the guys next to me in the locker room and his is different to the guy next day is so
00:30:10
Speaker
it's uh it'll be really interesting how it plays out um you know i think there's i think everybody in the league wants to play games um you know staff player you name it um but it's just trying to figure out you know what's uh what juice is worth the squeeze
00:30:26
Speaker
Yeah, that makes total sense. I mean, and you can just look around and you can see how, you know, fans can put themselves in those situations and say, it's very easy to say like, yeah, like I'd be happy to go play, but, or me, like, you know, if you have wife and kids and you're talking about turning your wife into like a single parent, all of a sudden it's, it's really hard.
Youth Soccer Rivalries
00:30:51
Speaker
Yeah.
00:30:52
Speaker
So, rewinding a little bit, I wanted to talk about your experience coming up in the Academy. You played at Crossfire really before the sounders were fully on the scene in the Academy situation, but you also played at UW, and there seemed to be a pretty good mix of both Sounders Academy guys and Crossfire guys.
00:31:15
Speaker
I'm just curious, was there an internal rivalry among you guys at all? Is there a sense of rivalry between Crossfire and Saunders Academy? Maybe a little bit, but the Saunders Academy, I don't even think it existed at all when I was there. I grew up, I was an Emerald City kid at first, and then I went to Northwest Nationals.
00:31:38
Speaker
Um, and from there to, to crossfire crossfire, which is beating our brains out year in and year out. And so I was like, all right, screw. We gotta, if you can't beat them, join them. So, um, and then about a year after joining crossfire, I got invited to a residency to join the national team down there. So I ended up being a pretty damn good decision. Um, but I mean, I guess so. It kind of felt like, uh,
00:32:04
Speaker
I guess some of the the crossfire kids kind of felt like maybe they had to pave the way a little bit more and then, you know, the big swing in Seattle Saunders came in and we're able to, you know, put together this incredible Academy pretty quickly. So I never really had that much, you know, when I was coming up when I was, you know, 15, I had moved down to Florida for the residency program, and then
00:32:30
Speaker
I think it was my first year down there, if I remember correctly, is when the sounders... What year did the sounders come into the MLS? They didn't... They came into MLS in 2009, but their academy, I don't think even started until 2010. Oh yeah, what am I saying? Did I say 2015 I went down? No, you said you were 15. Oh, I was 15, yeah. So I went down, yeah, 2008, maybe? Yeah, I mean, that would have definitely been before the sounders had any sort of academy set up.
00:33:00
Speaker
So yeah, maybe a little bit, but, um, I was, it'd be interesting to see what it's like now. Yeah, I know. I'm always curious about that in, you know, especially when, I know there was a lot of, I know there was a lot of, uh, animosity over, uh, Ryan Herman and DeAndre Yedlin when they were, when I used to go, uh, I used to drive to training with the, all the time when I was growing up. Um, and then I remember there was a lot of, uh, there was a lot of beef when those guys jumped ship and went to, uh, to the sounders.
00:33:29
Speaker
There's a lot, there's a lot more drama and use soccer than there should be. Even when I went from Northwest nationals to, uh, to crossfire. Like my parents were getting these nasty emails about how likely we left the team out to dry. He's just trying to get to a better competition. Like you guys, you guys need to back off. But so you mentioned Ryan Herman, he was, you, you split time with him part of your time at, at you dub, right? Yeah. So he,
00:33:59
Speaker
transferred in, I don't know if he was there my junior year when I played the whole season in full. Maybe he wasn't, but my senior year is when I broke my leg and like the second game or something. So he ended up playing that whole season. And that was this, that was the year, um, with Christian and, um, I dunno, it was on wall there yet or not, but Wingo was there. Um, that was the year we won the pack 12 championship.
00:34:28
Speaker
And then the following season, yeah, we split games for, we split like out of conference games. And then when a pack 12 play started, um, I was playing, um, every game at that point, but okay. Um, but yeah.
00:34:43
Speaker
Yeah. And so you, you had, um, you came to UW at a, at an opportunistic time, I guess you could say, uh, Jamie Clark had, has basically turned what was, I guess, kind of like a, you know, a middling pack 12 sort of team to a team that's been really among the best teams in, in the pack 12 and, and a national power in a lot of ways. And also, um, kind of a,
00:35:08
Speaker
You know, he's had a lot of pros come through there. Yeah. What, how, how has, like, how have you seen the, the kind of U-dubs kind of place in the, in the world change a little bit? I mean that, like, I can't stress this enough. That was probably the, the, the biggest break in my career was when I was getting recruited.
00:35:31
Speaker
I mean, I was coming out of residency, so I basically at that point could have picked my school. But I was a Seattle kid through and through. I mean, I Seattle public school kid, I grew up about five minutes from campus. My parents went to UW, my aunts and uncles, my grandparents, you name it. So it was always the school in my heart that I wanted to end up at. But
00:35:58
Speaker
They, so Dean Wurzberger was the coach at the time, but the goalkeeper coaches who I had, uh, the really good relationship with, who was rich Reese, who is now still the goalkeeper coach, but I'm at my high school graduation, uh, in December of my senior year, I graduated a half a year early and I get a call that rich is like stepping away from the program and they're bringing in a new goalie coach. And so at that moment, I almost pulled my, uh,
00:36:28
Speaker
because National Signing Day wasn't until later in the year. So I almost pulled my commitment and went to UNC Chapel Hill. That was the other school that I was really into. But I ended up sticking it out. We had a pretty bad first season and they cleaned the whole staff out. And that's when
00:36:46
Speaker
And there came Jamie Clark walking into the program, going into my sophomore year. And with that, he brought Rich back. So it was kind of like a win-win for me. And the rest of the staff that he brought was awesome as well, guys that I still speak to all the time, grab beers with when I'm back in Seattle. So it's a super awesome program. It has such a great impact on so many guys' lives, not just on the field, but off the field as well.
00:37:16
Speaker
Yeah. And one of your teammates that you kind of alluded to was Christian Roldan who had himself, who has basically adopted Seattle as his home.
Christian Roldan's Growth
00:37:27
Speaker
And if you give him the right time, he'll actually explain that he actually is from Rainier Beach and grew up here and did the whole thing. Which, you know, we don't need to get into details if that's how active that is.
00:37:42
Speaker
What was Christian like in college and did you see him as a budding national teamer?
00:37:53
Speaker
Honestly, I did. I mean, he, I remember, um, I remember when Jamie Clark called me, I was a, I don't know what I would have been a sophomore or junior at the time. Um, and he was down at surf cup scouting. Um, not when he called me, but before he was scouting some other player and he was watching that somehow he came across, uh, Christian playing and he was like, holy shit, this kid is the real deal. I think he had an offer from Cal Baker's field. I don't know if he had committed or not, but.
00:38:24
Speaker
Fast forward a little bit, Jamie got him up on an official visit, and so Jamie calls me and says, Spencer, I need you to come. And I need you to host this kid for the weekend and hang out with him, whatever, show him all the bells and whistles. And I remember my first two impressions were that one, Christian was a super good kid, and secondly, his dad couldn't fly in until the next morning because he had been driving a garbage truck all night. And to me, that was just like,
00:38:53
Speaker
It was crazy, man. It was just like so eye opening like this kid is so good or was going to be so good. I haven't really seen him play at that time, but just sort of like, you know, the path that he had come through to get to that point and then for him to eventually come to UW, you know, freshman of the year, you know, and once once he kind of got, you know, into that
00:39:17
Speaker
into that program and got settled. I mean, he progressed faster than any player I've ever played with. So it's no surprise now to see him, you know, a staple in the U.S. and a staple in the U.S. national team system.
00:39:31
Speaker
Have you kept in touch with him or any of the other guys that you played with? He called me today, actually. I don't know. We play Fortnite together quite a bit, but yeah, Christian, well done, 320. So no, we still keep in touch quite a bit. I don't know what other.
00:39:52
Speaker
Sounders guys. I mean like Wingo, some guys that I played at UW with, Taylor Pei was in my wedding the other month. So, I mean, that's kind of the way that that program is. You know, I just, it's been so fun. You know, that locker room.
00:40:10
Speaker
was such a fun, fun place to be, um, you know, for those four or five years. And, um, you know, it's no, it's no coincidence that guys, you know, six, seven, eight years later continue to, to stay in touch and to be good friends.
00:40:24
Speaker
You mentioned Fortnite, and I know Christian has become kind of like a rampant Fortnite streamer even.
Fortnite's Influence on Athletes
00:40:33
Speaker
Yeah, he's the real deal. Yeah, what is the attraction to Fortnite that soccer guys seem so... Maybe it's just all people, but what is the attraction to Fortnite? What is about that particular game that is bringing people in?
00:40:48
Speaker
Honestly i don't i it's hard to really like put a finger on it but i think just video games and streaming. And athletes like you know guys who are really these famous streamers and athletes really bond because athletes have so much of their day that.
00:41:06
Speaker
you know, they kind of have to just hang inside and, you know, you don't want to be going out to dinner, eating crap food or going out, you know, drinking or there's just, you know, when I was at in college, Jamie always said like, oh, athletes are the best board game players. Cause it's like, you just got to come up.
00:41:25
Speaker
You got to come up with all this stuff to kill free time. Surely, there are some more productive things that you could be doing that are not taking a toll on your body. But yeah, this Fortnite thing, I didn't even start playing until I came out in Cincinnati and a team introduced me to it, and it is crazy addicting.
00:41:48
Speaker
I think in conjunction with this whole streaming content creator field that has been around for a while, but I was only really taking flight in the past few years where these guys are becoming legit celebrities and icons and superstars and kids are looking up to them. It's like that same tier of musicians want to be athletes and athletes want to be musicians.
00:42:16
Speaker
It's, you know, throw streaming and, you know, being a professional esports player in there. And everybody wants a taste of the other guy's pretty cool life. So. Yeah, no, I can I can see that. Yeah. But it's always funny, like, Christian, now when he does these interviews and like everyone's doing these Zoom interviews and there are all these video interviews that are going on. He's always in this gaming chair, which I think is a perfect little like. And he's got a sounder's like race car chair and everything. Right. Exactly what I'm saying.
00:42:47
Speaker
Yeah. But anyway, it's it's it's it's good to catch up with you. I'm good. Good to see a a Seattle boy doing well out in the Midwest. Sure. You seem that it seems like you guys have a good handle on things there, which is which is always good to see. So thanks for hanging out with us. Definitely, man. Thanks for thanks for having me on. Yeah. Well, this was no sardietes and we'll see you next time. Thanks a lot.
00:43:16
Speaker
Green Douglas spur where the water's cut through. Down to wild mountains and tangents you flew. Canadian Northwest to the ocean so blue. It's Roll On, Columbia Roll On. Roll On, Columbia Roll On. Roll On, Columbia Roll On. Your power is turning our darkness to dawn. Roll On, Columbia Roll On.
00:43:53
Speaker
We love you. Let's win another one!