April 12, 2022 • 31 mins
In 2010, Jessica McDonald is drafted by the Chicago Red Stars of WPS, the women’s professional soccer league. The WPS acts as a feeder system for the larger U.S. national team, and McDonald is poised to become the fresh blood the USWNT needs. But in her first pro start, McDonald tears the patellar tendon in her left knee. The best-case prognosis: an 18-month-long recovery. Worst-case? Her soccer career is over. Then, during rehabilitation, perhaps the biggest surprise of the 23-year-old McDonald's life: an unplanned pregnancy.
New episodes coming each Tuesday, through May 17.
To continue supporting journalism like this, visit charlotteobserver.com/payback or newsobserver.com/payback .
Payback is hosted by Alex Andrejev. It's produced by Kata Stevens, Casey Toth, Julia Wall, and executive producer Davin Coburn. The executive producer for iHeartRadio is Sean Titone.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Long Shot is a production of McClatchy Studios and I
Heart Radio. Previously on Payback. Someone stripped of the tools
in high school to try to succeed at collegiate level
is going to continue to have to fight tooth and nail.
I needed to get to you and see I knew
even at such a young age, I can just throw
it away. What was critical is we had to get
(00:21):
her academics up to a level where we could admit
her at Phoenix College. They were like, this is what
you literally have to do if you want to make
it to D one. We're here because we get at
witness miracles like that. We're an outlet to help people
like Jessica McDonalds. Jessica McDonald m it was a hot
(00:57):
dog that told Jessica McDonald her life was a out
to change forever. Okay, I need to y'all know not
everything in my life was a horrible experience. You guys
knew how I grew up only girl for a long time.
But my family we are tight. This was one of
the final interviews with jess for this podcast, conducted over zoom.
(01:19):
We were talking about summer vacation and a family trip
to California and Courtney Stewart, a man she met at
Phoenix College. Our parents, everybody would save up money the
whole year, knowing we go to Disneyland, Sea World and
Knoxbury Farm every summer, and then suddenly the hot dog.
(01:39):
We're in San Diego and one of my cousins warmed
up a hot dog in the microwave, and it was, Oh,
my gosh, I'm about to cry. It was one of
the most horrifying smells I've ever smelled. Jess was twenty
three years old at the time. They're a difficult child
(02:00):
hood and then college years. She'd be the first to
tell you she was no stranger to microwave to meat.
But that morning something was clearly wrong. Very right in
the larger cosmic arc maybe, but in that moment, very wrong.
I feel like I need to throw up, and I'm
just like, I grew up eating hot dogs. What's happening
(02:22):
to me right now? Why do I feel like this now?
I was feeling roozy, and I was like, hold on,
I had to like calm myself down, and I was
like no way. I like thought back, and I was like, oh,
called Courtney immediately, and I was like I think I'm
(02:42):
pregnant from The Charlotte Observer, Raleigh News An Observer, McClatchy Studios,
and I Heart Radio. This is Payback. I'm Alexandreev and
this is Part five A tiny prophet. Welcome to the
(03:06):
inaugural Global Draft of the w u s A. The
Women's United Soccer Association. Women's soccer in America took a
grand leap forward in a modest event space in Boca Raton, Florida.
This is an historic event in soccer, in women's athletics,
and worldwide. There In two thousand, acting Commissioner Tony di
(03:30):
Chico ushered in a new era of opportunity for players
like Jessica McDonald. These players represent Olympic gold medals, Olympic
silver medals, and World Cup championships. Before the U S
women's national team became legendary, before jess had watched them
win it all at the Rose Bowl from the TV
(03:51):
in her grandmother's living room, there was no professional women's
soccer league in America, so at the time, there are
a few opportunities for players like jess to compete beyond college,
even if they were lucky enough to be part of
the national team, and there was almost certainly no way
for girls to dream of making soccer their careers. You're like, well,
how do we stay at the top of our game
(04:12):
when there's nowhere to play? Joy Fawcett was a defender
on that ninety nine World Cup team. We met her
in part one of this podcast. She told us that
during that World Cup run, even the biggest names in
women's soccer were wondering what would come next. If you
don't have a late what do you You're out of college,
what do you do? We're like struggling here, trying to
(04:33):
find places to stay fit and all in our different
states and how do we do that. During the mid nineties,
many people connected to the U S women's team had
full time jobs outside of the team. Even national team
head coach Anson Lawrence also coached at North Carolina. While
playing for the national team. Fawcett coached the u c
l A women's college team for five seasons through then
(04:57):
she abruptly retired to focus on training for that n
World Cup. We don't have to quit our jobs. Every
time we went to camp, we'd all go back and
find jobs. And I remember quitting jobs time and again
or having to coach. I mean, that was the ideal job,
and it worked with our schedule because Anson was coaching too,
you know. But as we started playing more and more,
(05:19):
it got hard and hardy. After that famous World Cup win,
public enthusiasm led to the creation of a professional women's league,
the Women's United Soccer Association or w u s A,
with eight teams. The players that were adding are the
body and soul and personality of each team. That first year,
(05:43):
each roster had twenty players. Three players from the women's
national team were allocated to each club, and two international
players were selected for each team to Chico then oversaw
a player combine and draft invoke overtone in late two thousand,
where coaches from each team drafted the remaining players on
their squads. I want to wish all our w USA
(06:04):
teams the best of luck. Most players in those teams
had annual contracts, a first for American women soccer players.
The allocated national team players were each paid eighty thousand
dollars a year or more. The other players on each
roster averaged about thirty thousand a year, with some making
considerably less pay. For fourteen two thousand and one, a
(06:28):
new league at the world's best death that would be
Superstars Today the Company of US kicked off the first
women's soccer league, opened play in the spring of two
thousand one in front of thirty four thousand people at
RFK Stadium in Washington, JP Della camera at the call.
It's a bestive day on a nation's capital, Washington, d C.
As we get ready to launch a brand new league,
(06:49):
the w USA. Today it's a Bay Areas Fibrary. The
US Soccer Federation bestowed upon the w USA a Division
one ranking, declaring it somewhat anti climb, actively the top
women's league in the country, but US Soccer had no
role in funding the league or any of those salaries.
Financing was raised from outside investors, and over three seasons
(07:12):
that dwindled with TV ratings despite cuts to roster sizes
and two player salaries, the w USA was forced to
fold in two thousand three. So for the next several years,
as Jess became a star with Sereno, then Phoenix College,
then North Carolina rag Tag, amateur leagues were again the
only options for post collegiate soccer in the US. Ross
(07:34):
soccer didn't even exist, you know, for two or three
years while I was in college. Jess remembered winning on
the best teams in the nation as a young player,
and then wondering if her career would simply end once
she graduated college. All I want to do is just
play soccer, and playing overseas wasn't even a popular thing
either at the time. But even if the w USA
failed to catch on, it did succeed in laying a foundation.
(07:58):
Some of their matches drew tens of thousands of fans.
This crowd will be a major part of today's story.
Man over twenty thousand tickets sold. As a Tuesday, they
had to open up the upper sections they could get
as many as thirty thousand here today. The recession following
nine eleven certainly didn't help attendance for sponsorships. Investors thought
(08:19):
maybe eight teams have been too many, or the league
had chosen stadiums too large. There were reasons to think
a successor could capture American audiences in ways the w
USA hadn't. So five years later there was a revival,
The Women's Professional Soccer League, or WPS, launched in perfect
timing for Jessice senior year in college. When WPS came about,
(08:42):
I was like, holy crap, maybe I can continue this.
Suddenly there was life after North Carolina. We'll go inside
Jesse's rides to professional soccer after this, jessup MacDonald, what's
(09:08):
end up enough? After that two thousand nine n C
double A title at North Carolina, Jess was named to
the all tournament team and was officially on the radars
of the seven teams making up the Young WPS. Entering
the WPS draft would mean for going her senior year
of college, but it was an opportunity just felt she
couldn't pass up. In Januar, the Chicago Red Stars chose
(09:34):
Jess with the fifteen overall draft pick. Jess joined a
roster that included US national team member Megan Rapino, as
well as a pair of Brazil's national team members, Christiani
and for Mega. Oh my goodness, I'm a rookie. I'm
playing with these incredible players. The level from college into
(09:57):
pro it's a huge gap because it's so much quicker,
so much fashion, And I'm like, holy crab, you can't
even hear yourself think it was a crazy ride. Heal
A Watt, the other celebrated UNC grad we met in
Part four, told us about her move to the professional
game back and how after playing for a dynasty like
North Carolina, stepping up to cash strapped professional women soccer
(10:21):
was surprisingly harsh, and not just in terms of competition.
And I do remember my rookie year. It was a
little sad because it's totally different. A lot plays for
the Chicago Red Stars Today. You can hear stories from
girls of washing your own clothes and not having a
locker room, and it wasn't like, oh my gosh, this
sucks so bad, but it was completely different from a
(10:46):
college with money that has has been around for so long.
And that is a big adjustment in our conversation. What
crystallized an idea that I heard over and over throughout
my reporting concept so simple and yet all encompassing that
it reverberates across levels, leagues, and generations of women's soccer
(11:09):
for decades. These players have shown true dedication, passion, and
perseverance in pursuit of growth and opportunities in the game
they love, but thanks to limited viable pathways to continue
playing time and again, they've acquiesced to personal treatment and
professional working conditions that can be stingy and unequal to
their male counterparts at best and at worst monstrously abusive.
(11:35):
But at every stage women's soccer players we spoke with
have told themselves that any chance to play pro ball
under any conditions has to be better than no chance
at all. We just wanted a league here in America,
and so we were all just so thankful to be
playing back in Chicago. Just made five appearances with Red
(11:59):
Stars over their first twenty matches. She showed off her
never say die passion to chase down every loose ball,
and late in the season, she was named a starter
for the team's matchup against the Washington Freedom, her first
start as a professional soccer player. Sure that was the
moment the year round sports and the endless miles she'd
(12:20):
put on her knees caught up to her. I got
my first start in August of two and within minutes
probably the most devastating moment of my entire life, alright
fully rubbed your my pateller tendon, which is like a
(12:44):
very rare injury. It happens in American football and car accidents.
The pateller tendon connects the bottom of the kneecap to
the top of the shin bone. It's not actually attendant.
It's a ligament, but to say the least, it's a
key ligament for any athlete. Jess told us that the
moment it happened and the rush of the team trainers
(13:05):
to reside is mostly a blur, but she did remember
lying in bed that night in pain, crying herself to sleep.
It's a two year recovery, way worse than a c L.
According to my surgeon, he gave me a one out
of ten chance of even playing at a high level again.
So here I am thinking my pro career is done.
(13:27):
Soccer is a no go. Sensing her playing career might
be over, Jess tried to recalibrate her identity. She'd been
a soccer player nearly her whole life. With that on,
what else could she do. I got my surgery, I
went home to Phoenix to get my rehab done. I
was bouncing around from my grandma's house during my recovery
(13:49):
and my best friend's house. Decitially just living off of
other people. I hadn't finished school yet because I got
drafted in the middle of my senior year. I have
no car, I have no job. The only thing I
had was just rehabbing every day. Little did Jess know
the road back to elite soccer was about to get
(14:11):
even more complex and uncertain than she'd imagined. But as
you'll hear, what everyone assumed would bury her career may
well have been the thing that would save it. I'm
(14:33):
Tom Bratcher. I'm a physical therapist. I've been doing rehab
and performance work with athletes of all sports and ages,
but soccer was my sport when I was coming up
in the ES. Tom Bratcher played a few seasons of
professional indoor soccer for teams in Arizona before turning his
attention to strength and conditioning, training and physical therapy. He
(14:56):
first met Jess in the early two thousand's doing conditioning
work with less arms on Sereno players, back when Jess
was a teenager on that club team. I went out
to watch one of the Sereno games and Jess was
She'll kill me if I say this, but she was
like a giraffe on roller skates. I mean, she was
growing so fast and she could run so fast. She
(15:17):
was just all over the place. It's kind of fun
to watch. After surgery to repair her torn for teller tendon,
Jess returned to Arizona and Bratcher to rehabilitate her knee.
She would have been or twenty seven years old at
the time something like that. I was looking at her, going,
holy cow, we've got an uphill battle here. The first
(15:39):
step in Jesse's recovery was admitting how severe the injury
actually was. You have to let it heal, and it
takes about six weeks for that tending to heal enough
to start bending the knee all the way. And once
you do that, you have to kind of relearn to
walk again with a new muscle that doesn't want to fire,
and you have to get it walking properly. Then you
have to get it strong enough to try to run,
(16:00):
and then you have to try to run. So it's
it's not uncommon to come back, but it's uncommon to
come back as good or better than you were female
at that age to play soccer. I bet there's not
very many of those out there in the world that
have done that. As she alternated rehab and couch surfing
with friends, jofre kindled a romance with a man she
(16:21):
met at Phoenix College, Courtney Stewart, but for those next
few months, her priority was getting back into something close
to playing shape. I said, look, I know you you're
gonna want to try to do too much, So I'm
gonna give you the stuff to do, but you have
to not do more than that, because if you do more,
you're gonna go backwards. She waited till the time when
I cleared her to go start playing. She waited at
(16:43):
the time when I told her she could start running.
She waited at the time, and when I told her,
she had walked, so she listened to all the steps
along the way and she pushed herself. You want to
see that. Jim played it. Once Chess was cleared to
train again, she knew Jess where to find some local competition. Hey, guys,
(17:04):
through Dave Cameron at Phoenix College. She still was trying
to recover and train. We had her as an assistant coach,
but she was really there to play and train, so
she was like a player's coach on the practice field.
Jess was driven to get back to professional soccer. In fact,
Cameron said, she dreamt even bigger, though rarely talked about
(17:25):
it in her head. She want to play in the
World Cup. That was number one, and if I was
going to bet on it, I wouldn't bet on it.
I was going to tell her that, but I would
not have bet on it. There's no way. A year
into rehab, Jess took that family trip to California, and
then there was the microwave hot Dog. She went to
(17:46):
Planned Parenthood for a pregnancy test final. I'm parted with
my son, surprised be responsible for a whole another human being, Oh,
dear God. In minutes, everything changed as vision of her
mother's past cast shadows across Jess's future. Family and friends
were like, Oh, you're having a kid. You need to settle,
(18:07):
be home, be a mom, get your nine to five going.
But I could even accept that, you know, in the
back of my mind, I'm like, there's no way I'm done.
To remain connected to the game, Jess coached a few
local youth teams throughout her pregnancy, and she never quit
showing up at Cameron's men's team's practices. She wanted to
(18:28):
train and she's I'm fine. I'm like telling everyone, do
not tackle her, you know kind of thing, And I
was scared, but you couldn't stop her from playing. Jeremiah
Stewart was born on March seven, two thou twelve. His
name was inspired by Jess's favorite Bible verse Jeremiah one five,
which goes before I formed you in the womb, I
(18:50):
knew you before you were born. I set you apart,
I appointed you as a prophet to the nation's and
with everything else suddenly knew in her life, Jess told
me the most unexpected thing was this. Soon after her
son's birth, Jesse as me felt better than ever. I
felt fine even after having my kid, and not a
lot of women can say that. The first few days
(19:13):
it's horrible. But I came out of that and it
was fine. And it took a couple of weeks for
everything just to like heal, and so my body changed
in a good way. I felt younger in a sense,
like I feel like I look better now than when
I was eighteen. Medical professionals we spoke with told us
(19:33):
that's not unheard of. There's a lot of things changing
in the body and pregnancy just from a hormone perspective,
you know, from a biomechanics perspective, you now have a
different weak distribution and that's going to affect how you walk,
which is going to affect the loading of your joints.
Dabby Gilmer is in the m D pH D program
(19:54):
at the University of Pittsburgh. She's a clinical researcher in
a field known as regenerative rehabilitation. We do have a
little bit of evidence with regards to how those specific
hormones affect joints and how they function. We know that
generally estrogen is very involved in the body and inflammatory
processes and relax and also goes up in pregnancy relax in.
(20:18):
His primary job is to loosen ligaments. It's very appropriately named.
It absolutely does seem plausible that there could have been
some kind of hormonal influence that helped her healing. Even
Dave Cameron, just as biggest champion there in Arizona, I
thought this new development would render soccer a thing of
(20:38):
her past. There's the nail in the coffin. All right,
your mom, now it's over. There's no way everyone thought that.
I thought that, whether he had true scientific evidence of
that healing process or not, Cameron told us that tiny
prophet made him a believer. I think jeremiahs saved her
career because ever since having Jeremiah, she's felt a million dollars.
(21:01):
So Jeremiah was heaven sent to keep her body functioning.
I truly believe that my pregnancy like literally helped heal me.
So I talked to someone about this, and actually, there's
certain hormones that can facilitate certain injury recovery a stronger.
(21:23):
So there's some real like yeah, see, so like I
really think something miraculous happened, and I truly believe it's
my son gave me my athletic ability back. We'll be
back in a moment. Well, I was leading the same
(21:55):
kind of life set all of us were supposed to
be leading in those years. You know, I'd had a
newspaper job, had been fired because I was pregnant, But
then I had been so guilty working anyway that it
was sort of a relief. And I wrote a housewife
on the census blank in the intractable balance of personal
and professional lives. There's no more obvious negotiating of time
(22:17):
and obligations than that which is brought on with parenthood,
or more specifically, motherhood. It's been that way since the
beginning of the battle for gender equality, no matter the field.
In nineteen sixty three, Ready for Dan described the struggle
of women unfulfilled by simply being housewives and stay at
home moms. As quote the problem that has no name.
(22:40):
I was just living the life, but I was also
freelancing for women's magazines and helping to create this image
of women that just wasn't true anymore. The name for
Dan chose for it became the title of her landmark book,
ushering in second wave feminism feminine mystique. She talked about
the book's origin in this ninety seven interview you on
British talk show Good Afternoon. Each woman had been struggling
(23:04):
with all these things alone. I mean, if she felt
there had to be more, somehow than making bread, she
was a freak. There was something wrong with him. But
it was like everyone was waiting to have it put
into words. For more than half a century, the role
of mothers in the workplace has been debated, legislated, and documented.
But I found that's not as true for women who
(23:24):
play sports for a living. There is very very little,
if any research about athlete mothers. Trying to think of it,
I don't think there is any. Dr Nicole Voy runs
the Tucker Center for Girls and Women in Sport at
the University of Minnesota. We met her in Part three.
(23:46):
There is some literature around mother coaches, but none about
professional female athlete mothers. So that's a huge gap in
the area of research that Warren's future investigation. In fact,
it has warranted future investigation for almost a generation now.
(24:08):
There's no information whatsoever out there as to pregnant women
training or running or anything. I'm like trying to find
things anything like can I run and what can I do?
And trying to stay fit because you wanted to get
back as soon as possible. Joy Fawcett, the U S
national team defender who became America's original soccer mom, struggled
(24:30):
not only to navigate pregnancy as a world class athlete,
but also to navigate motherhood. It's like any mother, they're
all working hard. I mean, this might be hard physically,
but it's just as hard I think on all moms
that are working. You know, they're all staying up late
and getting up and working. And if it's not soccer,
that's your job. You have another job and you're doing it.
(24:52):
Other legends of the game echoed that sentiment in our conversations,
especially for women whose work depends on elite physical performance,
thought of adding motherhood to that mix was too much
to process. Joy was the first to show, like, Nope,
I'm going to do both, and you're all gonna see
it's gonna be fine. Julie Foudy played soccer professionally from
(25:12):
two four. She started her family three years after retirement.
I would not have been able to do both. There's
no way now that I have kids to just becomes
another confirmation of Oh my word, how did you do
all this and do it so gracefully? And we should
be allowing women to make that decision and not have
(25:34):
to quit playing. But me, I was like, oh, hell no,
I can't do that. I'm not having kids. They're in Arizona.
Bess continued coaching youth teams and running training camps in
the months after giving birth to Jeremiah. She watched her
former teammates and members of her two thousand ten draft
class become stars. Always make the comments, you know, what's
(25:54):
good for women as good for everybody, and what's good
for the most marginalized women is good for all women.
And I think we're seeing that play out in many
different areas. Dr Lavoy again, pay equity, mental health, benefits, motherhood,
all these issues that women deal with all the time
(26:15):
in every industry, but we don't see them. They're not
on the TV sported such a visible and popular social institution,
so it gives visibility to these issues for women across
the board, which is really really important. Jessice drive to
compete had never been stronger. But in May, two months
(26:37):
after Jeremiah was born, WPS, the second iteration of a
women's professional soccer league in the United States, folded, just
as it's w u S, a predecessor had done. Suddenly
just had no professional team to return to and no
clue how to get back in the game. My circle
got smaller and smaller during my rehab because here I
(26:58):
am no longer pro. You know, I don't have people
calling me as much. And it's very eye opening. It
just truly showed people's true colors final ten seconds. Fortunately,
one of her mentors was still on her side and
in communication, Anson Drance from the University of North Carolina,
(27:27):
and he had an idea. I remember just like emailing
me when checking on me and stuff like that, and
I was like, oh, yeah, I'm good, just had my
son training, you know, blah blah blah. Suddenly Jess saw
a new path to her dreams. He was like, Hey,
there's a team in Australia that needs a striker there
at the tail another preseason their starting striker just Tory
a c l Are you interested? The Melbourne victory wasn't
(27:51):
exactly what Jess had in mind when she recommitted herself
to playing elite soccer, and particularly not with a new baby,
But there was no U S League at the time
to return to. And if a juco like Phoenix College
had been Jesse's stepping stone to n C double A
glory at North Carolina, why couldn't Southeastern Australia ultimately leader
to the U S national team. He's like, I know
your training again, do you want to go? And I
(28:13):
will let this coach know you are the person to
do this. And I was like, I really I slept
on it. It might have seemed like an easy yes,
but I'm like, my knee, my son, holy crap. Okay.
In the first of many difficult decisions Jess would have
to make, bouncing motherhood with her professional ambitions, she left
(28:34):
Jeremiah and Arizona with his father for that soccer season.
Her son was seven months old at the time. This
was kind of like my ticket to get back into
pro and so I went and It was a really,
really incredible experience. But I did make a huge sacrifice.
I didn't bring Jeremiah with me. That was gut wrenching.
(28:56):
That was very hard to just leave your baby and
his dad stayed in Arizona with him. Courtney and obviously
very thankful for that. I was still able to provide
for my family at the time, which I'm very proud of,
and so I missed my son's very first Thanksgiving and
Christmas and New Year's. I knew I had to do
(29:20):
a good job in Australia because of the sacrifice that
I was making at the time. Well, the closest season
ever in the Westfield w League culminated in a Grand
final between Melbourne Victory and Sydney f C at Amy Park,
with the Melbourne Victory just played in thirteen matches during season.
(29:44):
She scored seven goals and led the Victory to their
first ever league finals. My mom and dad were incredible athletes,
but they didn't take their chance. They didn't go to school,
they didn't pursue that. Their excuses that they had kids,
(30:06):
so they gave up on their dream. And I didn't
want to use my child as an excuse to not
pursue the dreams that I had for myself With him,
Jess was once again making a name for herself in
the professional game. At that same time, back in the US,
a third attempt at a woman's professional soccer league was
(30:27):
taking shape, and Jess was ready for the comeback of
a lifetime and on part six of Payback, welcome live
to inaugural match at the NWS. Here, I am trying
to figure out how to be a single parent. Now
I was making I couldn't afford child care. Oh what
a finish by Jess McDonald. The female athletes who have
(30:48):
visibility are using their platforms in ways that we have
never seen before. A shocking report that a prominent male
coach is accused of coercing players into having sex. I
don't remember ever being more livid. I'm tired of the bullshit.
I'm Alexandrea. Payback is a production of The Charlotte Observer,
Raleigh News and Observer, McClatchy Studios, and I Heart Radio.
(31:11):
It's produced by Cotta Stevens, Casey Toth, Julia Wall, and
Davin Cockburn. The executive producer for iHeart Radio is Sean
ty Tone. For lots more on this story and to
support journalism like this, visit Charlotte observer dot com slash
payback or news observer dot com slash payback. And for
(31:31):
more podcasts for my heart Radio, visit the I heart
Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your
favorite shows.
Long Shot is a production of McClatchy Studios and I
Heart Radio. Previously on Payback. Someone stripped of the tools
in high school to try to succeed at collegiate level
is going to continue to have to fight tooth and nail.
I needed to get to you and see I knew
even at such a young age, I can just throw
it away. What was critical is we had to get
(00:21):
her academics up to a level where we could admit
her at Phoenix College. They were like, this is what
you literally have to do if you want to make
it to D one. We're here because we get at
witness miracles like that. We're an outlet to help people
like Jessica McDonalds. Jessica McDonald m it was a hot
(00:57):
dog that told Jessica McDonald her life was a out
to change forever. Okay, I need to y'all know not
everything in my life was a horrible experience. You guys
knew how I grew up only girl for a long time.
But my family we are tight. This was one of
the final interviews with jess for this podcast, conducted over zoom.
(01:19):
We were talking about summer vacation and a family trip
to California and Courtney Stewart, a man she met at
Phoenix College. Our parents, everybody would save up money the
whole year, knowing we go to Disneyland, Sea World and
Knoxbury Farm every summer, and then suddenly the hot dog.
(01:39):
We're in San Diego and one of my cousins warmed
up a hot dog in the microwave, and it was, Oh,
my gosh, I'm about to cry. It was one of
the most horrifying smells I've ever smelled. Jess was twenty
three years old at the time. They're a difficult child
(02:00):
hood and then college years. She'd be the first to
tell you she was no stranger to microwave to meat.
But that morning something was clearly wrong. Very right in
the larger cosmic arc maybe, but in that moment, very wrong.
I feel like I need to throw up, and I'm
just like, I grew up eating hot dogs. What's happening
(02:22):
to me right now? Why do I feel like this now?
I was feeling roozy, and I was like, hold on,
I had to like calm myself down, and I was
like no way. I like thought back, and I was like, oh,
called Courtney immediately, and I was like I think I'm
(02:42):
pregnant from The Charlotte Observer, Raleigh News An Observer, McClatchy Studios,
and I Heart Radio. This is Payback. I'm Alexandreev and
this is Part five A tiny prophet. Welcome to the
(03:06):
inaugural Global Draft of the w u s A. The
Women's United Soccer Association. Women's soccer in America took a
grand leap forward in a modest event space in Boca Raton, Florida.
This is an historic event in soccer, in women's athletics,
and worldwide. There In two thousand, acting Commissioner Tony di
(03:30):
Chico ushered in a new era of opportunity for players
like Jessica McDonald. These players represent Olympic gold medals, Olympic
silver medals, and World Cup championships. Before the U S
women's national team became legendary, before jess had watched them
win it all at the Rose Bowl from the TV
(03:51):
in her grandmother's living room, there was no professional women's
soccer league in America, so at the time, there are
a few opportunities for players like jess to compete beyond college,
even if they were lucky enough to be part of
the national team, and there was almost certainly no way
for girls to dream of making soccer their careers. You're like, well,
how do we stay at the top of our game
(04:12):
when there's nowhere to play? Joy Fawcett was a defender
on that ninety nine World Cup team. We met her
in part one of this podcast. She told us that
during that World Cup run, even the biggest names in
women's soccer were wondering what would come next. If you
don't have a late what do you You're out of college,
what do you do? We're like struggling here, trying to
(04:33):
find places to stay fit and all in our different
states and how do we do that. During the mid nineties,
many people connected to the U S women's team had
full time jobs outside of the team. Even national team
head coach Anson Lawrence also coached at North Carolina. While
playing for the national team. Fawcett coached the u c
l A women's college team for five seasons through then
(04:57):
she abruptly retired to focus on training for that n
World Cup. We don't have to quit our jobs. Every
time we went to camp, we'd all go back and
find jobs. And I remember quitting jobs time and again
or having to coach. I mean, that was the ideal job,
and it worked with our schedule because Anson was coaching too,
you know. But as we started playing more and more,
(05:19):
it got hard and hardy. After that famous World Cup win,
public enthusiasm led to the creation of a professional women's league,
the Women's United Soccer Association or w u s A,
with eight teams. The players that were adding are the
body and soul and personality of each team. That first year,
(05:43):
each roster had twenty players. Three players from the women's
national team were allocated to each club, and two international
players were selected for each team to Chico then oversaw
a player combine and draft invoke overtone in late two thousand,
where coaches from each team drafted the remaining players on
their squads. I want to wish all our w USA
(06:04):
teams the best of luck. Most players in those teams
had annual contracts, a first for American women soccer players.
The allocated national team players were each paid eighty thousand
dollars a year or more. The other players on each
roster averaged about thirty thousand a year, with some making
considerably less pay. For fourteen two thousand and one, a
(06:28):
new league at the world's best death that would be
Superstars Today the Company of US kicked off the first
women's soccer league, opened play in the spring of two
thousand one in front of thirty four thousand people at
RFK Stadium in Washington, JP Della camera at the call.
It's a bestive day on a nation's capital, Washington, d C.
As we get ready to launch a brand new league,
(06:49):
the w USA. Today it's a Bay Areas Fibrary. The
US Soccer Federation bestowed upon the w USA a Division
one ranking, declaring it somewhat anti climb, actively the top
women's league in the country, but US Soccer had no
role in funding the league or any of those salaries.
Financing was raised from outside investors, and over three seasons
(07:12):
that dwindled with TV ratings despite cuts to roster sizes
and two player salaries, the w USA was forced to
fold in two thousand three. So for the next several years,
as Jess became a star with Sereno, then Phoenix College,
then North Carolina rag Tag, amateur leagues were again the
only options for post collegiate soccer in the US. Ross
(07:34):
soccer didn't even exist, you know, for two or three
years while I was in college. Jess remembered winning on
the best teams in the nation as a young player,
and then wondering if her career would simply end once
she graduated college. All I want to do is just
play soccer, and playing overseas wasn't even a popular thing
either at the time. But even if the w USA
failed to catch on, it did succeed in laying a foundation.
(07:58):
Some of their matches drew tens of thousands of fans.
This crowd will be a major part of today's story.
Man over twenty thousand tickets sold. As a Tuesday, they
had to open up the upper sections they could get
as many as thirty thousand here today. The recession following
nine eleven certainly didn't help attendance for sponsorships. Investors thought
(08:19):
maybe eight teams have been too many, or the league
had chosen stadiums too large. There were reasons to think
a successor could capture American audiences in ways the w
USA hadn't. So five years later there was a revival,
The Women's Professional Soccer League, or WPS, launched in perfect
timing for Jessice senior year in college. When WPS came about,
(08:42):
I was like, holy crap, maybe I can continue this.
Suddenly there was life after North Carolina. We'll go inside
Jesse's rides to professional soccer after this, jessup MacDonald, what's
(09:08):
end up enough? After that two thousand nine n C
double A title at North Carolina, Jess was named to
the all tournament team and was officially on the radars
of the seven teams making up the Young WPS. Entering
the WPS draft would mean for going her senior year
of college, but it was an opportunity just felt she
couldn't pass up. In Januar, the Chicago Red Stars chose
(09:34):
Jess with the fifteen overall draft pick. Jess joined a
roster that included US national team member Megan Rapino, as
well as a pair of Brazil's national team members, Christiani
and for Mega. Oh my goodness, I'm a rookie. I'm
playing with these incredible players. The level from college into
(09:57):
pro it's a huge gap because it's so much quicker,
so much fashion, And I'm like, holy crab, you can't
even hear yourself think it was a crazy ride. Heal
A Watt, the other celebrated UNC grad we met in
Part four, told us about her move to the professional
game back and how after playing for a dynasty like
North Carolina, stepping up to cash strapped professional women soccer
(10:21):
was surprisingly harsh, and not just in terms of competition.
And I do remember my rookie year. It was a
little sad because it's totally different. A lot plays for
the Chicago Red Stars Today. You can hear stories from
girls of washing your own clothes and not having a
locker room, and it wasn't like, oh my gosh, this
sucks so bad, but it was completely different from a
(10:46):
college with money that has has been around for so long.
And that is a big adjustment in our conversation. What
crystallized an idea that I heard over and over throughout
my reporting concept so simple and yet all encompassing that
it reverberates across levels, leagues, and generations of women's soccer
(11:09):
for decades. These players have shown true dedication, passion, and
perseverance in pursuit of growth and opportunities in the game
they love, but thanks to limited viable pathways to continue
playing time and again, they've acquiesced to personal treatment and
professional working conditions that can be stingy and unequal to
their male counterparts at best and at worst monstrously abusive.
(11:35):
But at every stage women's soccer players we spoke with
have told themselves that any chance to play pro ball
under any conditions has to be better than no chance
at all. We just wanted a league here in America,
and so we were all just so thankful to be
playing back in Chicago. Just made five appearances with Red
(11:59):
Stars over their first twenty matches. She showed off her
never say die passion to chase down every loose ball,
and late in the season, she was named a starter
for the team's matchup against the Washington Freedom, her first
start as a professional soccer player. Sure that was the
moment the year round sports and the endless miles she'd
(12:20):
put on her knees caught up to her. I got
my first start in August of two and within minutes
probably the most devastating moment of my entire life, alright
fully rubbed your my pateller tendon, which is like a
(12:44):
very rare injury. It happens in American football and car accidents.
The pateller tendon connects the bottom of the kneecap to
the top of the shin bone. It's not actually attendant.
It's a ligament, but to say the least, it's a
key ligament for any athlete. Jess told us that the
moment it happened and the rush of the team trainers
(13:05):
to reside is mostly a blur, but she did remember
lying in bed that night in pain, crying herself to sleep.
It's a two year recovery, way worse than a c L.
According to my surgeon, he gave me a one out
of ten chance of even playing at a high level again.
So here I am thinking my pro career is done.
(13:27):
Soccer is a no go. Sensing her playing career might
be over, Jess tried to recalibrate her identity. She'd been
a soccer player nearly her whole life. With that on,
what else could she do. I got my surgery, I
went home to Phoenix to get my rehab done. I
was bouncing around from my grandma's house during my recovery
(13:49):
and my best friend's house. Decitially just living off of
other people. I hadn't finished school yet because I got
drafted in the middle of my senior year. I have
no car, I have no job. The only thing I
had was just rehabbing every day. Little did Jess know
the road back to elite soccer was about to get
(14:11):
even more complex and uncertain than she'd imagined. But as
you'll hear, what everyone assumed would bury her career may
well have been the thing that would save it. I'm
(14:33):
Tom Bratcher. I'm a physical therapist. I've been doing rehab
and performance work with athletes of all sports and ages,
but soccer was my sport when I was coming up
in the ES. Tom Bratcher played a few seasons of
professional indoor soccer for teams in Arizona before turning his
attention to strength and conditioning, training and physical therapy. He
(14:56):
first met Jess in the early two thousand's doing conditioning
work with less arms on Sereno players, back when Jess
was a teenager on that club team. I went out
to watch one of the Sereno games and Jess was
She'll kill me if I say this, but she was
like a giraffe on roller skates. I mean, she was
growing so fast and she could run so fast. She
(15:17):
was just all over the place. It's kind of fun
to watch. After surgery to repair her torn for teller tendon,
Jess returned to Arizona and Bratcher to rehabilitate her knee.
She would have been or twenty seven years old at
the time something like that. I was looking at her, going,
holy cow, we've got an uphill battle here. The first
(15:39):
step in Jesse's recovery was admitting how severe the injury
actually was. You have to let it heal, and it
takes about six weeks for that tending to heal enough
to start bending the knee all the way. And once
you do that, you have to kind of relearn to
walk again with a new muscle that doesn't want to fire,
and you have to get it walking properly. Then you
have to get it strong enough to try to run,
(16:00):
and then you have to try to run. So it's
it's not uncommon to come back, but it's uncommon to
come back as good or better than you were female
at that age to play soccer. I bet there's not
very many of those out there in the world that
have done that. As she alternated rehab and couch surfing
with friends, jofre kindled a romance with a man she
(16:21):
met at Phoenix College, Courtney Stewart, but for those next
few months, her priority was getting back into something close
to playing shape. I said, look, I know you you're
gonna want to try to do too much, So I'm
gonna give you the stuff to do, but you have
to not do more than that, because if you do more,
you're gonna go backwards. She waited till the time when
I cleared her to go start playing. She waited at
(16:43):
the time when I told her she could start running.
She waited at the time, and when I told her,
she had walked, so she listened to all the steps
along the way and she pushed herself. You want to
see that. Jim played it. Once Chess was cleared to
train again, she knew Jess where to find some local competition. Hey, guys,
(17:04):
through Dave Cameron at Phoenix College. She still was trying
to recover and train. We had her as an assistant coach,
but she was really there to play and train, so
she was like a player's coach on the practice field.
Jess was driven to get back to professional soccer. In fact,
Cameron said, she dreamt even bigger, though rarely talked about
(17:25):
it in her head. She want to play in the
World Cup. That was number one, and if I was
going to bet on it, I wouldn't bet on it.
I was going to tell her that, but I would
not have bet on it. There's no way. A year
into rehab, Jess took that family trip to California, and
then there was the microwave hot Dog. She went to
(17:46):
Planned Parenthood for a pregnancy test final. I'm parted with
my son, surprised be responsible for a whole another human being, Oh,
dear God. In minutes, everything changed as vision of her
mother's past cast shadows across Jess's future. Family and friends
were like, Oh, you're having a kid. You need to settle,
(18:07):
be home, be a mom, get your nine to five going.
But I could even accept that, you know, in the
back of my mind, I'm like, there's no way I'm done.
To remain connected to the game, Jess coached a few
local youth teams throughout her pregnancy, and she never quit
showing up at Cameron's men's team's practices. She wanted to
(18:28):
train and she's I'm fine. I'm like telling everyone, do
not tackle her, you know kind of thing, And I
was scared, but you couldn't stop her from playing. Jeremiah
Stewart was born on March seven, two thou twelve. His
name was inspired by Jess's favorite Bible verse Jeremiah one five,
which goes before I formed you in the womb, I
(18:50):
knew you before you were born. I set you apart,
I appointed you as a prophet to the nation's and
with everything else suddenly knew in her life, Jess told
me the most unexpected thing was this. Soon after her
son's birth, Jesse as me felt better than ever. I
felt fine even after having my kid, and not a
lot of women can say that. The first few days
(19:13):
it's horrible. But I came out of that and it
was fine. And it took a couple of weeks for
everything just to like heal, and so my body changed
in a good way. I felt younger in a sense,
like I feel like I look better now than when
I was eighteen. Medical professionals we spoke with told us
(19:33):
that's not unheard of. There's a lot of things changing
in the body and pregnancy just from a hormone perspective,
you know, from a biomechanics perspective, you now have a
different weak distribution and that's going to affect how you walk,
which is going to affect the loading of your joints.
Dabby Gilmer is in the m D pH D program
(19:54):
at the University of Pittsburgh. She's a clinical researcher in
a field known as regenerative rehabilitation. We do have a
little bit of evidence with regards to how those specific
hormones affect joints and how they function. We know that
generally estrogen is very involved in the body and inflammatory
processes and relax and also goes up in pregnancy relax in.
(20:18):
His primary job is to loosen ligaments. It's very appropriately named.
It absolutely does seem plausible that there could have been
some kind of hormonal influence that helped her healing. Even
Dave Cameron, just as biggest champion there in Arizona, I
thought this new development would render soccer a thing of
(20:38):
her past. There's the nail in the coffin. All right,
your mom, now it's over. There's no way everyone thought that.
I thought that, whether he had true scientific evidence of
that healing process or not, Cameron told us that tiny
prophet made him a believer. I think jeremiahs saved her
career because ever since having Jeremiah, she's felt a million dollars.
(21:01):
So Jeremiah was heaven sent to keep her body functioning.
I truly believe that my pregnancy like literally helped heal me.
So I talked to someone about this, and actually, there's
certain hormones that can facilitate certain injury recovery a stronger.
(21:23):
So there's some real like yeah, see, so like I
really think something miraculous happened, and I truly believe it's
my son gave me my athletic ability back. We'll be
back in a moment. Well, I was leading the same
(21:55):
kind of life set all of us were supposed to
be leading in those years. You know, I'd had a
newspaper job, had been fired because I was pregnant, But
then I had been so guilty working anyway that it
was sort of a relief. And I wrote a housewife
on the census blank in the intractable balance of personal
and professional lives. There's no more obvious negotiating of time
(22:17):
and obligations than that which is brought on with parenthood,
or more specifically, motherhood. It's been that way since the
beginning of the battle for gender equality, no matter the field.
In nineteen sixty three, Ready for Dan described the struggle
of women unfulfilled by simply being housewives and stay at
home moms. As quote the problem that has no name.
(22:40):
I was just living the life, but I was also
freelancing for women's magazines and helping to create this image
of women that just wasn't true anymore. The name for
Dan chose for it became the title of her landmark book,
ushering in second wave feminism feminine mystique. She talked about
the book's origin in this ninety seven interview you on
British talk show Good Afternoon. Each woman had been struggling
(23:04):
with all these things alone. I mean, if she felt
there had to be more, somehow than making bread, she
was a freak. There was something wrong with him. But
it was like everyone was waiting to have it put
into words. For more than half a century, the role
of mothers in the workplace has been debated, legislated, and documented.
But I found that's not as true for women who
(23:24):
play sports for a living. There is very very little,
if any research about athlete mothers. Trying to think of it,
I don't think there is any. Dr Nicole Voy runs
the Tucker Center for Girls and Women in Sport at
the University of Minnesota. We met her in Part three.
(23:46):
There is some literature around mother coaches, but none about
professional female athlete mothers. So that's a huge gap in
the area of research that Warren's future investigation. In fact,
it has warranted future investigation for almost a generation now.
(24:08):
There's no information whatsoever out there as to pregnant women
training or running or anything. I'm like trying to find
things anything like can I run and what can I do?
And trying to stay fit because you wanted to get
back as soon as possible. Joy Fawcett, the U S
national team defender who became America's original soccer mom, struggled
(24:30):
not only to navigate pregnancy as a world class athlete,
but also to navigate motherhood. It's like any mother, they're
all working hard. I mean, this might be hard physically,
but it's just as hard I think on all moms
that are working. You know, they're all staying up late
and getting up and working. And if it's not soccer,
that's your job. You have another job and you're doing it.
(24:52):
Other legends of the game echoed that sentiment in our conversations,
especially for women whose work depends on elite physical performance,
thought of adding motherhood to that mix was too much
to process. Joy was the first to show, like, Nope,
I'm going to do both, and you're all gonna see
it's gonna be fine. Julie Foudy played soccer professionally from
(25:12):
two four. She started her family three years after retirement.
I would not have been able to do both. There's
no way now that I have kids to just becomes
another confirmation of Oh my word, how did you do
all this and do it so gracefully? And we should
be allowing women to make that decision and not have
(25:34):
to quit playing. But me, I was like, oh, hell no,
I can't do that. I'm not having kids. They're in Arizona.
Bess continued coaching youth teams and running training camps in
the months after giving birth to Jeremiah. She watched her
former teammates and members of her two thousand ten draft
class become stars. Always make the comments, you know, what's
(25:54):
good for women as good for everybody, and what's good
for the most marginalized women is good for all women.
And I think we're seeing that play out in many
different areas. Dr Lavoy again, pay equity, mental health, benefits, motherhood,
all these issues that women deal with all the time
(26:15):
in every industry, but we don't see them. They're not
on the TV sported such a visible and popular social institution,
so it gives visibility to these issues for women across
the board, which is really really important. Jessice drive to
compete had never been stronger. But in May, two months
(26:37):
after Jeremiah was born, WPS, the second iteration of a
women's professional soccer league in the United States, folded, just
as it's w u S, a predecessor had done. Suddenly
just had no professional team to return to and no
clue how to get back in the game. My circle
got smaller and smaller during my rehab because here I
(26:58):
am no longer pro. You know, I don't have people
calling me as much. And it's very eye opening. It
just truly showed people's true colors final ten seconds. Fortunately,
one of her mentors was still on her side and
in communication, Anson Drance from the University of North Carolina,
(27:27):
and he had an idea. I remember just like emailing
me when checking on me and stuff like that, and
I was like, oh, yeah, I'm good, just had my
son training, you know, blah blah blah. Suddenly Jess saw
a new path to her dreams. He was like, Hey,
there's a team in Australia that needs a striker there
at the tail another preseason their starting striker just Tory
a c l Are you interested? The Melbourne victory wasn't
(27:51):
exactly what Jess had in mind when she recommitted herself
to playing elite soccer, and particularly not with a new baby,
But there was no U S League at the time
to return to. And if a juco like Phoenix College
had been Jesse's stepping stone to n C double A
glory at North Carolina, why couldn't Southeastern Australia ultimately leader
to the U S national team. He's like, I know
your training again, do you want to go? And I
(28:13):
will let this coach know you are the person to
do this. And I was like, I really I slept
on it. It might have seemed like an easy yes,
but I'm like, my knee, my son, holy crap. Okay.
In the first of many difficult decisions Jess would have
to make, bouncing motherhood with her professional ambitions, she left
(28:34):
Jeremiah and Arizona with his father for that soccer season.
Her son was seven months old at the time. This
was kind of like my ticket to get back into
pro and so I went and It was a really,
really incredible experience. But I did make a huge sacrifice.
I didn't bring Jeremiah with me. That was gut wrenching.
(28:56):
That was very hard to just leave your baby and
his dad stayed in Arizona with him. Courtney and obviously
very thankful for that. I was still able to provide
for my family at the time, which I'm very proud of,
and so I missed my son's very first Thanksgiving and
Christmas and New Year's. I knew I had to do
(29:20):
a good job in Australia because of the sacrifice that
I was making at the time. Well, the closest season
ever in the Westfield w League culminated in a Grand
final between Melbourne Victory and Sydney f C at Amy Park,
with the Melbourne Victory just played in thirteen matches during season.
(29:44):
She scored seven goals and led the Victory to their
first ever league finals. My mom and dad were incredible athletes,
but they didn't take their chance. They didn't go to school,
they didn't pursue that. Their excuses that they had kids,
(30:06):
so they gave up on their dream. And I didn't
want to use my child as an excuse to not
pursue the dreams that I had for myself With him,
Jess was once again making a name for herself in
the professional game. At that same time, back in the US,
a third attempt at a woman's professional soccer league was
(30:27):
taking shape, and Jess was ready for the comeback of
a lifetime and on part six of Payback, welcome live
to inaugural match at the NWS. Here, I am trying
to figure out how to be a single parent. Now
I was making I couldn't afford child care. Oh what
a finish by Jess McDonald. The female athletes who have
(30:48):
visibility are using their platforms in ways that we have
never seen before. A shocking report that a prominent male
coach is accused of coercing players into having sex. I
don't remember ever being more livid. I'm tired of the bullshit.
I'm Alexandrea. Payback is a production of The Charlotte Observer,
Raleigh News and Observer, McClatchy Studios, and I Heart Radio.
(31:11):
It's produced by Cotta Stevens, Casey Toth, Julia Wall, and
Davin Cockburn. The executive producer for iHeart Radio is Sean
ty Tone. For lots more on this story and to
support journalism like this, visit Charlotte observer dot com slash
payback or news observer dot com slash payback. And for
(31:31):
more podcasts for my heart Radio, visit the I heart
Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your
favorite shows.
Popular Podcasts
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations.
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
The Nikki Glaser Podcast
Every week comedian and infamous roaster Nikki Glaser provides a fun, fast-paced, and brutally honest look into current pop-culture and her own personal life.