Nearly 30 years before the prodigious young soccer player made his mark on this World Cup, the Freeman name flashed across a Seattle scoreboard after a productive day in another kind of football.
Antonio Freeman caught two touchdown passes for the Green Bay Packers against the Seattle Seahawks in September 1996, an early step in a season that would end with a Super Bowl title. His name was stitched across the back of NFL jerseys, announced in stadiums and splashed across “SportsCenter” highlights — tied to production, promise and the possibility of a championship.