{"id":350632,"date":"2026-06-07T15:22:25","date_gmt":"2026-06-07T15:22:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/350632\/"},"modified":"2026-06-07T15:22:25","modified_gmt":"2026-06-07T15:22:25","slug":"u-s-soccer-legend-paul-caligiuri-is-trying-to-save-the-sport","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/350632\/","title":{"rendered":"U.S. soccer legend Paul Caligiuri is trying to save the sport"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

The 10th in an occasional series<\/a> of profiles on Southern California athletes who have flourished in their post-playing careers.<\/p>\n

The play started innocently enough with Tab Ramos bouncing a one-hop pass to Paul Caligiuri<\/a>, who played the ball off his chest 40 yards from goal. But everything changed when a Trinidadian player stepped lazily out to meet him.<\/p>\n

Caligiuri faked right then cut left, the beaten defender sticking his right leg out wildly in protest. Suddenly surrounded by nothing but space, Caligiuri let the ball take one small hop before striking a left-footed volley from about 28 yards that arced softly between the right post and the outstretched arms of diving goalkeeper Michael Maurice.<\/p>\n

Goal!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!<\/p>\n

That score, in the 30th minute of the final game of World Cup<\/a> qualifying in the fall of 1989, was as unlikely and unadorned as it proved to be earth-shattering. Because when the U.S. made that goal stand up for a 1-0 win over Trinidad and Tobago, the Americans qualified for the World Cup for the first time in 40 years.<\/p>\n

\"\" <\/p>\n

The U.S. has missed the tournament just once since then, and will play host to the World Cup for a second time this summer. Yet none of that starts without Caligiuri\u2019s goal, which has become known as \u201cthe shot heard \u2018round the world.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cSomeone asked me what moment in sports has ever impacted a complete sport as much as that goal,\u201d Caligiuri said.<\/p>\n

The list is a short one.<\/p>\n

Jackie Robinson<\/a> breaking baseball\u2019s color barrier. Dick Fosbury<\/a> flopping over the bar in the high jump. Tiger Woods winning the Masters<\/a>. Like those moments, Caligiuri\u2019s goal was so transformational it became the line separating the present from the past, the ancient from the modern.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe established the game,\u201d Caligiuri said. \u201cNow we\u2019re talking a whole different level. The expectations are way higher.\u201d<\/p>\n

Before Caligiuri\u2019s goal, the U.S. had no first-tier soccer leagues. Now it has both men\u2019s and women\u2019s leagues, with five teams valued by Forbes at more than $1 billion. When Caligiuri scored his goal, the women\u2019s national team was just four years old. Since then it has gone on to win four World Cups and five Olympic gold medals while the men\u2019s team has ranked as high as fourth in the world, according to FIFA.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe sort of expanded our wings because of what happened in 1989,\u201d Ramos said. \u201cYou can make a case a lot of things that happened after that wouldn\u2019t happened had it not been for that 1989 team.\u201d<\/p>\n

When Caligiuri scored his goal, soccer wasn\u2019t even a blip on the sporting landscape in the U.S. Today it has passed baseball and hockey to become the third-most popular sport in the U.S., according to a recent survey by the Economist.<\/p>\n

\"U.S. <\/p>\n

U.S. teammates Paul Caligiuri, left, and Alexi Lalas celebrate a win over Mexico in a World Cup tuneup at the Rose Bowl on June 4, 1994.<\/p>\n

(Michael Caulfield \/ Associated Press)<\/p>\n

\u201cI think about it all the time,\u201d said Soccer America editor Paul Kennedy. \u201cWould MLS have happened? Would soccer continue to grow if there hadn\u2019t been Caligiuri\u2019s goal?\u201d<\/p>\n

The goal changed Caligiuri\u2019s life as well. Cut from the Olympic team five years earlier, he went on to play 110 games for the national team, retiring as the second-most-capped player in history. (He\u2019s still 11th on the all-time list.) He started seven World Cup games and his goal in the team\u2019s group-play opener in Italy in 1990 was the first by an American in the tournament in 40 years.<\/p>\n

He was also one of the first Americans to play in Europe and was a charter member of MLS, starting for the Columbus Crew in the team\u2019s first game. His final game came with the Galaxy, in the 2001 U.S. Open Cup final. Four years later, he was inducted into the National Soccer Hall of Fame.<\/p>\n

Few men in U.S. Soccer history have had a hand in tearing down so many barriers and leading so much progress. But it\u2019s a history that must be retold to be understood and appreciated. The return of the World Cup offers an opportunity to do just that.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe information about players like him are getting lost,\u201d said Nick Webster, executive vice president of the Orange County-based United Premier Soccer League (UPSL), the largest pro-developmental soccer organization in the U.S. and an organization Caligiuri serves as an ambassador.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe played a long time ago. But the World Cup, that\u2019s a definite connection. What changed the landscape of the sport in this country was the World Cup.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\" <\/p>\n

More children are registered to play soccer than any other sport in the country, according to US Youth Soccer. That\u2019s another thing that\u2019s changed since \u201cthe shot heard \u2018round the world.\u201d Because when Caligiuri was growing up in Diamond Bar, the only playmate he could find was the door of his garage.<\/p>\n

\u201cOh, I bugged everybody from my siblings and neighbors. And I\u2019d kick it with anybody that wanted to give me some attention,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Usually, they didn\u2019t. So Caligiuri, the youngest of five children, played against the garage, developing his own drills.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe only way you could figure out how far you could kick it was to hit the garage on a fly,\u201d he said. \u201cNext thing you know, I\u2019m in the middle of the street, I\u2019m in my neighbor\u2019s driveway. Right foot, left foot. I\u2019d bounce it two or three times and try to kick it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Before long, he was strong enough to break the springs that raised the door and crack the stucco framing it.<\/p>\n

\u201cMy dad,\u201d Caligiuri said, \u201chad to replaster it.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"U.S. <\/p>\n

U.S. defender Paul Caligiuri, top, celebrates following a goal by teammate Earnie Stewart in a 2-1 win over Colombia at the Rose Bowl during the 1994 World Cup. <\/p>\n

(Anacleto Rapping \/ Los Angeles Times)<\/p>\n

His dad eventually asked him to find a new place to practice. So Caligiuri got a job washing dishes at a pizza place to earn gas money and when he got his driver\u2019s license, he began making regular trips to Palos Verdes to watch teams in the semipro Greater L.A. Soccer League practice.<\/p>\n

His passion and ambition were obvious and soon he was invited to train with a team, a 16-year-old playing with adults.<\/p>\n

\u201cSix months later I get to put on a jersey,\u201d he said. \u201cEventually, I\u2019m starting on that team.\u201d<\/p>\n

What inspired that passion and drive was an incident that had taken place four years earlier, when Caligiuri\u2019s youth team went to see the L.A. Aztecs play at the Rose Bowl. Outside the stadium a small net had been set up and any kid who could put the ball in the goal would be entered in a raffle to be a ball boy on the field.<\/p>\n

Caligiuri refused to leave, shooting, then returning to the back of the line to try again until finally he wore down the man running the raffle and was escorted to the sidelines to be a ball boy.<\/p>\n

\u201cI wanted to be close to the players,\u201d he said. \u201cAnd I\u2019m like, \u2018whoa, this [game] is really fast.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

But that wasn\u2019t the biggest takeaway. The Aztecs had just two Americans on their roster, so what Caligiuri heard on the sideline was a mix of Spanish, Serbian and heavily accented \u2014 and barely intelligible \u2014 English from players born in England, Scotland, Wales and Ireland.<\/p>\n

\u201cI had no idea what they were saying. I walked away going, where\u2019s the American player?\u201d he said as he sat at a conference table in the Santa Ana offices of the UPSL. \u201cFrom that point on I drove my family crazy, like I\u2019m going to turn pro. Because I wanted to show the rest of the world Americans could play soccer. That\u2019s what was driving me.\u201d<\/p>\n

So he raised money selling light bulbs and uncooked popcorn door to door to fund a trip to Germany, where he spent part of his freshman year in high school training with a youth club in Berlin. After high school, he played at UCLA, making two All-America teams and captaining the Bruins<\/a> to an NCAA championship. Left off the 1984 Olympic team \u2014 still a painful slight for Caligiuri<\/a> more than four decades later \u2014 he made the cut in 1988 and started three games in Seoul before returning to Germany to play in the second-tier Bundesliga 2 with SV Meppen at a time when Americans didn\u2019t play in Europe.<\/p>\n

But all that was just a prelude to the eight-match CONCACAF Championship in 1989, the qualifying tournament for the next World Cup in Italy. The U.S. hadn\u2019t played in a World Cup since 1950 \u2014 and hadn\u2019t even qualified for three of the last four qualifying events. The Americans\u2019 odds were better, though, since Mexico, long the region\u2019s top power, wasn\u2019t participating, having been banned by FIFA from knowingly using underage players in a youth tournament.<\/p>\n

After losing its first game to Costa Rica, the U.S. couldn\u2019t afford to lose again \u2014 and it didn\u2019t. But scoreless draws with Guatemala and El Salvador had the Americans third in the five-team table heading into the final game in Port of Spain. They needed a win to jump over Trinidad and Tobago and advance to the World Cup; Trinidad needed just a tie to move on.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe didn\u2019t know what we were doing,\u201d Ramos said. \u201cWe were just going one game at a time, playing as hard as we could. Not that we didn\u2019t think we could do it. But, you know, if you think about it, the U.S. hadn\u2019t qualified in four decades. What made us so special?\u201d<\/p>\n

But if that team lacked talent and awareness, it had grit and moxie, which were just as important.<\/p>\n

\u201cBeyond talent and fitness is personality. And that team had personality,\u201d Ramos recalled recently. \u201cNo one counted on any of those players. We were mostly amateurs but we pulled so much more than our weight. It didn\u2019t matter the nerves. It didn\u2019t matter where it was, it didn\u2019t matter who were playing. We just went for it.<\/p>\n

\u201cMaybe we didn\u2019t know what we didn\u2019t know.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"U.S. <\/p>\n

U.S. players react after Paul Caligiuri, second from left, scored on his \u201cshot heard \u2018round the world\u201d against Trinidad and Tobago on Nov. 30, 1989.<\/p>\n

(Associated Press)<\/p>\n

Caligiuri fit that mold perfectly.<\/p>\n

\u201cPaul was the typical laid-back California guy. Nothing fazed him,\u201d Ramos said. \u201cIt was that calming part of the team that we didn\u2019t have with the East Coast guys.\u201d<\/p>\n

Still, Caligiuri seemed an unlikely hero. The game against Trinidad was his first start in the qualifying tournament and he was playing up in the midfield, not in his usual position on the back line. Yet a third of the way into a scoreless game with everything on the line, Ramos trusted him with the ball most.<\/p>\n

What happened next changed U.S. soccer forever and validated the hours and hours a young Caligiuri spent kicking a ball against his garage door.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe garage is actually smaller than a goal, the stucco right above it. So I need to hit a line drive, but arch so it hit the garage,\u201d Caligiuri said, describing a shot he practiced thousands of times, eventually learning to make it with either foot. \u201cWhen the player kind of sold himself and stepped up to me, I just blew by him.<\/p>\n

\u201cI knew my distance. Touch, bounce and shoot. If you\u2019re going to give me the layup, I\u2019m going to take the layup.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\" <\/p>\n

On a chilly spring night, Caligiuri, wearing a hooded Adidas jacket and black sweatpants, stands in the center of a small soccer field on a bluff in Mission Viejo. Gathered around him are a handful of coaches and more than a dozen teenage soccer players, eager to learn from a master.<\/p>\n

Caligiuri is 62 and he doesn\u2019t move with the same pace and grace he once did. His unruly brown hair is beginning to gray and the stocky build he had as a player has filled out a bit. Caligiuri now prefers devouring barbeque to polishing off opposing forwards.<\/p>\n

\"Paul <\/p>\n

Paul Caligiuri controls the ball during a recent practice with youth players.<\/p>\n

(Chester Liang)<\/p>\n

But some things haven\u2019t changed.<\/p>\n

When Caligiuri walks into a room or onto a soccer field, it becomes a stage and he is the lone actor. He picks the topic of conversation and dominates the discussion. Opposing points of view don\u2019t stand a chance.<\/p>\n

Only now the passion and determination that turned Caligiuri into one of the most consequential players in U.S. Soccer history is fueling a new mission to change how players are managed, taught and developed at the grassroots level.<\/p>\n

He\u2019s not the only one from the 1989 team taking up the challenge. Ramos founded a soccer club, was a head coach in the U.S. youth national team system, an assistant with the senior national team and a head coach in both MLS and the USL Championship. Steve Trittschuh and Brian Bliss, who also started in the game against Trinidad and Tobago, have both coached in college and MLS. John Harkes coached in MLS and in the USL League One.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was just a generation of players that knew how to value every step of the way in soccer,\u201d Ramos said. \u201cWe feel like we\u2019re always selling the game. We\u2019re used to that and we\u2019re comfortable with it and maybe that\u2019s why we stuck with it.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s sort of a lifetime application to keep doing that.\u201d<\/p>\n

That\u2019s certainly what led Caligiuri to become an ambassador and tireless advocate for the UPSL. It\u2019s why he once oversaw the men\u2019s and women\u2019s programs at Cal Poly Pomona, served as an athlete representative on U.S. Soccer\u2019s board and ran for president of the organization in 2018. He has coached multiple youth teams in south Orange County and will give advice to anyone who walks up to him with a ball and a question.<\/p>\n

And Caligiuri is as bold and forceful with an opinion as he once was with a soccer ball. <\/p>\n

\u201cThe biggest issues we have with soccer in this country is fields and we have issues with costs,\u201d he says with the fervor of a Baptist preacher. \u201cThat\u2019s plaguing soccer in this country.\u201d<\/p>\n

For the sport to thrive, Caligiuri believes, the pay-to-play system has to be completely overhauled and the game needs to be made available to everyone. Travel for youth teams must be reduced so kids can use that time to train and play. And while elite teams and the MLS academy system is fine, the top of the U.S. Soccer pyramid will only be as strong as the grassroots base supporting it.<\/p>\n

And that base, Caligiuri said, is being ignored.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf I\u2019m 16 years old \u2014 which is key age, right? \u2014 where am I going to practice every day?\u201d he asked. \u201cHow do you make it affordable? How do you make it safe? How do you tackle the travel problem? And what do you do in terms of giving an opportunity to players? The rest of the world\u2019s practicing every day.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have to do the groundwork and roll up our sleeves and get it done.\u201d<\/p>\n

Which is exactly why Caligiuri is instructing youth players on a field so small cars zoom past without even knowing it\u2019s there.<\/p>\n

\u201cWith Paul, what separates him from other coaches is he always wants to train,\u201d said Roman Van den Bosch, an 18-year-old high school student who has been working with Caligiuri for a couple of years. \u201cWe have three practices a week, and then we have a game. He never misses a practice. He\u2019s here every day, whether we have five players, 12 players. He\u2019s going to be there for us.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Former <\/p>\n

Former U.S. soccer star Paul Caligiuri, center, coaches youth soccer players in Mission Viejo.<\/p>\n

(Chester Liang)<\/p>\n

Joe Martinez, whose son, Kahlel, has been on the same team for about a year, said Caligiuri rarely dwells on his accomplishments.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe does a great job not really getting into who he was as a player,\u201d Martinez said. \u201cHe might make a reference to it, just for the purpose of a coaching point. But beyond that, no. He tries to keep that low-key.\u201d<\/p>\n

The biggest change Martinez has noticed in his son since he began to work with Caligiuri is his confidence.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s another level,\u201d he said. \u201cSo it\u2019s been a great platform for Kahlel.\u201d<\/p>\n

Who, after all, knows more about building confidence than Caligiuri? He honed his skills banging a ball off his garage thousands of times until he built enough belief to take the most consequential shot in U.S. Soccer history. And with the World Cup returning to the U.S., the \u201cshot heard \u2018round the world\u201d will echo once again.<\/p>\n

But he isn\u2019t done tilting at windmills. After defying tremendous odds to get the U.S. into the World Cup 36 years ago, he\u2019s now battling an entrenched bureaucracy in an effort to build the support system the sport needs to thrive. And in his mind, nothing less than the future of American soccer is at stake.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m older now,\u201d he said. \u201cWhat is my contribution to the game going to be? I want to make a contribution.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The 10th in an occasional series of profiles on Southern California athletes who have flourished in their post-playing…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":350633,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[11432,4472,143418,25085,9831,2194,143421,48,52,51,47,50,49,143420,7496,143419,427,11425,2281,5393,72],"class_list":["post-350632","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-los-angeles","tag-americans","tag-ball","tag-caligiuri","tag-final-game","tag-first-time","tag-goal","tag-grassroots-soccer","tag-la","tag-la-headlines","tag-la-news","tag-los-angeles","tag-los-angeles-headlines","tag-los-angeles-news","tag-second-most-capped-player","tag-sport","tag-tab-ramos","tag-team","tag-trinidad","tag-u-s","tag-world-cup","tag-year"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/350632","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=350632"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/350632\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/350633"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=350632"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=350632"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=350632"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}