Welcome to Good Game with Sarah Spain, where we're dumping out our trick or treating bag, separating candy by our faves and which ones we're willing to trade anybody wants some whoppers. On today's show, we're talking to Angel City defender Merrett Matthias about her decision to retire the NWSL's evolution from game one to today, needing time to see the worthiness of her career and accomplishments and the.
Legacy that she's leaving behind.
Plus PWHL expansion and poorly timed awards.
It's all coming up right after this.
Welcome back, slices and Happy Halloween. Here's what you need to know today. Let's start with some news that I got to hear first during a panel I hosted at the espnW summit on Tuesday. Professional Women's Hockey League Senior VP of Business ops Amy Sheer announced that the league is planning to expand from six teams to eight, potentially
as soon as next season. The league plans to issue a request for proposals from interested markets, and y'all know, I'm hoping Chicago is in the mix, and if we get a team, I'm immediately stealing Kendall quinnscofield for my squad. In balloon Dior News, Spain's Ititana bon Maddi won her second straight Ballon d'Or feminine, the award given annually to
the best player in the world. Bone Madi, a midfielder who plays for Barcelona, helped her club win the Liga F Women's Champion League, Copa de la Rena and Spanish super Copa last year, the first time the club has.
Won all four trophies in the same season.
Meanwhile, US women's national team boss Emma Hayes won the inaugural Ballon d'Or Coach of the Year award after leading the US to Olympic gold, and then she went on to call out event organizers for always holding the prestigious award ceremony in the middle of a women's FIFA window. Hayes, along with most of the nominated players, wasn't able to attend the event in Paris as she was in the middle of a US women's national team camp.
Take a listen, Yeah.
I mean, it'd be like running an oscars, wouldn't it without a Golden Globe, without having any females present. It just wouldn't happen. I think that all too often it's an afterthought to be honest with you, and I know that there's nothing you know I can do to control that. If I'm honest with you, I'm happy to be with my team. I'm not really one for the glam so I love Paris, but I'm happy to be with my team. But I think for those players and coaches and is
the one industry moment they get recognized. And it's disappointing, but one that I did speak to. I did speak to the organize about it, and they said that that is something that will be changing in the future, and let's hope that that is the case.
The US woman's national team and MA has closed out the international window against Argentina last day in Louisville.
Will have more on that game tomorrow.
More soccer news, Angel City announced that the club has signed veteran forward Sidney LaRue to a new three year contract through the twenty twenty seventh season. LaRue, who has played in the league since it started in twenty thirteen, has been with Angel City since twenty twenty two, when she was traded from Orlando midway through the season. Y'all have to see the announcement that Angel City sent out for this extension.
This is the cutest.
Contract extension photo you'll ever see. It's Sid's two kids, Cassius and Rue, wearing Angel City jerseys with the numbers twenty and twenty seven, the year through which Sid is now signed. We'll post a link to that pick in our show notes.
We got to take a quick break when we come back.
Don't miss this an honest, raw and sometimes tearful conversation with retiring NWSL legend Meary at Matthias.
Joining us.
She's a right back for Angel CITYFC of the NWSL, and has won three NWSL shields and three NWSL championships during her twelve seasons in the league. One championship with FC Kansas City, one shield with the Seattle Rain and two doubles with the North Carolina Current. She heared a cap with the US when it's national team in twenty eighteen. She played college soccer at UNC and Texas and M And she's not dating Sydney LaRue, no matter how many times the Internet wants it to be.
So it's Merret, Matthia's what's up? Merrit? What's up? Everyone. Thank you for having me, Thanks for doing this. We're reunited where we first hung out. I know. Anniversary. Wow, it is our anniversary.
I've seen you less than I would hope if this is the one year occasion.
Of our data, I know, but I feel like the retirement is just going to open up so much time.
I have so much more time to get.
This conversation will need to be more professional than any conversation we had here last year.
Perfect. I think I'm ready for it, and the bar is low mart.
We literally could talk about almost anything anxietly qualifying. Okay, so you announced that you're retiring at the end of this season with, in my opinion, the perfect caption I came, I saw I ship up.
Perfect.
Angel City has been eliminated from the postseason, which means we are having this conversation as you are preparing for your last professional soccer game.
What are the emotions. I feel very at peace.
I am also currently just not able to play soccer. I sprained my mcl acl about a few weeks ago, and my body is taking longer than I would.
Like for it too to recover.
So the end of my season, the end of my career, looks much different than I anticipated. There was a moment where I had been coming back and we were in the back season of our or back half of our season, and I was like four appearances away from like hitting two hundred, and I was like, all I have.
To do is make it into like four games.
Make appearances. I'm going to wrap a bow around this career. It's going to be great.
And then yeah, we go to Louisville.
I go to block a shot and has changed in a matter of an instant, and I immediately knew.
I'm like, this isn't good.
And so I pushed to try to get back and my body just wasn't having it.
My knee couldn't hit a ball in the same way.
And so there were a few days that were really really tough, and just having to accept that I don't have control over this thing that I very much thought that it was going to end a certain way. I think within that time, allowing myself to kind of accept that, be at peace with that, and kind of be able to acknowledge that not ending my career the way that I want to take doesn't take away anything from what I've done. And so with that and a lot of
love and support from friends and family. I decided to lean into like being celebrated and really lean into what our last.
Home game looked like.
And it was just an incredible, incredible moment for me, and I think that was it allowed me to put a bow around a really successful career and one that I'm.
Really proud of. I want to talk about the retirement ceremony.
I want to talk about the physical aspect and the battle you had just to play this season. But I guess what I mean by your final professional game is that it's so much more than just playing soccer. It's being in the locker room with your teammates, it's being on the sidelines, it's being in uniform or in street closer or whatever it is, but being with your teammates in a way that you can always come back and
after retirement you could be a part of things. But is there any part of you that that last moment of like looking around at the fans or the pre and post game stuff, even as an injured player, is there any part of it you're going to pay special attention to.
In that moment and like really try to take in.
I feel for me, the last game it was really much like looking around and being like, oh my gosh, Like I feel so privileged to have played on the teams that I've played on and to be surrounded by the women that I've been surrounded by. I would argue that I've been a part of some of the best teams in the NWSL, not just on the field but outside of that, and they have, you know, those big and small moments have like shaped who I am so much.
And you love a locker room and like a good locker room because it's like what you're drawn to is that allows you to be exactly who you are and be loved for it.
And I think along my way and along my journey.
The more that I've been comfortable with fully being who I am, I hope that I've allowed other people to believe that they can do the same. So yeah, that you hear everyone say, like, you just miss the locker room. There's nothing that replicates that ever again, And so in that like the last game, you look around and I.
Think that's why it was so touching for the team to have dressed.
Like me walking in and to have had these like really special moments where I'm like, I think I was in all of just like what I have meant to people and when I have meant to people on my team and for them to take the time to like dedicate something to me was really really special. So yeah, that will be missed. I think you also, it's really funny. I'm like, I love being around like our younger players, like the Ilissa's and the Kennedy's and the G's, And
you're like, wow, you keep me young. You know, like there is a part of it that you feel, like Peter Pan like you don't grow up in this. And I like, I was actually with Sue and p not too long ago and I said something.
They're like, what does that mean? I was like, what do you mean? You don't know what that means? And like a retired they kept young, They're not being kept young. And so I'm like, oh my god. I had a moment of like, am I going to get old? Like that? Those little things are.
Those little things You're like, oh my gosh, this is such a massive part of my life. Not to say that I don't have community outside of soccer that I'm sure.
I will lean heavily on. And I think actually now it is better.
There is a lot more ability for female athletes to get together after their careers because it is a bigger deal to go to games, to go to championships. There's more events, there's more parties, there's more reasons to get together. I really feel for athletes of earlier times that that was it, like, you're probably not they're going to spread out across the country. There's not broadcasting opportunities, there's not managing and coaching opportunities, none of that stuff.
So you will, you will get to be around them.
Yeah, it's just that picture has changed a bit, which is a wonderful thing.
It's always great to bring.
I think the first year that the league really invested in like a championship weekend that really like kind of set the tone was DC and I remember being in this party and it's like, what the what is this going to be? Like?
Is it gonna be fun?
You kind of had like anything the league does, it's kind of like not a.
Torny, it's you know these things that you're like, eh, And it was one of the best nights.
I think, I will like woke come the next day, I'm like I'm so hungover, Like I had no intention of that being the case.
And within that.
Moment, there were like so many players from around the league that had come in, and whether you know someone closely or not, you just have a general respect if you've played in this league for any length of time, and you're just like you connect on that level. So all of a sudden, you're like, even though I don't know you, I feel like I know you, and I know of you enough from like people in between that it just is a really incredible community of women.
And so that's been really fun.
It's been really fun to see like that kind of takeoff in our league where to your point, you have moments an opportunity to like get that thing that you love so much, which is the camaraderie of women's sport.
You mentioned that a lot of your teammate showed up wearing fits inspired by you for that last ACFC home game.
A lot of tears, a lot of laughs.
You are one of the most stylish players in sport. That is a very notable thing about you. Who nailed their version of merit best. Oh my gosh.
I will start off by saying, I think everyone did like such an incredible job. I was actually blown away. I think I loved like Alyssa's take and Gee's take just because it was like, we're like straight up replicating it. I loved Kjo's like she did her thing in a me inspired way. So honestly, I can't really choose, Like everyone did. They saw an incredible job, they did such an incredible job.
You know.
The tunnel fits, the desire to get to know players off the field, to get to know people's personalities. It's all part of this growing fan and media attention for the league in a way that didn't exist before. And you're really uniquely positioned to talk about how different it feels now from day one because you were literally there day one, the very first NWSL match with FC Kansas
City in April of twenty thirteen. So how do you put in perspective how much things have changed in the twelve years of the NWSL.
Well, I can tell you no one had enough money to buy an sick outfit. I no Commas in that first page.
Oh Commas did not have a comma in that first paycheck, which I think we talked about. Yeah, I remember getting my first paycheck and it missed.
It missed a comma and it was devastating.
And also at that time, I didn't care, you know, and that's a bit of a privilege. I had parents that could help support me, and I can recognize that.
But I think.
There was a part of it that it was like the league had folded. There was for a while no hope that anything was coming back, and it came back quite quickly, and so you're in it and you're like, I'm a professional athlete, Like at the end of the day, this is the thing that I've wanted to do since it became an opportunity to do it. That for me at twenty I believe I was like, twenty three years
old was enough. Yeah, And what that looked like in Kansas City, I mean it was beautiful and hard and all the things that define you and start to shape you into what you are going to look like throughout your career.
And I believe that team really did that. It exposed me.
It exposed me to like professional sport and like an actually very safe way. The people, the women that were on that team were incredible and took me under their wing and allowed me to grow and understand this game. But yeah, from that moment to where we are now, I think that there has been a significant jump, and within that, there's a lot.
That is lagging. And so while we have.
Markets that look like Angel City, we don't have enough markets that look like Angel City. And while women are getting paid significantly more than they were twelve years ago, it's certainly.
Not enough to.
Live in the way that a professional athlete should be living, and so there is growth needed. There is definitely like we have not we are not done. I think that there is a great need for women that have played in this league for a long time to get back into roles that are making decisions and creating change and setting the direction for what this league will look like, and one there hasn't been opportunity there for a long time.
I think that is one of the things where I look back and reflect on my career where people used to ask me way too young, like what I would be doing next? And when I be done playing soccer? I'm like, you would never ask this of a male professional athlete, but okay, But I think for a long time I was like, I'm going to continue to keep playing, so the only path after this is coaching. And while I have a lot of respect for anyone who enters that realm, it just never felt right for me.
It's not what I felt passionate about.
It's not what I felt was going to scratch the itch that I of something a bit more. And so as the league's grown, is opportunities grown, that path has changed and it becomes there's a lot of different pathways.
While there's coaching, there is access to being a GM, there is the ability to work in the front office, there is like ownership opportunity, all these things that like twelve years ago didn't exist, And that is so powerful and it's also so necessary for the women of this league to feel in power.
To step into those roles in positions.
Because I think there is something to be said that you become an expert in something when you've done it for such a long period of time. And I think that there are people that are in positions and roles that don't have this experience. They don't know what it's like, and decisions are made based on something that they.
Don't know about.
Yeah, or let that trickles down and what that effect looks like on players.
Yeah, it harms them or not harms but it can't purs that it can sometimes, yeah, you know.
In September, ESPN release the result of an anonymous survey with all fourteen nwslgms. Among the things that they talked about was player safety and protections, and multiple gms said that they thought efforts to protect players have quote gone too far that it spreads fear and confusion among staff.
What is your response to that as someone.
Who's been in the league since the beginning when there was basically zero care for the players and the environments in which they played, and also as someone who played for with Paul Riley who's been banned for life from the league due to abusive behavior and sexual coersion. When you hear GMS people in leadership positions saying they've gone too far in player protections and safety, I think it's.
Hard to hear. I think there was a time, as you mentioned, that there was.
No guardrails around the league, there was no protection for players. There was rights could be held. They have no decision making power, and that is harmful. It created the environment that it created, and it harbored a sexual predator, and that once you make that mistake, you really can't make it again. And so yeah, you have to implement things to protect players.
What does this look like?
How do we move forward, and how do we move forward in a way that is really finding a balance between what it means to be a professional athlete and what it means to be harmed within your profession. And I believe that there is going to have to be a learning point of the pendulum that's had to swing the other way, and so it is finding that balance and that the ideas that come with like how do you create safe space, what does it look like to motivate?
How do you encourage players? How do you hold players accountable? No woman I believe in this league doesn't want to get better or doesn't want to perform at a high level. What they do not want is to be dragged in a way that is harmful and not supportive and abusive. And I think that there is a blueprint where it's like this is what worked, this is what we.
Know it works.
And now that that blueprint has been taken away, it's like what do we do? Should we say anything? Should we not say anything? And I'm like that also causes problems. I am not saying that that is like to do nothing and to not hold accountability and to not push a standard is what you should do within your environments. But there's certainly a balance between having no protection, right and having protection at some point.
It's like if you're airing on the side of the players for a while because you so gravely picked up before, then that's okay, and it's not that you want people
walking on eggshells. And actually, as someone who is more likely to be at my age friends with people in charge of places instead of the underlings, I recognize that there's a push and pull with gen z of once you learn language like toxic and you know, you start to use it sometimes maybe even when you're just not sure that that's how jobs are, they suck sometimes, right, there are a lot of work and you don't want
to be there, and sometimes people are wrestles. Yeah, there's a difference between that and someone who creates an environment or sustains an environment that is harmful to the health of people, and that as expectations that go beyond what's professional or otherwise. Finding that balance is hard anywhere. It is particularly hard in sport. And to your point, our idea of what we thought was like quote unquote, a good coach used to be pretty much dude.
Who yells a lot. Yeah, and we know that's not what gets the best out of people as a wiser, and we're so.
Beholden to that that we're so I can try to hold grace for people who are struggling with a workplace that they feel like is quote unquote too sensitive.
I can try to hear them out.
But I also want to say that because when you're so airing on the wrong side for so long, to instantly be frustrated by centering the players for a while and seeing how that goes is a reflection of the power dynamic.
Yeah, I think what I hear in that is like you have put people in positions of power that don't know how to build a blueprint, how to be a good lead, not that the players you've brought in are the problems or staff exactly. And so I think if women are felt that they are seen, supported and and celebrated,
you will get a lot out of them. They will push and they will play for you, and they will believe in and they will buy in, and they will buy in more so in like, maybe more so than like what we believe.
Is buy in on the male side.
And so I think women's sport in general is in this evolution process of taking what we believe blueprints were from men's sport and copying and pasting them here.
And it doesn't work. It doesn't work for so many reasons.
One that the money that was being able to be made in one area, it's not being made here. The way in which people or audiences engage in it, the way which coaches coach in it, it doesn't suit women. And so you have to be willing to find and be curious about ways that you provide a safe environ that sets a standard that is rooted in excellence.
And for me and the.
Women that I'm around, you don't go out to practice and not want to get better. You know, there's always questions, they want to ask, they want to be held accountable. And I think if that standard is set from the beginning and it's done in a way that is like.
Hey, that's not great, here's how you can get better.
This is what this that conversation is, it becomes more conversational.
I think in a lot.
Of instances there is coaches have a very difficult time of having difficult conversation and that is what in turn creates a what you could quote unquote say is a toxic environment. Or environment that loses buying or by an
environment that's petty or not supportive. And I think if you set that standard of like, because I can be consistent and what I'm asking you and consistent in what I'm asking of the team and explain why and explain why and not have a I think what I dislike the most and have traditionally felt is problematic in our league, and I can only speak on it because I haven't played elsewhere, is that there is an idea for whatever reason.
One in the earlier days, it's that we had no power as players, right, so you were treated as if you were It was an extension of club soccer or college soccer, and at some point there is a very vast difference of how a professional athlete is going to be treated in the way a adolescent in college or club is going to be treated. And there is a responsibility and a duty for coaching staff and upper management to create guidelines around as you bring in younger women
to play in this league. Yes there is going to be and need a different pathway for them in different conversations, but that blanket does not have to lay across the entire team.
Because you now have such a wide range of players.
You have a thirty four year old player and an eighteen year old player. All of those conversations and what is needed in the support and growth and all of that looks stressed.
And that's what being a coach is.
It's how do I get the most out of all the different people with all sharing one goal.
And so you have like the need for that, and I think with in that you create systems that look a bit more on like this is a punishment and this is to help hold you accountable.
We're going to have like a punishment system.
I'm like, that is just not that is not going to carry the way that you want it to carry. If there is a like this environment should be created to support the player. It should be created that they are on the pedestal. Whether you like it or not, these players are on the pedestal. So when they are
falling short, then it's a conversation. If there is something that they missed or did not do, it's the responsibility the staff and the people around them to support them be like, hey, you need to do this and like pick.
Up those pieces.
I think sometimes we tend to, especially in the women's game, leading to this way of being like, well, we're going to have like a punishment because there isn't a bit the ability to like find players and all this stuff. So this like kind of ability to be held accountable looks a bit rudimentary and it's act and it feels like a bit of a punishment system.
That it's like, I'm not a child, she is not a child.
This is a job, and so I think it is it's relearning what things are going to make people engage with, wanting to be the best that they can be within the environment.
And just being creative and thoughtful about how it should look different with women than men, and that being cool and interesting and a challenge and fun to do as opposed to as opposed to a frustration.
Yeah, because there's so many ways.
To do things a little bit differently and improve upon the model that we've just accepted for such a long time. You mentioned that earlier that you really were working toward that two hundred regular season cap. You are one of few NWSL players to get over fourteen thousand minutes played.
Could you imagine how many I would have gotten if I didn't get injured?
Right right?
But you were reaching for that number and obviously there's disappointment and coming up short. It is very hard in sport, especially not to assign a lot of meaning to numbers, very specific things. My final shot was a miss versus my final shot was a make. My final game was a loss versus a win or a number like two hundred. But you said you're feeling a little bit better about understanding that you will be at one ninety six one
ninety six. How can you put one ninety six in its proper place, which is a huge, gigantic, impressive number, instead of it needing to be this round number of two hundred.
Yeah, I think it is flipping that conversation on its head and not it being like these are the four appearances I didn't make, and instead leaning into like these are the one hundred and ninety six that I did, and all one hundred and ninety six had meaning, And I do not recall like one appearance that I didn't step on the field and wasn't proud of what I did. And so having that rhetoric and having that outlook on it, I think it will always have a bit of a bite to it.
I'm an I grew up in this. I strive for greatness.
I have been a perfectionist my entire life, a recovering perfectionist, now you know, and while you have and I have put in a lot of work into my own healing, there is a part of me that's like, it is hard to just take the competitor out of you, out of every situation.
But I think I know and can recognize and can sit.
In that to have done what I've done for the period of time that I did it, to the level of which I did it, that for me is greatness, and that's my definition of greatness.
So I get to own that, and that is really special. I loved your interview with Meglenahan.
She talked about in her pod, but she also wrote a great story that people can read in The Athletic and you guys talked about worthiness as a player, how much worthiness needs to be found outside of just the US Women's National team caps and appearances and gold medals.
And you told her that you've struggled in moments, particularly in the moment of playing in the NWSL, to understand how you've played this important role in women's soccer because you haven't had those many US Women's National team caps and those things.
You dreamed of when you were younger.
If you're always striving for something bigger than the thing you're in in the moment, that's fine, that's ambition, right. But I do think we need to respect an NWSL career in its own right. And I think we've come far enough with this league, and we've seen players like you take this league.
From no commas to what we see now. And without you, it doesn't happen.
Without players of your caliber that are there for one hundred and ninety six games, we don't get to a place where people will see an NWSL career as incredible in its own right. Yeah, maybe we're not quite there yet because we still elevate the national team.
Can you talk more about that process.
Is there a point at any point in the last couple of years where you sort of were able to let go of that national team part and say I'm rooted in this thing I am doing and there's worth in that.
Yeah.
Well, I want to thank you for all those kind words. I greatly appreciate them. I would say that that type of untethering to who I am and what I do started in like twenty nineteen and I tore my ACL and for a long time, soccer was that very like fraying thread that was wrapped around my life that like this is going well, so like everything else is okay. It was not true. I had a lot of work
to do. I had some things that happened within my family that like I got to a point where I'm like I do not have the tools or the capability of like holding this, carrying it or figuring it out. And so I started therapy.
I will thank my therapist till the day that I die for what she was able to help me with.
And so within that it became this process of just to what I said earlier, like defining what I believe success was and was I successful if I didn't reach this thing?
And I think I was.
I grew up in a generation a player where like we didn't have a professional league.
It was the national team or nothing.
It was a World Cup where you weren't good, you know, like you were either representing the crest or like what were you doing? And that narrative stayed really strong, and because I sat like so close to that for so much of my life and believed that like that was going to happen, and when it didn't, and when everything kind of like flipped on its head and my injury was like very ill timed, it kept me out of camps.
It kind of COVID happens, and.
I am set with this like whole new landscape of what the fuck am I going to do now? And like what if I don't not necessarily don't come back, but what if I never gained that momentum again.
And in a lot of ways I didn't.
I didn't gain the momentum to get back into camp and to represent this country in the way that I wanted to. And within that time it was the thing that I'm like I had to reflect back on all the things that I'd done in the success that I had, and I think also just recognizing, like the players in which I have played with and that I have spent time starting and playing significant minutes with, you don't do that unless you are.
Great at what you do, Yeah, And.
So recognizing that whether someone was going to choose me or not, it was out of my control.
But I knew when I stepped on the field.
Or the environment that I that I was going to inherently change it and make it better. And I think I've been one of those players that on the field, I will always give myself credit. But I think when I leave like organizations, like my absence is felt.
Yes, the way people talk about you makes that very clear.
And like that matters, And so I believe in this, in like the process of coming to terms with my retirement and the ability for me to allow myself to be celebrated, to be seen and to have those moments of like what if you announce this and no one cares because you kind of always have as much as
you can work through. Like I mean, the self critic that used to be in my head was constant and like the chat never shut the fuck up, And now it has its moments and I'm able to like settle it and turn towards it and be like I understand but like probably not going to be what we experience, and yeah, to give myself that opportunity. It has been really hard to even comprehend the amount of love and admiration I've received of the past like months or like weeks of like my.
Retirement, and to sit and stand in that and be open to that.
I don't believe with out being able to define what success was for me, I would be able to sit here today and hold it right.
There'd be bitterness there instead of the joy that you feel in the way people are talking about you and what.
You did for them. I mean, it's not just your soccer playing.
It's your personality, it's your sense of humor, it's all those things you bring, and then it's the work you put in for yourself and for other players. You were on the bargaining committee for the first NWSLCBA. Friend of the Show PA director Megan Burke told Madame meg Linahan, if anyone was asking me for real advice on how to organize a union, I tell them to find their merit. Matthiah,
She's the definition of ride or Die. Are you able to recognize your role in creating that CBA and defining what the league looks like even in the years to come that you're not playing in it.
Yes, I want like hearing that quote from Megan, like oh well forever, like touch my heart. And so if we did not have Megan Burke, I don't know where are speaking to ride or die?
Speaking Ride or Die.
She is a true champion of what this league should and can be, and she is an absolute writer die for players and it has been incredible to work.
With her and be alongside her and have.
Her love and support and her belief in me and her willingness to allow me to say what I'm thinking, to ask for more, to demand things that like maybe it's too far off, but if we don't ask, like we'll never know the answer, We'll never at least be able to like dwindle it down to something we actually are okay with having. And so I think for me that when I look at my career, I think if I would have just played, I would have been like cool,
had a great career. I was successful, I had these championships, I played with incredible people, was able to be coached by some of the best coaches in this league. But it is the work that I've done with the PA that has really like brought like such a holistic.
View to my career. It's around like very much rounded that out.
And with that work, I think I realized like how passionate I am about that side, about what it looks like to be in rooms that are making decisions, what it looks like to ask for things or re envision what is possible. And I think that doing that work has given me the foundation for what I will do next and the way in which I will be very similar to the player that I have been in the work that I will do in my afterlife.
I love it.
But yeah, I think that I talked to Sue about this a long time ago when she was, you know, on the WNBAPA and going through their conversations, and she's like, you do get to this point where like you're sitting at these tables and you're like, wow, I'm one of
the smartest people in this room. Yes, and you do like you do have this like this like reinvention of self where you're like, wait a second, I can actually speak to this, and I can speak to it with a firmness that like this is right and this.
Is wrong, and this is how we get to.
Be better, And like gaining that confidence is really something.
That I'm like been proud of.
And the initial CBA I will always hold close to my heart because it was the thing that just started to put this league on a much different trajectory. But our second CBA really meant something to me because I was like, I think I knew I wouldn't be around for what the length, Well, I knew I wouldn't be
around for like the length of the CBA. But I think I knew that I like wouldn't even enter it into like the next year, right, And to sit on those calls and to be like asking or pushing for something that you know is not gonna you are not going to benefit from, you get to be kind of more ruthless in your ask, you know, like because you know you're.
Not being selfish.
Yeah, you're saying, I know and feel that this is right, not because I want it for me, but because I know that it's what's right for everybody else.
Yeah, And what the standard should be, yeah, and what players should have and what they should have for a long time. And if you don't get you know, if you don't raise that level, if there isn't like enough of a raise, then like when the next CBA comes around, that jump off points too low. So you never reached to where you should be. And so I think, Yeah, that work has been incredibly fulfilling.
It has opened my eyes to a lot of things.
Is open my eyes to a lot of conversations, and it's opened it's open a lot of discussion around what is needed in this league for it to be to reach the level of success that it deserves, that the women in it deserve, because we're no longer in this position that it's like where.
They're going to have a league or we're not right.
We are in the position now, which I think is a lot more tedious of we will be successful.
But what is the height of that? How big can we go? How big can you go?
To my previous point, I think the more that women of this league step into positions to.
Shape that, the better off this league.
I completely agree, and I love that you said in those meetings you earned the confidence of knowing you were one of the smarter people there and someone who knew what was required, and your lived experience came into play.
I have to say, like one of the limited positive experiences I had in my ownership role with the Red Stars for a couple of years was that I was in meetings where I would have sold myself short as like, oh, I'm just a sports reporter, I'm just whatever, and instead realized I knew it was right for the players, I knew what the right choices were, I knew when people were doing the wrong thing or making the wrong choice, and I was confident enough to say it.
I didn't have the power or the money to change things, which.
Was in incredibly frustrating and made me see the world. I never have cared much about power and money, and now I'm like, well, shit, there's only so much you can do. But I did leave there being like I will feel confident in every room I walking, and I know Dominique Foxworth has said that about being in the NFL and then going into meetings with owners and being like, shit, these billionaires aren't smarter than me, they don't know better than me.
So I'm glad you learned that because Merritt Matthiah is off the field and in other places, whether it's.
A boardroom or at the front of a company or as a GM or an owner, like I want to see that. I'm excited to see that me too. You made me think of a Brett Dennen song. He as a lyric that says, now I'm planning trees I'll never climb, which is a way of looking at your later years of like, how am I making things matter that maybe I don't get but everybody else gets it. It feels significant, So we have to go. I'm not gonna have already taken.
Too much time. I'm not going to ask you what's next? Not enough I know. I mean, I could talk to you forever.
I'm not going to ask what's next in the long term, because I've been told retiring athletes hate to hear that. So I want to ask what's next in the short term, like next couple of weeks, next couple of months. As soon as that game on Friday ends and you're technically no longer.
You know, you'll have.
All your exit interviews and all your other stuff, but like, what's the first thing you're going to do.
I am very excited to just live in a moment where I'm not having to worry about like working out and being fit and yeah, to kind of just let myself be and travel and do things that you just don't get to do as a professional athlete. There's a lot of sacrifice that comes with putting yourself first and wanting to be great at something, and I have done that for a.
Very long time.
So I look forward to spending like some quality time with like friends and family and it not be not be weighed down by like I have this to do and I need to go do this, and I need to find the gym that I can be in, and I need to find the trainer that will help me like do technical work and like all this stuff. So yeah, to not have that part of my brain and that consistent like conversation going on, I I don't.
Know if I'll know what to do with myself. There's two paths.
How the people are like, oh my god, there's no one telling me what to do every second.
I hate it, And everyone else.
Is like, oh my god, what a dream is to just wake up and be like what do I want to do?
I know, and I know, like in you know, whatever's next.
There is this part that like you do lose a bit of autonomy when you start doing anything again. But I think for me, like there is a part of me, like within professional sport that in some of which I was saying before, the way women are treated in this we need to kind of evolutionize that and really be able to expand how women in professional sport, especially in the NWSL, are able to interact.
With life on the road, within environments, within markets.
And I think for me there was a part of it where I'm like, oh my god, like the lack.
Of autonomy that I have like I'm too.
Self aware to like let it not be a thing anymore, you know what I mean, Like I don't want to wear that on a wait trip, and I don't want to eat that, and I don't want to like be here then right now and all these things. So I think I'm going to lean into just having some time to do whatever.
Yes, which will be really nice. I know, a.
Like a thing of guacamole in Mexico hates to see me coming because and maybe a pacifico.
So yes, Oh my gosh, I'm so happy for you.
Just splurge, get some full ass nachos, is a bunch of beers.
Well, thank you so much for coming out so much. This was so fun. We're just going to turn this mic off of party. Yeah, let's do.
Thank you so much to Merrik for sitting down with me in Ohi and for being so great and so honest about her.
Time in the league.
We got to take another break stick around Welcome back slices. We love that you're listening, but we want you to get in the game every day too.
So here's our good gameplay of the day.
Keep sending us those Halloween costumes past and present, inspired by women's sports yours, your friends, folks you've seen on social you know, like the gal wearing the Asia Wilson car costume from the carmaxad.
So many Ellie the.
Elephants, I've seen all the ray guns and people like Misha who's saving time and money by going as White Tea Asia Wilson. No judgment, mesh, okay, a little judgment. I'm going to get you on the costume bend wagodbye.
Next year.
We want to see all the costume Send them to us at Sarah Spain on Twitter at Spain two three two three on Insta, or hit us up on email Good Game at wondermedianetwork dot com, and don't forget. You can always leave us a voicemail eight seven two two o four fifty seventy with all your show thoughts and slices.
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Watch Aubrey Plaza's photo shoot with Ellie the Elephant rating five out of five.
Split Jumps review.
We loved watching Ryder die Liberty fan Aubrey Plaza pretend to read a book while courtside all season, flipping the double bird to the JumboTron cam at games, just being Aubrey Plaza, but seeing her pose prom style with Ellie the Elephant earnestly and sweetly at the Wall Street Journal Innovator Awards.
Perfect Chef's Kiss.
Also, I'm wondering, can you book Ellie to come to events as your plus one? I have a couple producers and myself who want to know all right, slices, Now it's your turn, rate and review.
Thanks for listening, Happy Halloween, See you tomorrow.
Good Game, Merit, Good Game, women sports costumes, fuck you Awards ceremonies that don't prioritize women. Good Game with Sarah Spain is an iHeart women's sports production in partnership with Deep Blue Sports and Entertainment. You can find us on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Production by Wonder Media Network, our producers are Alex Azzie and Misha Jones. Our executive producers are Christina Everett, Jesse Katz,
Jenny Kaplan, and Emily Rudder. Our editors are Emily Rudder. Britney Martinez, Grace Lynch and Lindsay Cradowell. Production assistant from Lucy Jones and I'm Your Host Sarah Spain.