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 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 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. 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. 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 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 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 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 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 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 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 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 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 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, 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, 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 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 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, 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 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 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. 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 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, 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 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 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 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 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 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 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. 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 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 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 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 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. 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 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 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 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 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 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 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, 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 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 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, 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 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 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, 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 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 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 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 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 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. 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 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. 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. 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 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 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. 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 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 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. 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. 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 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. 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 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 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 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 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 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 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, 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 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 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 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. 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 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. 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, 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 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 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. 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 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 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 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. 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. 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 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 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 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 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 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 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 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 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 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, 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, 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 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 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, 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 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 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. 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 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, 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 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 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 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 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 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 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. 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 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 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 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 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. 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 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 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 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 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 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 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, 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 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 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, 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 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 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, 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 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 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 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 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 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. 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 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. 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. 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 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 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. 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 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 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. 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. 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 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. 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 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 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 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 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 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 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, 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 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 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 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. 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 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. 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, 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 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 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. 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 more podcasts for my heart Radio, visit the I heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.