On Valentine’s Day, Jeff Maylor surprised his son Mack with a gift that the soccer-obsessed 8-year-old couldn’t stopped talking about for weeks: tickets to see Lionel Messi play in person.
Mack and his dad, an attorney from Phoenix, Md., arrived in Baltimore on Saturday, thrilled to watch the first-ever MLS match played at M&T Bank Stadium between D.C. United and Inter Miami. But specifically, they wanted to see the 38-year-old Argentine in the flesh for the first, and perhaps only, time.
Mack picked up soccer a few years ago, according to his dad, and recently started playing club soccer for Pipeline SC. He knows little of Messi’s past as a Champions League-winning midfielder for Barcelona FC, or his dominance in leading Argentina to the 2022 World Cup title. He may not even know that Messi is in his third season with Inter Miami, coming off an MLS Cup title three months ago.
“It’s just the star power of [Messi] alone,” Jeff Maylor said. “He doesn’t know anything else … strictly Messi.”
It’s a testament to Messi’s near-mystical status, who, despite being in his 21st professional season, has shown no signs of slowing down. He will spend the next nine months defending both his World Cup and MLS Cup championships.
Messi’s star power was in full effect on March 7 before a sellout crowd of 72,026, who hung on to every movement Messi made on the field. When he touched the ball, a collective murmur grew, willing him to do something superhuman. The fans were quickly rewarded in the 26th minute when Messi received a through ball from Mateo Silvetti and feathered it into the right corner for the Herons’ second goal of first half on their way to a 2-1 win.
The crowd erupted into raucous cheers that belied what was supposed to be a home game of sorts for D.C. United.
“It was nice to have a game in front of so many spectators, and in this beautiful stadium but as coach and player we prefer to have good results at the end,” United head coach Rene Weiler said after the game. “But it was a nice atmosphere.”
The match, announced last year to accommodate more than three times the number of fans than what could fit in Audi Field, served as an inflection point for soccer in the Baltimore area and a sign of momentum toward an expanded footprint of the sport.
Last month, Mayor Brandon Scott and United brass announced a partnership to bring professional soccer to Baltimore, featuring a $200 million stadium at the city-owned Carroll Park golf course and a youth academy. Baltimore native and Hall of Famer Carmelo Anthony is backing the project. The top-flight women’s team would compete in the USL Super League and a minor league men’s would play in MLS Next Pro, joining the only other major soccer outfits, the Blast in the Major Arena Soccer League and Christos FC in USL League Two.
While the prospect of pro teams forming in Baltimore is far from certain — a bill to provide funding for a stadium has made little headway in the Maryland General Assembly this session — Saturday’s matchup showed that the region’s appetite for soccer is ravenous.
“It’s the biggest event for soccer families of the year,” said Cesar Ramos, a former midfielder for Loyola Maryland, who now coaches for Pipeline SC as well as several other local youth programs. “All my players are talking about it at practice. Parents are talking about it. They’re all trying to get together and make it a big event. … It’s more than a game, it’s an huge event for the community to go out and support and watch literally the best player of all time.”
Brandon Quaranta, a Pipeline director and boys’ soccer coach at McDonogh School, brought his entire family to the game on March 7, including his four kids, ages 8 to 15. The chance to give his children what might be the only time they get to see Messi before he’s gone was something he couldn’t pass up, Quaranta said.
“I was a basketball fan as a kid and I never saw Michael Jordan play,” Quaranta said. “I had opportunities … and now I regret it. So, I’m not going to let that happen again with Messi. He’s in town, he’s in our stadium, in our city, and we’re not going to miss the opportunity.”
Mack Maylor is a new member of the city’s rich youth soccer system, a network of championship-winning club programs and elite college teams that have fed top-tier players into the MLS and beyond for decades.
Some of the fruit it has borne suited up on March 7, including Miami goalkeeper Dayne St. Clair, who played at the University of Maryland. Jacob Murrell, a McDonogh and Georgetown product currently in his third season with United, saw his first minutes of the year in stoppage time as his team tried to find a late equalizer.
Ahead of the match, Mack Maylor couldn’t decide which jersey to wear, his dad said, a D.C. United home kit or a pink Messi jersey. He ended up in D.C. white, because despite his abiding love for the greatest player of all time, the squad looking to expand its footprint into his home town is his team.
Photo Credit: Colin Murphy/PressBox