Social media head over heels with Barrera
He made waves with an impressive goal. But the 30-year-old midfielder is more than just the viral play.
A flick of his right leg at the right time propelled Hartford Athletic’s Danny Barrera into the national spotlight.
Tied with Philadelphia Union II in the 90th minute on Wednesday, Barrera, the team’s captain, camped outside of the box after teammate Tyreke Johnson ripped a shot on net from 30 yards out.
Philadelphia keeper Mitchell Budler corralled the long shot and scanned the field looking for a teammate to throw the ball to.
Barrera began to turn up field, but kept a steady watch on Budler, who then attempted to swing a pass into the open field. Barrera, maybe out of instinct or desperation or a combination of the two, kicked his heel up and deflected the ball. It kicked high into the air and dropped back onto the pitch, rolled into the net and secured a 3-2 victory for Hartford (10-3-2), and helped the club keep its dream of clinching the top seed in the United Soccer League’s Group F alive.
“I kind of saw that he was thinking about throwing, and you know I gave him a little pretend that I wasn’t interested,” Barrera said. “I thought if he throws it, I’m going to have a little bit of speed for it to deflect towards goal. It just hit me right in the heel, right in the perfect spot. It made for a dramatic win.”
Barrera’s goal quickly made national news. It was a top play on SportsCenter, all over national and international soccer media, as well as social media. It would be easy to consider Barrera’s goal lucky. Even he said things had to be perfect.
But Barrera, 30, has not built his 10-year long professional career on luck. If anything, the winning goal perfectly encapsulated the midfielder’s journey, which has seen him play for nine different professional teams. Before that, he was one of the country’s best high school soccer players, and played for the United States national youth team, and for one of the premier youth programs in the country.
It didn’t come easy, though many wouldn’t guess that by watching Barrera play.
“That’s Danny,” said Dan Metcalfe, Barrera’s youth coach, after watching his game-winning goal. “I wasn’t surprised, I wasn’t shocked. That’s just Danny ... he’s a genius when he taps into his full potential.”
‘Nobody took that option except me’
Barrera was born i n Bogota, Colombia. Despite spending his early years in a country where soccer is king, it was not viable for him at a young age. He attended an all-boys elementary school which focused on academics. It wasn’t until he was 6 years old that Barrera’s mother, Sandy, tried to push him into soccer.
“She tried to get us into a soccer team, because I played in the house with my brother,” Barrera said. His older brother, Diego, also played professionally. “They said no, because we don’t come from a soccer family. They were like, ‘Who is he?’ and she was like, ‘He’s 6 years old.’ They were like ‘But where has he played?’ and she was like, ‘Nowhere, he’s 6 years old.’ If you don’t get in there or if you don’t have a connection in there, it’s not as accessible as it is here.”
It wasn’t until Barrera moved to California at the age of 8 that soccer became a realistic option. He played for lower-level recreational leagues until he was 12, when his mother made him try out for one of the country’s premier club teams, the DMS11 Academy Club.
There were hundreds of players at the tryout, Barrera said. Many were better players than him at the time.
“These k i d s we r e machines,” he recalled, with a laugh.
Barrera didn’t make the cut, but Metcalfe offered each player the opportunity to attend practice and train with the team, although a roster spot was far from guar
anteed.
“I think he gave that option to all the kids,” Barrera said. “And nobody took that option except me.”
Barrera stuck with it and trained with the team for nearly two years before he earned the chance to play. He said that while he came in a step or two behind the others, he progressed quicker than they did. He eventually earned the opportunity, and quickly showed his prowess as one of the area’s best midfielders, with natural vision and technical ability.
He parlayed his success with DMS11 into an opportunity with the regional Olympic Development Program. He traveled to the Czech Republic for a tournament where he was named MVP. He trained with Premier League club Sheffield United’s U-23 team, and played with the United State’s U-17 national team at its residency program in Florida. He starred at Westlake High in Thousand Oaks, Calif., where he was regarded as one of the nation’s top recruits entering college. He had over 50 scholarship offers, and eventually chose Cal-Santa Barbara.
But Metcalfe remembers the moments in which Barrera struggled, too. He said that he and Barrera had a love-hate relationship, with Metcalfe constantly trying to pull more and more out of the young midfielder. Metcalfe said Barrera at a young age had a tendency to show a lazy streak or showboat.
When Barrera was a teen playing for DMS11, he was put into a scoreless game with the hope of lighting a spark under its offense. Barrera took possession of the ball and dribbled into the box, and was quickly met by defenders. Instead of passing, Barrera attempted to make a play on his own. A defender stripped the ball from Barrera, and the opposing team drove down the field and scored.
Barrera, according to Metcalfe, just stood there.
“He had been on the field probably three minutes,” Metcalfe said. “I pulled him off the field immediately. I said, Danny would never reach his potential unless we made him into a worker. He has all this talent ... [that moment] changed Danny. I knew Danny’s potential. If he doesn’t get out of that lazy streak, he will never go
further.”
Metcalfe has seen Barrera at his worst and at his best, as he said. He held training sessions at 6 a.m. before school, and Barrera was often the only player who showed up. That innate ability to improve is part of what made Barrera into one of the country’s best high school soccer players.
The lazy streak which concerned Metcalfe had disappeared with each and every early morning workout.
“Danny never missed [a training session],” Metcalfe said.
Even before Barrera’s goal against Philadephia earned him five minutes of fame, he was on the big screen, too. Metcalfe, who coached Barrera as a teen, was also involved in the theater world, and was regarded as one of Hollywood’s top soccer choreographers for movies. Metcalfe was hired to choreograph the soccer scenes for the Will Ferrell movie “Kicking and Screaming.”
Barrera came along, and worked on set for three months. He even had a line in the film.
“There was a scene where I was with Robert Duvall, and we were scouting the Italians,” he said. “And it was totally improv, because I didn’t have a line, and he tapped me in the head with his foot and said, ‘What do you think?’ and I said a line, and it made it onto the movie. I became a registered actor in the Screen Actors Guild, it just escalated like that.
“I guess I’m a lucky guy.”
‘Hartford is lucky to have him’
Barrera is now years removed from his youth career, as well as his shortlived film career. He’s a father of three kids with a fourth on the way in February. After scoring against Philadelphia, he celebrated by rocking a cradle with his arms.
“Preseason baby,” Barrera said, referencing his soonto-be daughter Dakota’s expected arrival time.
He’s now a veteran in every sense of the word, on the pitch and off it. He’s one of five players on Hartford Athletic above the age of 30, and he’s made good on his experience, helping the younger players on the club to develop. He has aspirations of being a head coach
one day, something he first took an interest in while playing for Sacramento Republic FC.
His eyes beam when he speaks of his children. Jacob, his 10-year-old son, is running sub-7 minute miles, and knows all the players and stats on the FIFA soccer video game by memory. His 5-year-old daughter, Addie, recently read an entire cover of a magazine while waiting at line at CVS, something Barrera said she couldn’t do even a month prior. Barrera spoke highly of the Farmington public school system, as well as his new home state in general.
Suffice to say, Barrera, a soccer nomad for much of his professional career, has settled in Connecticut. He was named captain of Hartford Athletic prior to the start of the season. He’s one of four players in United Soccer League history with over 30 career assists, and holds the Hartford Athletic team record for that stat, too. On the season, Barrera has two goals and seven assists.
“We decided to get him back to Hartford this year because we know his value, we know his quality,” Hartord coach Radhi Jaidi said of Barrera earlier this season. “We know what he brings to the squad in general with his experience. I’m not surprised [at his success].”
Barrera is not the same young midfielder he once was back in California. Metcalfe thinks he could have had the potential to be one of the best players in Major League Soccer, though things always don’t work out the way you’d expect.
Metcalfe doesn’t think Barrera’s story has been fully written yet. He thinks there’s still another level to Barrera’s game waiting to be unlocked. For now, though, he’ll continue to lead Hartford into the playoffs, with the hope of achieving heights that a professional team in Hartford hasn’t in years.
“I always said, if I had a professional team, I would have brought Danny onto it,” Metcalfe said. “Hartford is lucky to have him. If he continues to give his best, and inspire everyone else, that team will continue to fly and grow.”