Steffen eager to show hometown Union what they’re missing
The symmetry of the Philadelphia Union’s week may not produce a win against Eastern Conference foes. But it presented a pertinent statement of the organization’s growth.
As Sporting Director Earnie Stewart huddled with club brass Monday and trumpeted 17-year-old Anthony Fontana signing as the club’s sixth Homegrown player and third of the unofficial Academy-fueled second wave, he explicitly described the motivation to hedge against losing the uber-talented midfielder sans compensation.
Stewart didn’t specifically reference the game looming six days later. But with Zack Steffen, the ultimate one who got away from the Union, set to take on the team of his youth twice in a span of five days, the specter loomed large enough that it didn’t need illumination.
Saturday’s visit to Columbus is the first chance that the Downingtown native will have to tangle with the Union as a pro, on the one-year anniversary of signing with Crew SC.
And while the renowned 22-year-old goalkeeper harbors warm memories of his stint with the Union and specifically under the wing of manager Jim Curtin, there’s no denying that Steffen’s starting role in Columbus owes in part to the intransigence of former Union regimes.
“It’s definitely going to be a little different than playing any other team just because of the hometown pride and everything that went down there,” Steffen told the
“I think it’ll be fun. Obviously I’m very motivated and excited for the game. To be back in Philly and playing in that stadium again, it’ll be nice. And I definitely want to get two wins against them.”
There’s a loaded clause in there that speaks to the incompetence in player dealings that blighted the Union’s pre-Stewart incarnation. The Downingtown West grad and FC Delco veteran was a stalwart of U.S. camps since the Under-14 level. He featured prominently on U-18, U-20 and U-23 squads and last summer was in with the full U.S. camp, one of a carousel of next-big-things on the goalkeeping block stuck behind enduring veterans like Tim Howard and Brad Guzan.
Steffen’s development traces through the incipient Union Academy, including the 2011 Generation Adidas Cup-winning squad that marked the first major coaching gig for Curtin after his retirement as a player.
“Jim is a great guy,” Steffen said. “I really liked him. He and I had a really good relationship. We kind of kept in contact for the past couple of years on and off.”
It’s an indictment of the Union’s system that Steffen, just four years removed form his time with the club, knows almost nobody on the current first team. He was an academy teammate of Keegan Rosenberry’s and got acquainted with a few vets from training spells, but his strongest connections are to guys like Fafa Picault and Alejandro Bedoya via last summer’s U.S. camp.
While they Union experienced moderate early success in fostering talent, they lacked any semblance of retention mechanisms. The club failed to establish a reliable first-team pipeline, and as illustrated by Rosenberry’s Homegrown claim being denied, generally didn’t have their ducks in a row. (One of Steffen’s GA teammates, Zach Pfeffer, is already retired from the game at age 21.)
Steffen is the highest-profile miss. Overtures from the Union materialized as soon as the 2013 season under manager John Hackworth, but Steffen wasn’t yet ready to take the leap.
“Back then, it was very unorganized,” Steffen said. “It wasn’t great. And I knew that and at the time, I was working with (goalkeeping coach/technical director) Rob Vartughian. He and my family and myself, we had a good relationship. He saw potential in me and knew that I was more than likely going to make it to the professional level as long as I kept going that way.
“He and my parents and I sat down and had a big discussion about going to college and my future. And signing right then with the Union wouldn’t be the best decision. I’m happy it all worked out.”
“A lot of guys in our league should’ve been Homegrowns for us, but the rules of the league and mechanisms change on the fly,” Curtin said Tuesday. “… You could make a good list of talented young players in this area. Philly has great players. …
“Zack Steffen is in that category. He’s done a great job for (Columbus) in goal.”
When Steffen elected to turn pro after his sophomore season at Maryland in 2014, the Union were in no position to oblige, even had the interest existed on Steffen’s part. They had a young, Maryland-educated, U.S. youth national team goalie in Zac MacMath languishing on the bench. They had selected Andre Blake with the No. 1 overall draft pick in January 2014, anointing him the goalie of the future. And they had foolishly marked Curtin’s ascent to the top job by the front-office-orchestrated capture of Algerian World Cup anomaly Rais M’Bolhi, one of the worst signings in MLS history who outstayed his welcome after nine games and a lone victory.
There’s no blaming Steffen for failing to imagine his place in that infernal logjam. So Steffen signed with German club SC Freiburg in January 2015, played sparingly with their reserve team and training with a first team that was relegated from the Bundesliga in his first half-season.
“I know I made the right decision for myself,” Steffen said. “I know that I wasn’t ready professionally and mentally to go be a professional athlete (in 2013). I knew that going to college and experiencing college and growing up and growing older and becoming more knowledgeable and professional on the field and off the field was what I wanted. “I knew that I made the right decision.” Steffen never cracked the lineup with Freiburg’s first team, so Columbus approached last summer and inked him as a discovery signing, a further insult to the Union, which was entitled to no compensation on either end of his transfers.
After a handful of USL games with the Pittsburgh Riverhounds, Steffen won the starting job for 2017; he hasn’t missed a minute with five clean sheets for seventhplace Columbus (9-10-1, 28 points).
“It’s definitely a new experience,” Steffen said. “It’s one that I wanted and one I hoped for. It’s been an awesome experience. There have been ups and downs, but that’s life. So I’m really happy here in Columbus.”
Steffen is progressing in other ways, too. After living with Homegrown defender and former Maryland teammate Alex Crognale and his parents, Steffen moved into his own apartment this month. And after conferencing with his family, he’s ready to have connections turn out by the dozens next Wednesday when he travels to Chester for the back half of the home-and-home.
“My adrenaline will probably be going through the roof and I’ll be wanting to shut them out and do the best I can,” Steffen said. “It’ll definitely be a little bit of extra nerves, but I’m really looking forward to it.”