While Messi dominates the conversation, players like the Crew’s Nagbe have helped grow MLS
FILE - Columbus Crew midfielder Darlington Nagbe, right, controls the ball in front of New York Red Bulls forward Fabio during an MLS soccer match in Columbus, Ohio, on Sept. 14, 2021. (AP Photo/Paul Vernon, File)
As soccer players go, Darlington Nagbe has approached his lengthy career differently.
Nagbe recently wrapped up his 14th season in Major League Soccer and his fifth with the Columbus Crew. He’s been on four MLS Cup championship teams over the course of his career.
In a season that’s been dominated by the outsized talent of Inter Miami’s Lionel Messi, Nagbe is among the quietly steady performers who have helped raise the profile of MLS throughout the years.
The Crew won last season’s MLS Cup title, reached the CONCACAF Champions Cup final this year and won the Leagues Cup. While the 34-year-old softspoken midfielder isn’t a flashy goal scorer, he is the consummate facilitator for teammates including Cucho Hernandez and Diego Rossi.
Like Messi’s Miami, the Crew were unexpectedly eliminated in the first round of this year’s playoffs, falling to the New York Red Bulls.
The finish marred an otherwise stellar MLS season. Columbus was second only to Miami in the regular-season standings with the second-most goals in MLS and the second-fewest goals allowed.
Coach Wilfried Nancy was named the league’s Coach of the Year last week as the league began rolling out its postseason awards. On Monday, Nagbe was awarded the league’s end-of-season Impact Award for his work with the Boys & Girls Clubs in Columbus.
Nagbe has always placed his family and community ahead of his chase of accolades. Although he made 25 appearances with the U.S. national team, he turned down call-ups because that meant considerable time away from home.
“I think the thing for me, it’s just I try to focus on what I know is gonna be permanent when my career is almost done. I play 15 years or 20 years, you know, it’s a good amount, and then after that you have the rest of your life to live. So I think I just try to focus on the things that I know I’m gonna be there when I’m done playing and try to live my life that way,” he said.
The three-time All-Star’s attitude has won him fans across the league.
“This profession has its gray clouds. Nagbe is a sun. He grows on the field, his smile shines on the stage, holding a trophy in his hands, as he did with every club he played for,” former teammate and current broadcaster Diego Valeri wrote in an eloquent post about Nagbe on social media last year.
Civil war in his native Liberia prompted Nagbe’s family to flee when he was a baby. When Darlington was 11, the family moved to Ohio and at 15 he caught the eye of then-Akron coach Caleb Porter, who recruited him to play for the Zips. He won the MAC Hermann Award for the nation’s top college player as a junior.
Nagbe was the second overall pick in the 2011 MLS draft by the Portland Timbers, where he spent seven seasons. He also played with Atlanta before returning to his Ohio home with the Crew.
Nagbe told The Associated Press that he’ll return to the Crew next season, and then he’ll reassess.
“I hope the players, my teammates, the people that I’ve worked with, I hope I helped them out in some way, obviously, on the field, but off the field, too,” he said.
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