Welcome to the Scuff Podcast where we talk about US Soccer. Our guest today is a former MLS referee, a VAR referee and now the state referee

administrator for the California State Soccer Association South, also known as Cal South, which as we all know is one of the hotbeds of soccer in America.

Please welcome Juan Guzman. Juan, thanks for being here.

Adam, thank you for having me.

I'm very excited about the show.

I've seen a few of the shows prior,

so I think you've done a great job

with a lot of the things that you're highlighting.

So, kudos to you and the whole program team there.

Thanks, man.

First of all, let's go way back.

How did you get into refereeing in the first place? I was young I was about 11 years old my dad was a referee there was a

shortage and it was a Hispanic men's league and they only had finals they only had three referees on the finals and

this 11 year old kid said hey dad I think I could do it my dad was upset because the other

referee didn't show up and he kind of you you know, he said he had some choice words,

get out of my way kind of a thing. But the other AR was like, hey, you don't have anybody else.

Might as well put this kid on there. I did four games that day, made 25 bucks a game. I survived and the rest was history.

I saw you say somewhere that you part of your motivation for getting involved was with

refereeing was to be closer to your dad.

Can you talk a little bit more about that?

I mean obviously he was referring referring that day you joined him but could you talk a little more about that?

Yeah I think the the pride aspect when you're a 10-11 year old kid right trying to

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