Welcome to the scuff podcast where we talk about U.S. soccer.

Our guest today is a native of Augusta, Georgia.

He was a big, mean centerback for the Augusta Arsenal Gunners growing up in the 1990s. He has been a player, a coach, a referee, a referee assigner, and a field volunteer in American soccer. He was the driving force behind the construction of the National Training Center just south of Atlanta. He spearheaded the hiring of Matt Crocker and then supported the hiring

of Emma Hayes and Maricio Pocetino. His name is J.T. Batson and he is the CEO and Secretary

General of U.S. soccer. J.T., welcome to scuffed. Thanks. Thanks for having me. It's great to be here.

Let's start with the 94 World Cup.

Sure.

I imagine you were what, 12, 11?

Yeah, 11. Yeah, 11 would have been the math, yeah.

Okay. What do you remember from that tournament?

I assume you were already into soccer at that point?

For sure.

I actually was at the – Mark Berson, University of South Carolina soccer camp during a good chunk of the World Cup.

And I remember watching the infamous U.S you know, at Stanford Stadium at soccer camp.

And it was all of the guys who were there for the boys soccer camp and the cheerleaders.

And so it was a very memorable day for an 11-year-old.

And, you know, that World Cup, even though I wasn't able to go to any games you know

sort of totally hooked me in I remember the 90 World Cup watching some of those games on

television but 94 you know you lived every every bit of it and that certainly got me

hooked in and obviously I'm excited for what that's going to mean for for kids and

everyone this summer yeah of course so so were your parents into soccer? Were your

parents soccer people or they just signed you up and you fell in love with it? So my dad was a college

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