Atlanta United president and CEO Garth Lagerwey basically tried to lead two clubs last year. One was 2024 Atlanta United, managed by Gonzalo Pineda and overseen by technical director Carlos Bocanegra. The other was the future version that he expected would have new leadership.
“I would tell you that this year was the most frustrating year of my career,” Lagerwey told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. “Because you’re desperately trying to push things forward and preserving, above all else, your flexibility for when you get long-term leadership in place and aligned.”
Club supporters weren’t doing backflips, either. The Five Stripes, holding a top-four finish in the MLS’s Eastern Conference as a goal, finished ninth. Play was inconsistent, mistake-prone and lacking urgency. In that unfortunate way, it was consistent with recent Atlanta United seasons past. Fan ire peaked.
Pineda was fired in June and Bocanegra in September. The club did deliver a stunning result in the playoffs, ousting Lionel Messi and Inter Miami in the first round before losing in the conference semifinals. But it did not erase the continuation of the club’s pattern of underachievement that started in 2020, the reason that Lagerwey was hired in the first place after having led two clubs (Real Salt Lake and Seattle) to MLS Cup championships.
“I think we’ve lost the faith of some people,” Lagerwey said.
Lagerwey believes the club’s season of discontent has ended. After inheriting Pineda and Bocanegra, he gave both time to prove themselves before ultimately dismissing them.
He now has his coach (Ronny Deila) and sporting director (Chris Henderson) in place, both hired in recent weeks. While the club has yet to make a splashy player acquisition — preseason training is scheduled to begin Monday — Lagerwey said that he was hopeful that the club will make significant moves over the next two transfer windows.
The club has two Designated Player slots to bring in high-priced international talent. Lagerwey spoke magic words of the potential impact, his hope that “we can see that big jump and become a title contender again.”
If so, an extraordinary chapter of the club’s history is about to start. Since establishing itself as arguably the league’s premier club in its first three seasons in existence (2017-19), Atlanta United spent the next five sliding back down the mountain. It tried to portray itself as the same dominant team even as results failed to substantiate the self-image.
“One (postseason) win in five years,” Lagerwey said. “You do have to move on from that. And you have to be willing to acknowledge that’s not quite at the level we want.”
Lagerwey used the appropriate terminology to describe what is happening here. He called it a remake. After treading water since his arrival in November 2022, he has put his full imprint on the club since the end of the season.
Besides Henderson (who won two MLS Cups with Lagerwey in Seattle overseeing the roster before building the Inter Miami roster that set the league’s regular-season points record) and Deila (who won an MLS Cup with New York City FC as well as championships with clubs in Norway and Scotland), Lagerwey also hired a director for the sports-performance staff (David Tenney) who worked with Lagerwey and Henderson in Seattle and has a similarly impressive résumé.
“There’s an ability to effect real change now,” Lagerwey said. “And I know some folks are like, ‘Well, why didn’t you do this two years ago?’ We couldn’t. We had so much stuff that we had to clear the decks to be able to say, ‘OK, now we can build it the way we want to.’”
For instance, Lagerwey wasn’t in sync with Bocanegra’s strategy of keeping four U22 players on the roster (instead of three or fewer) when they didn’t bring much value on the field.
“If you think about the total U22 minutes we’ve had the last two years, it’s not awesome,” he said.
The situation with player contracts was another.
“What I would tell you honestly is, my first couple weeks (with the club), I was like, ‘Oh,’” Lagerwey said.
If Atlanta United supporters are hesitant to dive in with the same confidence as Lagerwey, no one should blame them. The club has been nothing special in the past five seasons as it has unsuccessfully chased its past glories with changes to the roster, coaching staff, approach and, finally, with Bocanegra. Fans’ loyalty, demonstrated in annually being one of the top-drawing clubs in the world, was not rewarded. Lagerwey acknowledged that there was a “a little bit of a dip (in the season-ticket renewal rate) but nothing catastrophic.”
Given that the club also raised season-ticket prices, the lack of enthusiasm is understandable.
Lagerwey would say that Atlanta United has traversed the depths of the valley and is now emerging.
“I am certainly hopeful that we’re going to win some of these folks back where they suffered for a while, but, hey, now’s the fun part,” he said. “Now’s the time to come back on board.”
Ultimately, results will matter far more than confident talk or hires of administrators and coaches with successful backgrounds. That’s where Lagerwey will have to build back the trust of a disaffected fan base. Right now, he’s asking for faith where the club hasn’t provided much reason for it.
He has his people in place and, by season’s end, the talent on the field should be what they want also. His season of frustration is in the past. Now all Atlanta United and Lagerwey have to do is deliver results.
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