“Since I’ve been a pro coming from Chicago to Angel City, every team I’ve been on embraced my son Caiden. From college too, every single team”
“It’s really special to see the bonds he makes with the different players throughout these different teams. They really are his aunties and he loves them”
“I will also say that he’s eight years old now, he just chose number23, not because he likes Michael Jordan or anyone else, becausehe wants to be like Press,he loves Press”
“I just think it’s amazing to see how much he loves the game because he’s been around the game, been around these strong fierce women and they just embraced him with so much love and it’s really special”
Christen Press was born to play for Angel City. “I wanted to play at the highest level on a team that had ambition to win, and then after I heard about the club, I found out about the mission and the vision and the why. It felt serendipitous because a lot of the values that this club holds are the values that I’ve prioritized in my own life. I was meant to play here. And it really called to me to play for a team that has equity at its core.”
Press is inventive as a goal-scoring forward, but her creativity thrives most as the co-founder and CEO of re-inc. “I brought my characteristics as a player into myself as a CEO. People always say, ‘athletes make great entrepreneurs.’ And I was like, ‘That’s a lie.’ And then I started to do it, and I did understand what people meant because there’s a relentlessness and a little bit of a craze [you have to have] as an athlete.”
Press feels empowered to fulfill her larger calling at her day job, and for the first time, she sees herself in the Angel City ownership group. “For the entirety of my career, I’ve been trying to push the game forward alongside all of my teammates. There’s a full job off the field, fighting for resources and trying to raise the standard. I think Angel City just represents that entire mission of a new future for women athletes — and progress. And to have female ownership and leadership, it offers a different model where now when we need something, and we’re speaking to the people that own and started this club, there’s less of this feeling of resistance — like we’re fighting against the man that has the money.”
For Press, every day has its own legacy. “Legacy is kind of a funny word for me. It’s a big word. I don’t think about legacy. I think about impact, [and] I think about touching people’s lives. I’m a very existential thinker [and] kind of person, and even in hard times in my career, it’s not that I was a little girl that played football. What motivates me is that there’s people in the stands, and for those 90 minutes, they’re having fun. And they’re celebrating. And they’re with their friends and families. So, touching people is what really motivates me and the movement you can create.”
Angel City FC/USA Forward Christen Press reacts to a Lineman’s call during a match against NJ/NY Gotham FC on May 29, 2022. (Photo by Noel Danseco via Instagram)
