Steres
Photography by Lorena Barros.
“One of my earliest memories is going to watch the LA Galaxy play at the Rose Bowl for their Fourth of July game in ‘98.”
It’s been over two decades since that fateful day in Pasadena, and little could have Daniel Steres known that one day he’d be playing for his childhood team. Not only that, but today, he’s the current Galaxy player with the most appearances for the club. The climb to get to the Galaxy wasn’t easy, but the seven years he’s been with the organization have been well worth it.
“To be honest, it could have all been so different,” remembers Daniel.
Born in Burbank, California, Daniel grew up playing both baseball and soccer, and he excelled at both of them.
“I was doing well in both, but there was something about soccer that just drew me in. I liked running around and being with my team. I also remember growing up watching the Premier League. All my friends looked up to football players, and they wanted to be like them. I wanted to be a soccer player. I wanted to be up there.”
While that childhood dream didn’t crystallize until much later, his ascent in the California youth soccer scene garnered the attention of San Diego State University. By then, Daniel had been playing for the same team from U-11 through U-19 and collected trophies in the Dallas Cup, Surf Cup, and NHB Cup with his club.
“It was a huge jump, physically. I was a skinny guy. But I ended up making the starting lineup pretty quickly and solidifying my spot on the team,” says Daniel. While the transition to the college level went fairly smoothly, Daniel's biggest lessons from those four years came off the field.
“I think the biggest thing for a lot of guys who make it is just their discipline. That’s something I learned pretty early with my club team when I was younger. I had to sacrifice a lot of different things on the weekends with friends. In college, it was the same but with higher stakes.”
“And to be fair, I’m not a huge studier,” admits Daniel with a laugh. “I majored in business, and I’m the type of guy that waits two hours before the assignment is due, and then what I have is what I have. Maybe if I went back now, I’d get more out of it, but I was just really focused on soccer. I was taking care of what I needed to do in terms of school, but still making sure I was well-rested and everything for training or for games.”
That slight gamble on his schoolwork ended up paying off, and by the time he was ready to graduate, Daniel was getting attention from multiple clubs in MLS. In 2012, he was selected by Chivas USA with the 28th overall pick of the MLS Supplemental Draft.
“That’s where the real interesting journey for me started.”
Daniel joined Chivas USA for their preseason, eager to show what he could do.
“I just didn’t do enough, so I ended up getting cut and released. It was devastating.”
Coincidentally, Chivas USA’s assistant coach at the time was Greg Vanney -- LA Galaxy’s current gaffer --, and he gave Daniel words of encouragement as he was being let go.
“Greg kinda talked to me afterward, just telling me to keep trying and that this wasn’t the end. But I was pretty devastated. I felt like I had lost my chance.”
The next few months were back to the drawing board for Daniel. He went back to training with his college team to stay fit, and he worked his connections to see if he could get another shot anywhere else in the league. Finally, midway through 2012, he was able to land a spot with the Seattle Sounders.
“They were the cream of the crop in terms of clubs here in the US. It was just unreal, but I never really pushed into the lineup too much. I’d done well in some of the reserve games, but I was never really cracking into the starting XI. I’m generally a shy person and sort of reserved, so I didn’t really push on to make a bigger effort to get out of that. I was a little taken aback by being at the pro level and was just waiting for my turn instead of going for it. So I ended up playing a lot of the reserve games, hoping to get a preseason with the first team the following year. Unfortunately, that didn’t happen.”
Daniel was stunned. But thanks to the support of his family, he regrouped. “There was never any pressure from them,” he says. “I’d made it up in my head that I was gonna make this work. I’d seen the level that I was trying to get to, and I knew I could do it. I just had to figure out a way to get in. I could’ve dropped it and just tried to become a banker or something, but I knew I just had to find my next opportunity.”
That next opportunity would take him to Wilmington, all the way across the country.
As Daniel puts it, “it was quite an interesting experience.”
“I went from Seattle, where they have the best facilities and take care of you in every way, to Wilmington. Looking back at it now, it’s shocking that some of the stuff was the way it was. We had one turf field that we’d use for games, one locker room that was a third of the size of what we had in Seattle, we had four showers -- two of them were broken --, and I think we didn’t have a trainer on site, which is crazy to me now. I don’t even know how we did that.”
For Daniel, it was an eye-opening experience to see the reality of soccer in North America. And even though it’s been nearly a decade since his time in Wilmington, that anecdote-filled year is one that he always talks about to younger players in MLS now.
“I always tell them about our nine-hour bus rides. We had little beds where you couldn’t even turn, and you’d try to sleep and then wake up in the next city. The money just wasn’t there, but it was a lot of fun. We’d play games on the bus, stop to get food in the middle of nowhere. It was crazy. And it was always funny because half of the guys were really serious about soccer, and then you had the guys that had other jobs and stuff too. It was a unique experience because it showed me a lot about the reality of soccer here. It was somewhere between college soccer life and the professional level. That whole season just gave me a sense of ‘this is not what I’m doing forever, I need to get to the next level.’”
After leading the team with seven goals and being named Wilmington’s MVP, Daniel caught the attention of two brand new USL clubs -- Sacramento Republic and LA Galaxy II.
“I was the first player that the Galaxy II went for. They really wanted me, and for me, I thought it was the best opportunity to catch some eyes to make the jump to MLS. On top of that, I would be around family, and I’d be playing for the Galaxy. What more could I ask for at the time.”
For Daniel, wearing the Galaxy jersey for the first time was “a huge deal,” and being part of MLS’s first USL affiliate team was also an added bonus.
“It was everything I’d hoped,” says Daniel. “It was a good mix of veteran-type guys, guys like me who hadn’t quite cracked into MLS yet, and academy players.”
Those two years with the Galaxy’s USL affiliate were great for Daniel’s development, but they both ended in heartbreak from a competition perspective. His first year with the club ended with a painful USL Playoff semifinal loss against Sacramento in a mythical game dubbed “the Miracle at Bonney.” The following year, Daniel and the Galaxy would fall to the Rochester Rhinos in the USL Championship grand final. But despite failing to lift the coveted USL silverware, those two years were more than positive from an individual perspective. Daniel was named captain and Defender of the year in both 2014 and 2015.
The following year, he’d finally break into the first team.
“Some people make it when they’re 17, but that wasn’t my story. I was 25 when I got into the first team.”
In a poetic turn of events, one of his first-ever games with the Galaxy was against Barcelona at the Rose Bowl.
“After watching that game with my grandma when I was a kid, I had also been a ball boy as a kid. I was walking around the stadium prior to kickoff, and I was just thinking, ‘Wow, I haven't been down in any of these areas since I was being paraded around the field as a little kid. It was just so special.”
In that game, Daniel faced off against the likes of Iniesta, Pique, Sergi Roberto, and Jordi Alba -- well before he had even signed an official contract with the Galaxy first team.
A few months later, he would officially be called up by Bruce Arena, and he penned his first MLS contract at the beginning of the 2016 season.
His first official match with the Galaxy came against Santos Laguna in CONCACAF Champions League, where he made a solid appearance off the bench. The following week, he was tapped to make his first official start with his childhood club.
“I’d been waiting for too long for that moment. I just wanted to get out there. We played DC United, and I got jitters coming out of the tunnel. All my family and friends were there. Hearing them cheer when my name got called during the whole announcements, the national anthem, the opening whistle, I’ll never forget it.”
If the pre-game was already an emotional moment for Daniel, the actual game was just a dream come true.
“I told myself, ‘don’t leave anything behind because, for all you know, you’ll be back on the bench next week.’ So it was a really physical game, and I just had to be super aggressive. And then I actually ended up scoring. I don’t even remember what minute, but it was just a euphoric rush. Probably one of the best moments of my professional career. It was just a rush of energy. ‘Till this day, my friends joke saying that I started running like a high school girl after the ball went in.”
Since that spectacular debut, Daniel would end up solidifying his starting spot, missing only three games the rest of the season. The Galaxy made the playoffs with Daniel as a key part of their defensive unit, but unfortunately, they fell to the Colorado Rapids in the Conference Semifinals.
The following year, Daniel made 21 starts for the Galaxy, despite struggling with injuries. 2017 was an up-and-down season for the team as a whole, with various coaching changes coming into effect. But while 2017 did not go precisely how Daniel and the organization would have hoped, 2018 was quite a rollercoaster ride.
“That week when Zlatan came in is probably the one I remember the most so far in my career. He showed up to two trainings before the first-ever El Trafico, and it was a media circus. I haven’t seen that many cameras at a Galaxy training ever.”
“When matchday came around, you didn’t know what to expect. The atmosphere was wild because it was the first-ever El Trafico. We arrived, and the fans were already chanting at each other. There was just an energy we hadn’t really felt before in the stadium.”
“But even with that energy, we came out flat. Vela came out and scored two, and we didn’t have any answers. The game was getting away from us. And we came out after halftime with LAFC just moving the ball around us, and you could tell all of us were like, ‘F this, we’re not getting passed around like that.”
So the Galaxy fought their way back into the game. Lletget pulled one back, and Pontius put them within one.
“It was 3-2, and everyone started chanting for Ibra to come in. We had had two trainings with him. We didn’t know anything about him other than he’s obviously sick.”
And lo-and-behold, Daniel and Zlatan would end up playing a part in the Galaxy’s famous remontada against their new rivals.
“LAFC had a goal kick, and I just went up for the header to put it back into their half. The ball ended up falling to Zlatan, and he just rips off that shot. The entire place went wild. I’ve never heard it louder. We all just ran to the end line to celebrate with him. And we hardly knew him at all, but we’re just jumping all over him going crazy.”
As the whole world knows, the Galaxy would end up completing the 4-3 comeback with another Zlatan goal at the death, and that day is one neither Daniel nor LA Galaxy fans in general will ever forget.
“It’s awesome that I got to experience all of that on the field, but I have friends who still tell me stories about what it was like in the stands or what it was like at the bars. It was really just an unforgettable day.”
While 2018 and 2019 did not end exactly how the Galaxy might have hoped, Daniel continued to rack up appearances for the club, and this 2021 season might really be a special one.
“Greg Vanney came in this year, and he kind of recognized me, so it’s cool that we’ve met again after all these years. But it’s been great because he’s brought a whole new system, and that’s what we needed. We needed consistency, a style of play, and an identity. I think we’ve slowly been able to find that this year, especially after 2019 and 2020.”
Within the Galaxy’s new identity, Daniel has had to step into a role that he might have never expected to have -- the role of experienced vet.
“It’s funny how quickly things change. It feels like just yesterday I was getting my start at 25, still trying to get the hang of things. Then you blink, and all of a sudden, you’re 30, and you’re the veteran trying to be that experienced figure for all of the young guys coming.”
“It’s an interesting role that I’m still trying to get used to. I like to lead through action and by the way I play, but I’m still trying to find that sort of voice. You go from people telling you you have no experience, and then within like a day, you’re a vet now,” says Daniel with a laugh. “But I guess that’s just part of the learning process as a player. Learning to be that experienced figure and help the next guys along.”
Seeing the new generation of players step up in recent years has been a delight to see for Daniel. “They’re better than I was at that age,” he admits, “but they also have it way better. They get to fly private and all that. So I always make sure to let them know how it was when I was coming up. It’s all in good fun, but it’s just so good to see how everything’s changed.”
While a lot has changed in the league, there’s a lot that’s changed for Daniel as well. Just five years ago, he was taking his first steps with the LA Galaxy, and today, he’s closing in on 150 appearances for the club.
“I just received my 100th appearance jersey last year. I don’t try to look back too much or look ahead too much. I try to stay in the moment of what’s going on, but there are certain occasions where you’re kind of forced to step back and realize what you’ve done. I still feel like that guy in 2016 who was pushing to try to make an MLS team and look at how far I’ve come, you know. There’s not a lot of guys who can say they’ve made 100 appearances in MLS, especially for a legendary club like the Galaxy.”
“It’s cool that it’s not one of those things where someone just hands you an award. I’ve played all of those hundred-something games. I’ve earned all of that. It’s something I’m definitely very proud of.”
While Daniel rightfully takes pride in getting as many minutes as possible, all of those appearances are a testament to his dependability and perseverance.
“I know I’m not the flashiest guy in the world. But I’m consistent, dependable, and I think I’ve been able to adapt to many changing situations. I owe that to the lessons I learned by not making it right away.”
“I had to treat each day, each game, each new coach, each season, as an opportunity to show that I belong out there. I’ll still keep doing that until my very last moment on the field.”
Photography by Lorena Barros.
