Hometown Hero Scott Gordon living the Hollywood Dream in Los Angeles

By: Pedro Heizer

If you follow soccer in the United States, you know that the highest level of soccer one can achieve in the United States is to play for a team in Major League Soccer.

Former Lynn University standout and Fort

Lauderdale Strikers defender Scott Gordon is doing just that, on Friday Gordon signed a deal with Chivas USA of Major League Soccer for the 2012 season.

Drafted in the second round by FC Dallas in 2011 MLS SuperDraft, Gordon did not get a contract offer from the club and ended up signing with the Fort Lauderdale Strikers of the North American Soccer League in which Gordon appeared in 19 games and scored one goal.

“It was a blessing in disguise when I went to the Strikers after Dallas released me last season,” said Gordon during a phone interview, “By the end of the [NASL] season I had gotten some great experience that I otherwise would not have gotten had I stayed in MLS,” Gordon explained.

Gordon and the Strikers were one game away from winning the NASL Championship last season, “I got a lot of games in, the players the Strikers have are very high-level and in the long run that has helped me,” Gordon said.

Gordon signed with Chivas USA on Friday and he was dressed and was available to play in the 1-0 loss to the Vancouver Whitecaps on Saturday.

As for any differences he sees between MLS and the NASL, “The game is faster in MLS. Luckily for me, Fort Lauderdale is a team that plays at a high level and so they helped me prepare to play at the highest level of soccer in the United States,” a grateful Gordon told me over the phone as he drove down Los Angeles apartment hunting.

With a loaded backfield in place with players like Ante Jazic, Heath Pearce, Rauwshan McKenzie, and James Riley, Gordon knows it will be an uphill climb in order to make the starting eleven, “Chivas USA is a very good team with a very solid defense,” he explained “I’m taking this day-by-day, week-by-week, and game-by-game and see what happens. I’m here to do whatever they need me to do.”

“Scott brings a very professional attitude,” explained Daryl Shore, Gordon’s former coach in Fort Lauderdale “he never asks why he has to do things like carry the bags or move the soccer goals, he just does them and moves on. His work ethic is very high and he is an all-around good guy which I think makes him fit into any locker room quite easily.”

Gordon knows the challenge of making a MLS starting eleven is not an easy task, but his head is in the right place, “It will be tough getting into that starting eleven but the competition will push me to do my best and give it my all.”