Julie Ertz - The Innocent
SOCCER - CENTER MID - USWNT - CHICAGO RED STARS
ARCHETYPE: THE CHILD/INNOCENT
Day 17/135
Athletic Accomplishments
Julie Ertz is really REALLY good at soccer. A fixture on the U.S. Women’s National Team and Chicago Red Stars since 2013, Ertz is a physically dominant player, known for going in hard for tackles, unafraid to use her body and strength, and winning the ball almost every time.
With her signature blonde high ponytail and wide blue pre-wrap headband, it’s hard to miss her. She is everything and everywhere. She wins the ball in the air, and is a favorite target for corner kicks because she can deliver a header like we haven’t seen since Abby Wambach. On the ground, she wins the ball because she tackles harder than anyone. Period.
Ertz is more than just a bruiser, too. She is technically sound and has a natural understanding of where to be on the pitch to control the flow of the game, which led to her transition from playing center back early in her pro career to center mid.
In addition to leading the USWNT to back-to-back World Cup victories in 2015 and 2019, Ertz has won many accolades:
U.S. Soccer Female Player of the Year 2017, 2019
U.S. Soccer Female Player of the Year: 2017, 2019
CONCACAF Women's Championship Golden Ball: 2018
IFFHS Women's World Team: 2019
FIFA FIFPro Women's World 11: 2015, 2019
NWSL Rookie of the Year 2014
NWSL Best XI 2015
At only 28, Ertz is already one of the most dominant players to ever play the game. She still has many more years ahead of her, but she’s already looking like a Hall of Famer.
Character Archetype: The Innocent
Julie Ertz doesn’t play dirty, but she DOES play hard. She is intensely competitive, physically dominant, and aggressive on the ball. So, it’s hard to believe that someone who has tackled her way into a central role on the U.S. Women’s National team could be characterized as The Innocent. But it’s about her motivation.
Like The Innocent, Ertz just wants to be happy, and winning is the thing that makes her happiest. She will sacrifice her body and play any position, so long as it benefits the team and leads to that win or title. She just wants to win.
Off the pitch, her archetype is solidified as The Child/Innocent, who just wants to be happy. Ertz is sunny and smiley and completely in love with her dreamy husband, Zach Ertz, who plays tight end for the Philadelphia Eagles. I bring this up only to remind us of this tweet from 2019, not 1954:
Eagles tight end Zach Ertz leaves training camp to watch wife in World Cup https://t.co/9fmD1wjd9c pic.twitter.com/5FixB1TrZI
— CBS News (@CBSNews) June 13, 2019
CBS News referred to Julie—the starting center midfielder on the most dominant soccer team in the world, on her way to a second World Cup title—as little more than a footnote in her husband’s life. This is what happens when you don’t have a beat writer for women’s sports and you don’t have enough women editors on staff* to say, “Hey, this is sending the wrong message.” It’s a fixable problem.
*Greater than 88% of sports writers and 90% of sports editors are men.