Jeff Agoos

Jeff Agoos was an defender who played for the United States for 15 years but gained his greatest fame by playing for title-winning teams in five of Major League Soccer’s first eight seasons.

Agoos played 134 games for the United States, a total that still, six years after his final game for the United States, stood second on the U.S. team’s all-time appearances list. The first of those 134 games was against Guatemala in 1988 and the last against Wales in 2003. Included among them were three games at the 2002 World Cup and 26 in World Cup qualifying in 1996, 1997, 2000 and 2001. In addition to the 2002 World Cup, Agoos also was a member of the United States teams at the 1998 World Cup and the 2000 Olympic Games, and the United States team that won the 2002 CONCACAF Gold Cup. Agoos, largely a stay-at-home style of defender, scored four goals in those 134 national-team games. The first of those goals came in his only his second game for the United States, in Guatemala City in on Jan. 13, 1988.

At the start of Major League Soccer in 1996, Agoos joined D.C. United, which was coached by his college coach, Bruce Arena. He started in D.C. United’s winning efforts in the MLS championship games of 1996, 1997 and 1999, as well as the U.S. Open Cup final in 1996, making him one of five men to start for D.C. United in each of those games. While at D.C. United, he also played in the 1998 team that won the CONCACAF Champions Cup title and went on to take the Interamerican Cup from Vasco da Gama of Brazil.

He is the second member of the team that won the inaugural MLS title to be elected to the Hall of Fame, behind John Harkes.

Agoos was traded to the San Jose Earthquakes before the 2001 MLS season and continued his winning ways there. He won two more MLS championships with the Earthquakes, in 2001 and 2004. When he retired in 2005, after playing a final MLS season with the MetroStars, he had played 244 MLS regular-season games in his 10 years and 39 MLS playoff games. He scored 13 goals in MLS play.

He was chosen to Major League Soccer’s postseason Best XI all-star team three times, in 1997 and 1999 when he was with D.C. United and in 2001 when he was with San Jose.

In between the conclusion of his college career in 1988 and the start of MLS in 1996, he had, in addition to his appearances in the national team, played one season for the Maryland Bays of the American Professional Soccer League, one season for the Dallas Sidekicks of the Major Indoor Soccer League and one season for SV Wehen of the German third division.

Agoos, the son of an American diplomat, was born in Switzerland, but grew up in Texas. He played four seasons at the University of Virginia and was a star of the Virginia team that tied for the NCAA championship in 1989. He was a 4-time NSCAA All America.