HOUSTON – Jamey Rootes is not an idle person.
When the 54-year-old resigned as Houston Texans’ president in February, retirement was the last thing on his mind. Instead, Rootes was on a quest to find his next career move.
Enter new Houston Dynamo FC and Houston Dash owner Ted Segal.
Segal and Rootes were introduced by, coincidentally, a former Texans player. The two, along with the rest of Segal’s group, talked and had a good connection.
“They liked the experience that I had here in the Houston marketplace,” Rootes told the media Wednesday in his first official press conference as Dynamo and Dash CEO.
“I think Ted talked about that, the connectivity that exists and certainly that’s something that I’ll bring to the table and a different set of experiences to provide my perspective on some things that might help us in that quest of awakening the sleeping giant.”
From soccer player to coach to CEO
Rootes has been a lifelong fan of the beautiful game.
“I played throughout my younger life, I’m not able to do that anymore,” Rootes said with a smile.
In college, he played for the Clemson Tigers and won two national championships. On the 1987 title-winning team, Rootes was the starting midfielder.
Rootes later pulled double duty at Indiana University where he served as an assistant coach for the Hoosier’s men’s team while getting a Masters of Business Administration.
Rootes said soccer seems to be part of the family business, adding that his brother is a soccer coach at Lynn University.
The CEO doesn’t have one specific moment when he fell in love with soccer but he does have a cherished memory.
“In 1994, I worked at the World Cup venue in Chicago and I was a field manager. I was in the corner and the first goal was scored and it was just electric, and crazy,” Rootes said. “I saw the full potential of what the game could be here in the United States for the first time, so that was a very memorable moment.”
Rootes’s first foray into the sports business came when he was president and general manager of the Columbus Crew. At that point, MLS had 12 teams. Rootes returns to a vastly different MLS than the one he knew. For starters, there are 27 teams in MLS with more on the way.
MLS having a “national footprint” and growing popularity surprised Rootes.
“I will say that that was the vision from the beginning,” Rootes said. “You never know in a doubtful undertaking how it’s going to turn out, but it turned out the way that folks like Robert Kraft and Lamar Hunt and others envisioned. It’s really nice to see it come to fruition.”
Dynamo and Dash fans surely hope that Segal’s and Rootes’s words to improve this organization from top to bottom come to fruition. And while Rootes has just started his role, he’s hitting the ground running.
Getting to work
Rootes is only one week in his role but the club’s first-ever CEO has already identified some areas that could use improvement, more specifically, to BBVA Stadium.
Rootes wants to do a holistic review of the organization’s stadium. The new CEO wants to identify the investments that can be made to the stadium that will enhance the fan experience for years to come.
One such improvement is geared towards supporters.
” I understand that this has been a point of contention relative to our supporters, so we’ll be providing safe standing sections beginning in 2022,” Rootes said.
“Supporters make such an important, not only for their support but the experience they provide. That is what differentiates the fan experience from my perspective at an MLS Stadium from anything else or a soccer stadium from anything else. They are a part of the entertainment and just so energizing to see.”
Despite being a part of the Houston Texans for the past 20 years, Rootes has seen first-hand the kind of sleeping giant the Bayou City is when it comes to passionate soccer fans.
NRG Stadium has hosted numerous soccer matches and tournaments during Rootes’s tenure that drew record-breaking attendances. Such as the 2016 Copa America semifinal matchup between USMNT and Argentina which drew a crowd of 70,858.
How does Rootes envision translating NRG’s sell-out crowds to BBVA Stadium?
“That’s the challenge and that’s what we’ll be working on. I don’t know what the answer is right at this moment but that’s what we’ll be working on, is building the audience,” Rootes said.
“It’s about, what I term trial and loyalty. People coming out experiencing it, having a great time, seeing how differentiated this experience is, and coming back and telling their friends.”
BBVA Stadium will open to full capacity Friday when the Dash takes on the OL Reign, and on Saturday as the Dynamo welcomes FC Cincinnati. Rest assure Rootes will be in attendance surveying the stadium and taking notes.
Jesus Acevedo Jr. is the Editor-in-Chief of The Bayoucitian. He’s an award-winning bilingual journalist from Houston, TX. A graduate of the University of Houston, he has written for the Houston Chronicle, La Voz de Houston, MLSsoccer.com, and ProSoccerUSA.
Before becoming a journalist, Jesus spent his early 20s drumming his way across Houston with two bands — Shortcomings and InsertNameHere. The memories that Jesus made as a musician were the seeds that started the idea for the comedy, Houmans: The Series.