Atlanta United: Chris Henderson looks to “build something really special”

It was almost exactly 10 years ago that Garth Lagerwey left Real Salt Lake to join the Seattle Sounders, becoming a colleague of Chris Henderson as the Rave Green sought to reach another level in their evolution as an MLS club.

The recruitment of Lagerwey, now Atlanta United‘s president & CEO, proved a vital step in Seattle’s ascension, a prelude to a historic Concacaf Champions Cup triumph, two league titles, four trips to the MLS Cup final and various other successes. And the echoes of those first days on Puget Sound reverberated again on Tuesday, as Lagerwey welcomed Henderson to Atlanta, a major coup for the Five Stripes’ ambitions of rejoining the league’s elite in 2025 and beyond.

“The reality was that the year before I came, the Sounders won the Open Cup and the Supporters’ Shield in 2014. So I’ve always said I was the knucklehead that was like, ‘Oh, I’m definitely gonna make this better,’” Lagerwey recalled dryly in a press conference at the Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta Training Ground, where Henderson was introduced as ATLUTD’s new chief soccer officer and sporting director.

“Chris, from day one, was open to me, and said, ‘Hey, I’d love to have you aboard. I think we’re going to work great together.’ And given his own success to that point, he definitely didn’t have to do that. And so there was that trust, the fact that he wanted to work with me, that always meant a lot to me. That really was the beginning of a great relationship working together.”

The largest fanbase in the league — at least going by home attendance — hopes, and expects, the duo can reprise that magic in Georgia, where a roaring start to life in MLS cooled markedly in recent seasons, necessitating what figures to be a sweeping overhaul over the next year or two.

In attracting Henderson to ATLUTD — and convincing their Eastern Conference rivals Inter Miami to let him leave after four impressive years of shaping the Herons into a Goliath — Lagerwey has made perhaps the biggest signing of an MLS offseason that’s mere days old.

“We have everything we need, from a player and a competitive side, to prepare to be a team that can be an elite team in this league,” said Henderson….