Lionel Messi didn’t deserve the Presidential Medal of Freedom

Last updated: 2025/01/07 at 10:05 PM

BigP Published January 7, 2025

Alexi Lalas

Soccer Analyst

Lionel Messi, the star forward for MLS side Inter Miami and Argentina’s men’s national team, was among the 19 recipients of the Presidential Medal of Freedom on Sunday — which is ridiculous.

He’s been here, what, a year and a half? I am not saying that Messi has not been influential or not been important by any stretch of the imagination, but not only is it ridiculous for him to be awarded this medal, but it’s kind of strange.

Having said that, if you are given this honor, you should respect it, and Messi was the only person that did not show up to the event. I think that’s a bad look: it’s a bad look for him, it’s a bad look for Inter Miami, it’s a bad look for Major League Soccer and, ultimately, I think it’s a bad look for American soccer.

They had to have gone to his people and said, ‘This is what’s going to happen.’ At that point, if he didn’t want to be a part of it for whatever reason — it could be politics, it could be personal — he could have said, ‘No, no, this isn’t going to happen,’ and they could have avoided this. But it looks worse because he wasn’t there.

When you’re in this group of people — Magic Johnson, Bono, Ralph Lauren, George Soros, Denzel Washington, Anna Wintour — that have had an absolutely incredible impact worldwide, but also an incredible impact in the United States, and most of them have been doing it for several years, you should want to be a part of that group. Not only for what it says about you, but for what it says about the country that you and your family now live in. The country that now employs you, Messi.

It was a wasted opportunity for him, for Inter Miami, for Major League Soccer and American soccer.

Alexi Lalas is a soccer analyst for FOX Sports and host of “Alexi Lalas’ State of the Union Podcast.” He represented the USMNT at the 1994 FIFA World Cup and had a nine-year professional career. In 2006, he became the president of the LA Galaxy and helped bring David Beckham to Major League Soccer.

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