The crosstown rivalry known as El Trafico returns to Pasadena's hallowed stadium, where the Galaxy organization first started in 1996
Kevin Hartman remembers attending the Galaxy’s Fourth of July game in 1996. Hartman, who is now the Galaxy’s goalkeeper coach, got tickets to the game from his then-roommate and former UCLA teammate Greg Vanney.
Vanney, a player on that first Galaxy team in 1996, is in his fourth year as head coach of the Galaxy.
One year after attending the game as a fan, Hartman found himself on the field as the Galaxy’s goalkeeper in 1997.
“I’m really proud of my roots within Southern California,” Hartman said. “To be able to play professional soccer wasn’t even anything that I ever really considered.”
The beginning of Hartman’s career coincided with the founding of the MLS. At the time, the Galaxy trained and practiced at the Rose Bowl. In 2003, the team moved to Carson to the new Home Depot Center, which is now known as Dignity Health Sports Park.
In 2023, the team returned to the Rose Bowl for its El Trafico game against LAFC on July 4. The match had an MLS-record 82,110 spectators, who saw the Galaxy earn a 2-1 victory.
The rivalry game is back in Pasadena this year, with LAFC and the Galaxy tied with 40 points atop the Western Conference and each with a conference-best 41 goals scored.
“I think it will be an exciting game,” said Vanney, who played seven seasons for the Galaxy. “You have two teams that are in really good form right now and are fighting for the top of the West and two teams that score a lot of goals.”
For many of the players who played for the Galaxy in its early years, their ties to the Rose Bowl weren’t limited to the stadium. At the time, the team didn’t have a training center, so they trained on the fields outside the stadium in the surrounding Arroyo Seco park.
“(Fans) would be tailgating and when we would come back to train, we’d find all that there, be it bottle caps, trash, flares, and try to pick up stuff to get it out of the way,” former Galaxy star Cobi Jones said.
According to Hartman, on the same day the team picked up items left behind from the Fourth of July game, a manhole cover was in his six-yard box in the penalty area on the practice field.
He also remembers Jim Liston, who is now the the team’s director of high performance and innovation, made the team run laps around the Rose Bowl complex during his first stint with the club as its head of strength and conditioning from 1998-2003.
“I believe we did a lap of the complex, including the golf courses, and I recall how exhausted I was after one of them,” Hartman said. “And then he said we were doing the second lap.”
Hartman commented that now Liston “has the audacity to talk to us about players being overtrained.”
“I’m like, ‘Remember that one day?’” Hartman said. “I feel like I contributed to Jim’s expertise in terms of evolving his concept on what was the right way to train goalkeepers.”
Pasadena mayor Victor Gordo attended the first couple games of the Galaxy at the Rose Bowl. Gordo, who played soccer at Pasadena High, said he hopes to see the game continue at the stadium.
“Absolutely it should be here,” Gordo said. “We’re in the beginning stages of what is a great rivalry now that LAFC is in town. As both teams rise to the top of their games, to have them here at the Rose Bowl stadium is very fitting.”
One of the advantages of the game at the Rose Bowl is its proximity to Old Town Pasadena. After games, the team would go to the downtown area and have dinner at nearby restaurants.
“It was a great time to be able to have a beer and celebrate a victory and share that camaraderie with the fans,” Hartman said.
