Meet Galaxy Draft Pick Ty Harden (Who Comes From a REALLY Good School)

By: Laurie | January 30th, 2007

First we had a Beaver. Then we had a Hoosier. Now, at last, we have somebody from a school with a normal mascot. LA Galaxy defender Ty Harden is a Husky from University of Washington.

Note: In the interest of full disclosure, I must admit here that I did grad school at UW, so I may be a teensy bit biased. Plus, since the school is something like ten miles from my house, I’ve probably seen Ty play a couple of times. And I believe I know the mother of one of his former teammates. (And I think I could probably write on the France National Team for a hundred years without ever typing the previous sentence. So let’s hear it for supporting US teams!)

But anyhow. Ty is a defender and former captain of the UW team, originally from Junction City, Oregon. And, according to the Eugene Register-Guard, he played club soccer with new Galaxy teammate Nate Jaqua, who recently arrived at LA from the Chicago Fire. (Nate’s three years older, and according to Ty’s mom, Ty always looked up to him and is excited about playing on the same team.)

So what does Ty think about playing for the Galaxy? “First off I was excited to be picked at all, just for the chance to play in the MLS,” Harden said. “Furthermore to be picked by the Galaxy, which is the star team in the league, kind of like the Dallas Cowboys, America’s team, was real exciting. On top of all that to get a chance to play with one of my heroes as a child, David Beckham, in my first year in the league is unbelievable.”

He also says that after the draft, all of the focus was on the five new Galaxy players, and what everybody wanted to know was how they felt about playing with Beckham.

So let’s be original here. How DOES he feel about playing with Beckham?

From an interview in the UW Daily: “’As long as I’ve been playing soccer seriously, he’s been like the man, the top guy on the best club in the world, a player I’ve always looked up to,’ Harden said.

Let’s hope that Ty’s fully recovered from the stress fracture that had him sidelined for a portion of last season so we can see what he can do!