Czech footprint in MLS! Son of a famous father ended up betting on great marketing ideas instead of goals

Every football fan probably remembers the name Luboš Kubík. The former national team player and Slavie player was one of the first Czech players to make the jump to Major League Soccer in the US at the end of his career. As is customary in the football environment, Kubík’s son, Luboš junior, followed in his father’s footsteps. First he trained at the Pardubice academy, but his steps led him overseas, following the example of his famous father.

He moved to America at the age of sixteen. The American environment perfectly combines education and sport, and so Luboš’s original one-year plan stretched out for a much longer time. After high school in Iowa, he spent four years at the University of Pennsylvania and then worked his way up to the Philadelphia Union, the top team in MLS. While he didn’t play soccer for the prestigious franchise, his mark on the club will always remain.

“After graduating from university, I played for Philadelphia’s B team and because I had a degree in sports management, I also got an internship in marketing for the whole club. I thrived in football, but as it happens, the struggle for everything didn’t go my way. Then I found out they wanted to send me to a farm in another city. It was also a second league, but I couldn’t work for an MLS team at the same time. At that time, I already knew that I would not make a big hole in the world as a soccer player, so I chose to stay in Philadelphia in marketing, where I was offered a paid position,” Luboš says.

From a young age, he dreamed of running on the best turf like his father. But he was also interested in education. “I’m glad I could make this choice at a time when I was sure I was making the right choice. In the Czech Republic, athletes have to choose their path at the age of eighteen. If they stop doing well in sport after a few years, they may not be as attractive on the job market without school,” he says.

He spent over three years at the Philadelphia Union, was promoted twice and had the opportunity to absorb the workings of American soccer in the best environment.

“We revamped the whole marketing strategy of the team, which was relatively young at the time. We reached out to masses of new fans, improved the perception of the club in the city, and gained the support of smaller clubs. And I even designed their mascot, which they still have today, it’s a snake and it’s called Phang. So there’s something left of me there, I’m very happy about that,” he recalls of his time with the unit that celebrated winning the competition in 2020.

Former Sparta captain Bořek Dočkal, who joined the club in 2018, also helped him leave his Czech mark in Philadelphia.

Luboš Kubík himself has a vivid memory of the time when he first encountered the American football environment. At the age of 16, under his high school in Des Moines, Iowa, he was the best player, and soon the third highest league team started to borrow him. At a very young age, Lubos was running around on the turf alongside grown men and was able to grow as a soccer player because of it. The university fox didn’t wait long.

“At the beginning, I didn’t see the football environment in such an exaggerated way. When I went back to the Czech Republic after graduation and a stint in Philadelphia, I saw how quickly football in America had moved on,” he says.

“The Czech league has overtaken America by leaps and bounds. They have a great structure, they take care of both men’s teams and women’s and youth teams, which they definitely don’t skimp on. At the club level, they are interested in concept and vision and think long-term. For example, they took coach Jim Curtin, a fairly unknown name at the time, to Philadelphia. They liked his vision and a few years later the team won the whole league,” Luboš Kubík recalls.

The journey from a 16-year-old soccer player to an American university degree to a career in the office of a leading soccer club was full of experiences for Luboš. At the same time, he says he realizes that he made some decisions along the way that he might have made differently today.

“It would definitely have been easier if I had been guided along the way by someone more experienced who had been through the same environment and could have advised me at certain junctions,” Luboš believes.

It is also for this reason that he has long worked under the USA Sport & Study organization, where he heads the soccer division and helps young Czech soccer men and women follow in his footsteps overseas to American universities.

“I enjoy helping athletes who want to try something new and also pursue interesting studies and increase their credibility on the job market, whether in America or back in the Czech Republic. And I really recommend it to anyone who wants to play sports and study at the same time and nurture both options for a future career for as long as possible,” he concludes.

Source: USA Sports & Study