The USL Championship's reigning Defensive Player of the Year has felt freedom to be himself in San Antonio — part of the reason he's planted roots in the city.
Mitchell Taintor reacts after jumping off the team's barge and into the San Antonio River as the San Antonio FC soccer team celebrates their first United Soccer League championship title along the RiverWalk and Arneson Theater on Tuesday, Nov. 15, 2022. Several hundred die-hard soccer fans joined in the revelry.
Since coming to San Antonio FC and uniting with coach Alen Marcina in 2020, Taintor has felt free to be authentic. That liberty, Taintor said, is the perhaps biggest reason he blossomed into the USL Championship’s Defensive Player of the Year last season, and why he can see himself staying in San Antonio for years to come.
He played two years with Toronto FC II and two seasons with Sacramento Republic before joining SAFC in 2020. He returned to Sacramento for 2021 but was loaned to SAFC that August and committed to the club on a permanent basis for 2022. “Throughout my whole career I was hyper focused on making the jump to MLS and moving on to other things, but coming to San Antonio, I feel like the professional soccer player I always wanted to be,” Taintor said. “If something happens where a bigger league comes, I’ll cross that road when I get there. But I have no intention of seeking that out. I just want to focus on playing well here, and winning.
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