Mike Petke is very passionate about soccer. To the point that early in his coaching career, he referred to himself as “a little psychotic.” Those days are behind him, mostly, but that passion still burns in him and after a two-year hiatus from coaching, he is beyond ready to live that passion again as Real Salt Lake’s Head Coach.
While his passion seems like something he was born with, there have been a parade of people through his 41 years that have played a role in influencing his love for the game and desire to give back to it everything he got during his playing days.
His Father’s Son
Growing up in Long Island, Petke had a blue-collar background. There, his father Ed worked at the Long Island Rail Road for over 35 years. During his time, his son remembers, he took just two sick days until he retired. That subtle aspect of a 9-to-5 job was never lost on Petke and it was instrumental in shaping him as a player and has gone even further to set him up to be a successful coach.
He ranks among the top 30 players in Major League Soccer history with 307 career appearances during his 13-year career with New York (as both the MetroStars and Red Bulls), D.C. United and the Colorado Rapids. He was durable and reliable, even if he did have a bit of a wild streak.
Like his father, he left everything on the field as a player. And it was memories of walking on his father’s back every morning before he left for work that drove him every training session.
“His health and his back were terrible, but every morning he got up and he went to work,” Petke said. “He took two sick days in over 37 years. So every day I come to practice, I think of that.”
He was always accountable. And dependable.
While he knows it’s not realistic to expect that to exist on the same level with every player, it is an element that he won’t budge on, especially when forming the culture of a team.
“If you do all of those things, the culture and identity should form itself.”
Coaches Among Us
Once he stared playing soccer at age seven, Petke fell quickly in love with the game. That was thanks in large part to his coach, a Dutch transplant named Wim Roemersma. Without a professional league to watch – other than the occasional scrambled game that would come through on the UHF channel of his black-and-white television – kids generally found their way through the game through the eyes of expats who had passion for the game grown over years immersed in it.
During his collegiate years at Southern Connecticut State, Ray Reid helped him develop from a kid with promise to a professional. Now the Head Coach at UConn where he has four National Coach of the Year honors and four National Championships, Reid has continued to be an important influencer in the American game.
Once he reached the pros, he played for Bruce Arena and Bob Bradley, providing the opportunity to learn from two of the best in the U.S. professional game over the last 20 years.
Counting all of those coaches as role models, Petke has taken elements from each to form his coaching style. But even still, it took some advice from a doctor to finalize the transition from his fiery playing days to what he describes as a more even-keeled approach.
Early in his coaching career, he wasn’t feeling well after a match and had his blood pressure checked by the team doctor. With alarming results, Petke vowed to make changes to his coaching style to save his own health while also keeping his edge.
“I do have my moments still, but that’s the one thing I’ve adapted. You can’t have too many highs and too many lows,” he said. “It was tough for me to get to that place without losing my passion because that’s important to me. It’s a fine line that you can toe.”
“Behind every great man is a better woman.”
Any conversation with Petke will involve his family at some point. And for good reason. A family deep-rooted in soccer, he can always turn to his wife Kim, herself a former player who spent some time working at the MLS offices.
She drove him into the coaching ranks after his retirement in 2011 and kept that spirit strong while he was away from the game in 2015 and 2016. So when it came time to leave their home state – she is a New Jersey native who converted him over time – it was without trepidation that he consulted her and their two sons knowing that if the situation was right he would have their full support.
“She is invested in this just as much as I am. When we got married she knew this was the life we chose. She was the first one to push me into opportunities and this was no different,” Petke said. “Everything I do, I do for my family. These opportunities don’t come every day. To jump on them is the right thing to do for myself and for my family.”
If his family was a deciding factor in making the move from New Jersey to Utah to coach initially at the USL level before he was named Real Salt Lake Head Coach this week, it is also because they were his motivation when he spent two years out of the coaching fraternity.
He spent the time away as a broadcaster and had the chance to watch his kids play more than ever.
“My family drove me. At my low points, they were the ones there for me,” he said. “My wife reminded me every day that I was a coach. She really was the driving factor.”
A New Passion
Petke got his professional start with the MetroStars and finished his playing days with the Red Bulls. With 169 of his career matches played in front of family and friends, there was a natural passion that was unique to New Jersey. He put similar emotion into his coaching with the Red Bulls.
Now the head of Real Salt Lake, he’s not about to pretend that he has limitless passion for the club he has called home for just four months. However, he is giving the club an open-armed embrace and already has developed an excitement and respect for the club that he sees developing into a greater passion in the near future.
“I’m not fooling anybody. I’m not kissing the scarf, because that would be fake. I respect, 100%, this club and I have for years. Now being immersed in it, I have a newfound respect,” he said. “What I want is to see from the players who have been here, from the staff and from the upper management to show me that passion so I can buy into that. They’ve done a hell of a job so far. I love this club already. I’m going to do everything I can for this club. But a true 100% passion is going to come and I look forward to when it does.”
