Downtown Chula Vista will be taken over by the Major League Soccer club, San Diego FC for its fifth and largest stop of its 2024 Chrome Ball Tour on May 4. Free to the public, from noon to 10 p.m., this event will kick off with a Chula Vista first responders’ tournament with players from the Chula Vista Fire Department and the Chula Vista Police Department.
The event also features a 3v3 street soccer tournament — men’s, women’s, youth co-ed, high school — a local car show, a Lucha Libre performance with Masked Republic, a San Diego FC Colors of the Community Fashion Show featuring a musical performance by Chula Vista natives Rossi Rock and Sebby OG, and musical acts featuring South Bay native DJ Beto Perez, world-renowned cumbia band Vilma Diaz y La Sonora, and San Diego native Lil Rob, and local artists exhibitions. Additionally, the Chrome Ball Tour will have a beer garden and a kid’s area that will include face painting, inflatables and more.
SDFC Senior Vice President of Brand Marketing and Community Sebastian Morua said SDFC is the new major league sports team in San Diego.
“San Diego has been waiting for a professional soccer franchise for quite a while now,” he said. “Soccer has been a huge part of San Diego culture for many years, dating back to the 70s with the San Diego Sockers, and more recently with the San Diego Loyal. For us to be able to bring this team together with our ownership group, and support San Diego, is an honor and a privilege.”
Morua said SDFC has a unique model and ownership. Fifty percent of ownership is the Sycuan Band of Kumeyaay Nation, and the other half is owned by Right to Dream, an international ecosystem of elite academies and professional clubs with operations in Ghana, Africa, Egypt, North Africa, Denmark, and across Scandinavia. SDFC is the 30th team in the league. This ownership makes history as the first-ever Native American ownership group in global football.
“It is a holistic development model,” he said. “We care as much about the human being as we do the athlete. It is a residential model and 100% scholarship based. We provide two different pathways for kids who join. A guaranteed professional contract to one of our clubs, or a guaranteed full scholarship as a student athlete at the high school and university level here in the U.S. and the United Kingdom.”
Morua said its long-term vision is to develop role models, and change-makers that will shape the industry.
“They are going to represent San Diego and show the country and the world the potential that San Diego has from a soccer perspective,” he said. “We build a community driven and community purpose club. And that is where the Chrome Ball Tour comes in. Being a new team and a new franchise, the Chrome Ball Tour is our way of saying hello to the community and planting the seeds. It gives us the opportunity to introduce local leaders, individuals and organizations. And it all starts with the passion for the game.”
Morua said the Chrome Ball Tour is a combination of music, art, soccer, and the local community all coming together to celebrate this new team that San Diego now has, and to celebrate the love of the game. He said the tour is going around the 18 communities in the county, a huge part of its community strategy. The tour began in January, and has gone to Oceanside, Escondido, Poway and Santee, and now with its largest event, Chula Vista.
“We are going to have a big soccer street party in Downtown Chula Vista in the heart of Chula Vista, and we are hoping to get the entire community to join us and celebrate with us,” he said. “We have our biggest tournament with more than 600 players coming from all over San Diego County. They will literally be playing soccer on the streets in downtown Chula Vista. We are closing Third Avenue, and we are super excited for this.”
Downtown Chula Vista Association District Manager Dominic LiMandri said it is thrilling to welcome the San Diego FC 2024 Chrome Ball Tour to Downtown Chula Vista.
“It’s a fantastic opportunity to bring our community together through the love of soccer, while also showcasing local artists, musicians, and vendors in exciting activations along Third Avenue,” he said.
Morua said everything about this event is local to Chula Vista. And Chula Vista is where SDFC will premier its new club merchandise, The Colors of the Community collection.
“We really try to bring the local flavor to each event and celebrate the local community,” he said. “All with the intention of making the club available to the community and a platform and a resource to show what that community is about. The glue bringing everyone together is soccer and the love of the game.”
Morua said the actual chrome ball that is going on the tour has the names of the San Diego County communities engraved on it, representing its commitment to all the county’s communities.
Morua said the day will kick off with a first responder’s tournament.
Chula Vista Fire Department Public Information Officer Captain Eric Martinez said when he heard about the Chrome Ball Tour coming to Chula Vista, he wanted the fire department to be part of it and inform the public and potential employees about the department.
“I saw this as a non-traditional way to partner with another community leader because the CVFD really prides itself on being deeply engrained in the community of Chula Vista through all our other volunteerism acts,” he said. “Our Foundation, our Easter Egg Hunt, our Pancake Breakfast, our open houses, our summer school tours. We thought this was another opportunity in a new and unique way to connect with the public and the citizens of Chula Vista who we proudly serve every day.”
Martinez said when collaborating about the first responders’ tournament, the topic mutually agreed on, was that this would be another community event where members of the fire department, both from suppression and its emergency transport system to play in a house tournament with each other, to showcase the normality of who they are as public servants.
“There are many ex-athletes and people still playing in adult tournaments in our department,” he said. “The benefit is that we will be playing against each other, our co-workers. The benefit of our job is that we are seen as tactical athletes. We train constantly for a physically demanding job. Many people remember the glory days of playing soccer in high school, and there are some pro athletes that have made it in our department. We are looking forward to another unique and engaging way to connect with the community, having some fun, and meeting with this new community leader here in San Diego.”
Morua said it is building an academy on Sycuan land at Singing Hills. It is a 28-acre project, with a residential academy with a school and five professional soccer fields, with state-of-the-art facilities for San Diego and Mexican youth to come together and form SDFC’s future squad. He said this gives youth in San Diego to live their dreams here in the county that they are growing up in. The Academy is scheduled to begin operations in 2025.
