It would have been easy for Orlando City right back Alex Freeman to feel pressure to follow in his father’s footsteps.
Former Green Bay Packers All-Pro wide receiver Antonio Freeman certainly had dreams of teaching his son the art of route-running in the backyard.
“Of course, every dad’s dream as a former athlete is that I’m going to have my hands on him, I’m going to teach him, I’m going to show him the nuances and the tricks of the trade,” Antonio Freeman recalled in a phone interview with The Athletic.
But Alex Freeman wanted to kick every ball around him. And his mother, Rochelle Hinkle, threw him into every sport. In fact, tennis looked like a potential path for him at one point. In the end, however, the tendency to put the ball at his feet prevailed.
Soccer was the right path.
Freeman is in the midst of a breakout season with Orlando City. Another strong outing in a 3-0 win over Inter Miami on Sunday night — he created four chances, including two big chances, had 0.8 expected goals and 0.34 expected assists — reinforced his impact this year. The 20-year-old right back has won the starting job under Óscar Pareja, and his effectiveness on the ball in possession and getting forward and contributing in the attacking end has put him on the radar of the U.S. men’s national team.
Freeman, who has three goals and one assist this season, was a surprise name on Mauricio Pochettino’s 60-man preliminary roster for next month’s Concacaf Gold Cup. He’s an intriguing prospect at a position of need for the U.S., and his inclusion on the list is confirmation of his progress.
Alex Freeman has been a breakout star at right back for Orlando City. (Photo by Nathan Ray Seebeck/Imagn Images)
For Freeman, it’s all validation for the path that he is forging on his own.
“It’s kind of good to create my own story,” Freeman said last week. “To be able to maybe step away from the fact that my dad was a professional football player and just try to create my own narrative.”
The Freemans always wanted to make sure the son never felt any paternal pressure. They thought about naming him Antonio Freeman Jr., but they opted against that to avoid those sorts of comparisons to the Super Bowl XXXI champion and Packers Hall of Famer.
Alex picked up nearly every sport he tried. Rochelle said she thought basketball would be the path, and that tennis coaches told her Alex could pursue a pro career in that sport, too. In the end, he started to lean toward soccer, the sport in which his stepfather, Jake Hinkle, was his first coach.
The whole family started to get baptized into soccer life at the youth fields, where they became fixtures. Rochelle is now a Liverpool fan and jokingly called Alex, “my little Trent Alexander-Arnold.”
Antonio Freeman recalled his own exposure to soccer growing up in Maryland at a camp run by John Murdock, a well-known coach and mentor in East Baltimore. He laughed that his career ended at age 12, when he stopped going to Murdock’s camps, and said he felt like he had picked things up when he finally understood the offside rule while watching his son at a tournament in Dallas.
“The more they watch it, the more they’re trying to tell me stuff,” Alex Freeman said, laughing. “And I’m like, come on.”
The all-in moment came during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Alex tried out for Inter Miami’s academy but didn’t make the team. His former coach at Weston FC, Javier Carrillo, convinced him to come play in Orlando City’s academy. Rochelle hesitated at the idea of sending her 15-year-old son three hours away in the midst of the pandemic, but ultimately allowed him to go live with the family of another player on the team in 2020.
In Orlando, Alex, who had largely played as a winger and forward, started his transition to right back. He won an MLS Next Cup U-17 championship in 2021, then signed a homegrown deal in 2022. After spending three seasons with the club’s reserve side, Orlando City B, with three MLS regular-season first-team appearances in 2023 and 2024 combined, Freeman won a starting job with the first team this season.
Freeman races by Jordi Alba in Orlando City’s 3-0 win over Florida rival Inter Miami. (Photo by Megan Briggs/Getty Images)
“I feel like everyone has a different journey,” he said. “I wanted to be a professional soccer player, and at a very young age I was offered the opportunity to be one. I knew maybe I wouldn’t play right away, but that I could be able to play for the first team eventually.
“Playing with OCB for about three years improved me a lot. … And now that I finally got to the point where I want to be at, it’s about not taking anything for granted and just keep giving 100 percent.”
There have been moments this season with Orlando that keep drawing your eye to the young right back.
In the 75th minute of a draw against the Philadelphia Union in April, Freeman held the ball away from Philly defender Nathan Harriel with his right foot. Then, as midfielder Jovan Lukić approached from the other side, Freeman calmly pulled a Cruyff turn between the two of them to break free, then ran at the Union back line and set up a shot by forward Luis Muriel.
Against the Galaxy a few weeks earlier, Freeman recognized how he could create space by carrying the ball inside and then playing it wide. He kept his run inside in the channel and accelerated past a defender to get into space for a dangerous cross.
Against NYCFC, he stayed alert and in position and was able to clear the ball off the goal line on an overhead kick after a Pedro Gallese save.
Then, of course, there are his goals, including his first career goal in his first career start.
Freeman waited until gameday to tell his parents that he was starting. Rochelle said she’s perpetually late and that Alex told her to try to be on time for this one. Antonio missed the first two minutes because he accidentally parked near the Citrus Bowl for a car show instead of near Orlando City Stadium. He sprinted through the neighborhood to get to the stadium, but missed the walk-out, which was the big moment in his mind.
Then, Alex scored, in a moment Antonio captured jubilantly on social media.
For his parents, it was a payoff for the work they saw him putting in to try to get to that first-team level.
“He is very passionate, he’s always worked so hard off the field, even when he’s not practicing he would be in the gym or working out or watching other games,” Rochelle Hinkle said. “He’s just so focused. It’s amazing. It took him a minute to get to this level, but it looks like he’s ready. Watching him play these last few games, I am not surprised, but he has risen to the occasion.”
Freeman still has plenty of work to do, especially on the defensive side. But his confidence and ability going forward are on display in nearly every game for Orlando City.
Pareja, who consistently produced young homegrown talent at FC Dallas, said he wouldn’t have put Freeman into the lineup if he didn’t think he was ready to take this next step.
“Alex is putting all the pieces together,” Pareja said. “Defensively, he is working much better understanding the function and the responsibility that he has as a fullback. Offensively, I think he’s understanding much better, as well, his connections with his midfielders and also his winger on his side. All those parts are growing.
“He has the intuition, the intelligence to (come inside to play). I like it because he’s not forcing it. It’s natural. He comes especially as a false winger with a very natural way. He allows us to make some movements that convert Alex into a very functional player. That ability that he has to combine with his teammates around him just caught my eye.”
Antonio Freeman scored three receiving touchdowns across Super Bowls XXXI and XXXII. (Photo by USA TODAY Sports)
If Freeman can continue to progress as a defender, his profile will certainly be attractive at higher levels. And while he’s forging his own path, he made sure to say he takes enormous pride in adding to his father, and his family’s, legacy.
“To have someone that’s always there for me, he has impacted my life a lot,” he said. “It just shows how he came from so little, and he was able to do so much for his family and give back to them. And not only that, but he was able to succeed. He beat the odds.
“I feel like in life, you’re gonna have odds against you. You’re gonna have to work and try to beat them. You’re gonna have stuff that you’re gonna have to overcome. As a person, not even just as a parent, but as a person, he’s done that a lot. So he’s definitely someone that I look up to every day.
(Top photo: Nathan Ray Seebeck/Imagn Images)