Colombian American Olympian Melissa Ortiz Talks Latinas in Sports

Latina athletes face a serious lack of institutional support across the sports industry. For one, they don’t receive the same marketing, sponsorships, encouragement, or attendance that men’s sports do. In fact, a 2019 study found that while 54.6 percent of high school girls played on at least one sports team, only 48.4 percent of their Latina peers did the same. They also found that coaches were more likely to be biased against Latinas, believing that they came from families who failed to see the value of sports. Yet we have been dominating over the past few years. We’ve seen superstar athletes representing our communities on the world stage like Mexican-Kenyan judoka Prisca Awiti Alcaraz, Afro-Latina gymnast Jordan Chiles, Brazilian gymnast Rebeca Andrade, Panamanian Gymnast Hillary Heron, and Mexican golfer Lorena Ochoa. Despite the obstacles, they have made important, groundbreaking strides in their respective sports. But we clearly have much more work to do, especially when it comes to advocating for more Latinas to pursue sports, increasing the diversity within the industry on and off the field, and supporting them post-athletic career.

That’s where Latina athletes like Melissa Ortiz comes in. Born to a Colombian family, she is a former professional footballer who has played for Colombia’s senior clubs and national teams, eventually representing her family’s home country at the Summer 2012 Olympics. Since retiring from playing professionally in 2017, she now works as a sports broadcaster, analyst, and host for TNT Sports and Fox Sports, and has covered many sports events including the FIFA World Cup.

“For me, soccer has always been a bridge of expression, community, unity, and cultures. Sometimes you have two different cultures like Colombia and the United States, for instance, but you have 90 minutes of a game where both cultures will come together to watch and put away their differences,” Ortiz tells HipLatina. “Soccer has also been an opportunity builder. I never could have imagined that kicking a soccer ball would have not only led me to travel the world, but also led me to a full-time career in broadcasting and some of my greatest relationships.”

Ortiz was born and raised in Florida in the city of West Palm Beach with two older brothers. Constantly being around boys made her always want to play outside with her brothers and their friends, and being the only girl was almost never a new experience. She was often the only girl when they were playing baseball, derby, football, wrestling, and soccer. Though the gender disparity was obvious, all she wanted to do was have fun and play with the people she loved.

Of course, being Colombian, soccer became her favorite sport early on in her life, thanks to a culture where soccer was almost equated to a religious experience, with soccer games playing on TV screens almost everywhere she went. Though it was obvious how much she loved it, to the point that she often competed against players two years older than her and up, it wasn’t something that she was pushed into or encouraged to do, especially being a young girl.

“My grandpa was old school and Colombian, so he was always questioning why I was playing sports, why I was always with the boys, and why I played soccer,” she explains. “But once he saw me scoring goals, he was the first one to celebrate because I had this passion for it and it made me happy.”

As she grew, she expanded into playing other sports like volleyball, basketball, and lacrosse, later playing golf and padle post-retirement. Every sport in some way taught her something about form, leadership, teamwork, and empowerment. There were attempts on the part of her mother to get her to try other, more traditionally feminine activities like ballet and even flamenco dancing. But time and time again, she returned to soccer, fully in love with this exciting game.

“Soccer was an outlet for me to express myself and a bridge to show the boys that girls are not only able to play or allowed to play, but also that we can hold our own,” she says. “When I was younger, I would ball out amongst the boys because it was about me showing up, proving myself, and proving that women, girls, and and Latinas can.”

Throughout elementary and middle school, soccer absolutely defined her life. But things changed when she was in high school and she realized that she didn’t really see herself having a future in the sport. It wasn’t because she lacked the passion or drive, but because she felt like she didn’t have any Latina role models in sports to look up to.

“At the time, we didn’t get to see women’s soccer on TV apart from the Women’s World Cup. There was no social media back then, so I never was able to see that I could actually make a career out of this. Being a first generation American, seeing my parents work day in and day out nonstop to give us a better future, I was just thinking that I needed to create a stable future. And women’s soccer wasn’t a route that I saw as possible,” she explains.

So she put soccer aside. She stopped playing competitively in her club and just played with men in the local community – which she later found drastically improved her skills. In the meantime, she had other options. When she ended up getting accepted to the Pratt Institute of Design, an architecture school in New York City, she was further convinced that this was what she was supposed to do.

Then, at the end of her senior year, she ended up going back to soccer for the spring season recreationally and for fun. One day at practice, Erin, a coach from Lynn University, a private university in Boca Raton, came up to her and asked her where she was going to college the following year. Erin was surprised to hear that Ortiz, who was clearly motivated and talented at soccer, was going to Pratt, where they didn’t have a soccer team. Though Ortiz initially refused the offer to try out for the university, Erin was persistent. Every day for the next two weeks, she called Ortiz’s house and eventually convinced her and her mom to train with the team. After a few days, Erin pulled Ortiz into the office and offered her what was practically a full-ride scholarship, which Pratt wasn’t offering, and that changed everything.

“That was my turning point where I made a decision to play college soccer,” she says. “That’s when I realized that I was really good and I had potential.”

And once she ran down that road, it was like the opportunities just kept coming. She had a great set-up, including a team training facility, at school. It felt like she’d finally been given a platform. And in her freshman year of college, she was scouted by a coach from Colombia’s national team, and she saw the potential to play in the World Cup or the Olympics.

At the same time, however, another big reason and motivator for her to pursue women’s sports was the fact that on a national and even international scale, women’s sports were not and continue not to be supported in the U.S., Colombia, South America, and beyond. As she became pro, she saw herself and other female athletes not receiving the resources or support they deserved, especially compared to men’s sports. During the seven years that she played in and for Colombia, she and her teammates sometimes weren’t paid, were given used and old jerseys, didn’t have their own training camp for over two years, and were forced to pay for their own travel and flights to play games. Both back and then and today, equal opportunity across the gender spectrum has struggled to reach an equilibrium.

“On a government and federation level, soccer was never given resources or support,” Ortiz says. “I was motivated to grow with soccer and to be an advocate for the growth of our game, of women’s sports, and of women in general. I had this feeling in me to keep on pushing.”

Starting in 2019 following her retirement, she and a teammate publicly spoke out against the Colombian soccer federation, advocating for greater rights for women’s soccer – and women’s sports – across the country. In the years since, she has already seen incredible impact and changes. Today, Colombia’s female soccer teams perform better in the World Cups and Olympics. They’re given training camps. They’re getting paid – though of course, it could be better – and are given greater coverage from networks and broadcasters. It’s huge progress toward a more equitable future. But of course for Ortiz, the work is just getting started.

“I want to use my platform and voice as much as I can to be an advocate for the growth not only of of Colombian soccer but also of women’s soccer and women’s sports in general. I promote events as much as possible. I know how much I wanted all of this as a little girl and thankfully, I now have the platform to be able to be an advocate for it,” she says. “And I do it from the Latina lens because as Latinas we lack in support for women’s sports and we need to see the potential and trajectory it could give us, our daughters, and future generations.”

She has seen first-hand how a lack of investment in women’s sports hurts the female athletes who play them, from a lack of press coverage to refusal of big-name sports brands to back or sponsor women’s teams. Thankfully, her role as a broadcaster has allowed her to break through the glass ceiling of common industry behaviors, standards, and biases, and support the game she loves.

Notably, that was something she pursued all on her own, essentially carving out a new space and career for herself. At first, she was just setting up her camera and creating videos in her apartment where she talked about men’s and women’s soccer for a bilingual audiences. When she spoke to companies for opportunities, they sent her products rather than sending her on trips or offering her compensation. Soon after, she attended the Russia World Cup, self-funding her trip and content she created while she was there. Once she moved to New York, she worked hard to meet and network with the right people. It was only then that she had opportunities to get paid for her work, including collaborations for sponsored posts and paid flights to soccer events and games in exchange for press coverage. Since then, she’s broadcasted with networks like TNT Sports and Fox Sports, collaborated with Verizon, EA Sports, and more, and covered the biggest events in sports from the Olympics to the Superbowl.

Looking ahead, Ortiz will be launching Hasta Abajo, a podcast with Argentine Peloton instructor Camila Roman through iHeartRadio Women’s Sports. As Latinas, they are hugely inspired by each other’s work ethic and combined interest in fitness, sports, and music. They hope that the podcast will be motivating to other Latinas and plan to interview powerhouse Latine musicians, artists, actors, athletes, and entrepreneurs, With six episodes already recorded, she’s excited to share the podcast with her audience and hopefully see even greater support for women in sports. Because ultimately, across all her projects, pursuits, and everything she does, her hope is to see women uplifted, encouraged, and empowered to go after their ambitions and what they really want out of life, regardless of their industry’s attitudes towards them. She notes:

“I’ve always lived and led with passion. I kept going and followed my instinct, my heart, and my gut to play and work hard to get the opportunities to be on the national team and play professionally. Starting out in the broadcasting world was no easy task nor transition.When I started seven or eight years ago, there weren’t many Latinas like me who were former players and had like I did. But I led with passion because I had a calling to go into broadcasting and use my voice as a Latina in this space. I had the knowledge of the game. I wanted to be on camera even when nobody really cared. But once you get those opportunities and get your foot in the door, it’s about proving yourself, keeping a foot inside that room, then opening doors and lending a hand to others so that they can come in it as well.”