Gothamist76%
Could blind soccer have its moment? That's the goal for NYC's only pro player. 11%
By Apolline Lamy21%
6/21/2026, 3:01:02 PM
BS Summary: This article contains 24 faulty reasoning types, including Hasty Generalization, Anecdotal, and Post Hoc (False Cause), with Appeal to Authority as the most egregious example at 12.7% saturation with 148 hits. Analysis detected 1,455 faulty-reasoning hits from 1,165 analyzed words, generating a BS Score of 28.4% and a BS Rank of 11% (18,291 of 20,518 articles). This article is better (less manipulative) than 89.10% of the article peer group.
A coach stood on a small artificial turf field in Central Park and threw a ball past Charles Catherine.
With each bounce, the ball rattled.
The coach yelled to Catherine: “R-2!.”
For passersby, it might have sounded like a game of Battleship or chess.
But coach Isaac Foster was practicing with his Catherine — the captain of the USA Blind Soccer Men's National Team.
As the New York area embraces soccer players from around the globe for the World Cup, Catherine and teammates are looking ahead to the 2028 Paralympic Games in Los Angeles, the first time the U.S. will send a blind soccer team to the games.
Catherine ran toward “R-2.”
“Each team has its own system, and we divide the field into different squares, and we have a reference point,” Catherine told Gothamist in between practice plays.
“So they'll say, ‘pass to C-4,’ and I know exactly where that is, right?”
Blind soccer athletes, including those who are partially sighted, play with masks to keep things fair.
A goalie who may be partially sighted is the only member of each team of five allowed to keep the mask off.
A guide behind the goal directs players to sections of the field as a ball with bells or other noisemakers gives them further sensory feedback on where to go.
“L-2” sends a player to the second square on the left side, or “R-1” to the first on the right side.
“C-4” is up the center.
Catherine, originally from France, has been a New Yorker for 14 years, and lives on the Upper West Side.
In his day job, he’s vice president of corporate and government relations at the National Organization on Disability.
Lately, he’s been training every day in Riverside Park or in the new “FIFA Arena” temporary field built in Central Park for the World Cup.
He was already an athlete long before he found blind soccer in 2019 — he was a triathlete and had run three marathons.
“When I started, I didn't know how to dribble,” said Catherine.
“I didn't know how to move on the field, you know, because the one thing for a blind runner is that you're usually tethered to a guide.
But when you play soccer, you're running free on the field.”
But Catherine usually has to practice without other players, since he’s the only team member in New York City — in a sport that’s had a slower uptake in the U.S. than many other countries.
Blind soccer started in Brazil in the 1960s, and made its debut as a Paralympic sport in Athens in 2004, according to the U.S.
Association of Blind Athletes.
The U.S. association started its own program in 2018, and in 2019 became a member organization of U.S.
Soccer.
The New York Association of Blind Athletes tried to start a blind soccer program in 2018 — but blind soccer needs 10 players and two volunteer guides for two teams to play, which can make it difficult to organize.
Not enough players showed up to every practice to keep it running, according to Alvin Suarez, the group’s president.
And Catherine said in New York City, the scarcity of soccer fields makes developing momentum for blind soccer even more complicated.
Suarez said that his group found goalball — where players roll balls down a court and their opponents try and block them — to be the most popular sport among local blind athletes, with 25 players in New York City.
The enthusiasm for that sport is mirrored in the success of the American Paralympic goalball team.
Since 1976, U.S. teams have earned 12 Paralympic Games medals (seven for women’s teams, five for men’s) and 11 World Championship medals (eight for the women, three for the men).
But with the excitement around the World Cup, Catherine hopes blind soccer could have its moment at home.
According to the Census Bureau’s American Community Survey, there are about 25,000 youths who are blind or have serious difficulty seeing in New York City — about 1.5% of the youth population.
There are also 258,000 adults who are blind or have serious difficulty seeing, or about 3.8% of that population.
Some city-based initiatives look to serve young athletes with disabilities.
The nonprofit Kids Enjoy Exercise Now provides multiple free sports— swimming, basketball, yoga and soccer — to children with disabilities, and will run a soccer program in New York this summer.
Jazzy Smith, the executive director of KEEN NY, said soccer is one of the most popular sports among children.
Children usually have to undergo long waitlists; the summer soccer program offers 25 spots for 50 to 80 applicants.
But to be able to expand to offer blind soccer specifically, KEEN NY would need more access to pitches, as well as more volunteers and more funding, Smith said.
Jorge Polanco, head coach of the Blind Soccer USA Team, said that for blind soccer to grow more, he’d like to see a league developed in the U.S. — much like in Brazil, where there are three leagues and more than 20 teams.
He also said kids with visual impairments need to know the sport is available.
He’s worked with coaches and teachers to provide classes to blind and visually impaired youths.
“That is the biggest way we will grow this sport, because then they know at a young age what they have capabilities of being able to do,” Polanco said.
Catherine said that when he grew up, his parents focused a lot on his schoolwork, on helping him learn braille — but not on playing sports.
“I think young children with disabilities are not encouraged to play sports,” he said.
“We need to change mentalities around youth sports for children with disabilities.“
And Catherine said blind soccer and other athletic activities have made a tangible difference in his life.
A Centers for Disease Control and Prevention study finds people with disabilities report mental distress at 4.6 times the rate of people without disabilities.
Catherine had similar struggles, but said sports helped him to rebuild his pride, his identity and his confidence.
“When I started running I was depressed.
I struggled with my identity as a disabled adult.
All the ideas and words that came in my mind associated with blindness were loneliness, lack of opportunity,” Catherine said.
In athletics, Catherine found community.
“And through sports, you meet people who are very well adjusted, who have gone through that journey, who can teach you so much more than just sports, right?
They can teach you how to use your phone, how to connect with people, how to ask for help.
And that's really the key, right?
Asking for help is not easy.”
He said through soccer, he’s found a platform to talk about his experience as disabled person in a way that’s engaging and friendly.
“Instead of being something intimidating, my disability becomes something interesting,” he said.
Speakers
5speakers49%attributed speech595writer words
Voice mapSelect a segment to jump to its words
Selected voice
84%flagged-word coverageJorge Polanco
86 attributed words15% of attributed speech62% writer coverage
Attribution is sentence-level. Pattern percentages are calculated only from words assigned to that voice.
Loading…
Loading…
Loading…
Loading…
Analysis
Hover over highlighted words in the article to view the associated bias or fallacy analysis.