In an interview with Apple TV’s Andrew Wiebe before a July 17 match against Nashville SC, Jay Fortune said that he “only (wanted) to play for Atlanta United.” With the homegrown midfielder’s contract ending at the end of the 2026 season, the message was clear.
Of course, in life, one learns to expect the unexpected.
After a strong 2024, Fortune looked to continue his emergence in 2025 until a mid-foot sprain with Trinidad and Tobago in the Gold Cup that June sidelined him for nearly 10 months. He returned on April 4 as a substitute against the Columbus Crew.
Then came the Nashville match, Atlanta’s first after the World Cup break, when he was lifted after 11 minutes due to a hamstring injury and was ruled out for three to four weeks. Fortune would return to training until injuring his other hamstring last week, with the team revealing that it’d be another three to four weeks until he returns.
That certainly won’t go unnoticed by the front office as it considers Fortune’s future. Injuries are a bit easier to digest while on a supplemental contract, when you don’t count toward a club’s salary budget. When you’re a senior roster player, it’s a different story.
There’s no doubt that Fortune is a talented player; he wears the badge with the passion of someone who’s been in the organization since 2018 and worked his way up through the academy, to ATL UTD 2, to Atlanta’s first team and the Trinidad national team. When it comes to an advertisement of the club’s methodology, he’s up there with players like Caleb Wiley and George Bello.
But how will his injury history affect his standing with the club?
In a perfect world, Fortune would have remained healthy in 2025 and signed a multiple-year contract to stay in Atlanta long-term. Instead, his season has been interrupted for the second year in a row and, frankly, it’s destroyed any leverage he and his team had. For Atlanta’s part, it’s tough to see it letting him walk at the end of the year. It could opt to re-sign him to a low-risk deal for the sprint season with an option for 2027-28 to see how he recovers.
Hopefully, Fortune comes back from this latest setback stronger than ever. More importantly, let’s hope he can eventually get exactly what he’s looking for: a nice, long-term career in the place he’s called home for the better part of a decade.
I have been banging the drum all year about how this is a systematic issue. We have had way too many players picking up soft tissue injury. We clearly need to reevaluate our medical/training staff. I completely understand players picking up soft tissue injury during a match, but it seems like we are having most of our soft tissue injury during training sessions.
This kid is a special talent. A real difference maker on what has been a very bad team. I really hate to see the injury pattern that has developed, and I truly hope he can turn this page. Too many talented athletes have lost their careers because their bodies just couldn’t take the stress. If that is the case with jay, it will be real loss for him, our club and the tnt national team.