A year after building a super team by landing four U.S. women's national team stars, one would be forgiven for thinking NJ/NY Gotham FC are a finished product. The tumult of NWSL offseasons rest for no one, though, including the 2023 champions, who are once again positioning themselves as one of the league's most fascinating teams to follow as preparation begins for the 2025 season.
In the month since November's Championship, Gotham have signed off on several high-profile outgoing moves that laid the groundwork for a surprise rebuild, chief among them the trades of attacking stars Lynn Williams and Yazmeen Ryan. The impressive quality and quantity of Gotham's departures forced questions about what was next for the 2023 champions as well as the longevity of their super team project, though the wait for an answer was not long. On Monday, Gotham signed Brazil star Gabi Portilho from Corinthians at the end of a career year for the goalscorer, signaling a rebrand for Gotham's super team era.
Though it is still early in the NWSL offseason, Gotham's busy winter offers the latest glimpse at the new rules of roster building in a league under constant evolution as well the sustainability of super teams in a league as competitive as this one.
Gotham's new look
Gotham's super team era began with the 2024 season, but the group's attack was already in strong shape thanks to two players who joined the fold for the 2023 season and were part of the Championship-winning team – Williams and Ryan. The pair fit right into the super team in 2024 and earned spots on the NWSL's Best XI Second Team by year's end, with Williams notching four goals and three assists last season and Ryan posting five goals and six assists.
Williams' trade to the Seattle Reign and Ryan's to the Houston Dash over the last two weeks, though, raised questions about how Gotham would replace their end product in 2025. The good news is that Juan Carlos Amoros' side still has 2024's top three goalscorers in Esther Gonzalez, Rose Lavelle and Ella Stevens, all of whom scored seven-plus goals in the NWSL last season. Portilho, though, is expected to fill in the gaps left by Williams and Ryan after showcasing her best self in international play this year.
Portilho was the star of Brazil's run to the Olympic silver medal in Paris over the summer, registering two goals and two assists in five games. She was their most involved player in attack and excelled in wide positions, and was also arguably the best player in the gold medal match that the USWNT went on to win by a single goal. Her subsequent Ballon d'Or nomination and spot in FIFA's Women's World 11 make Porilho one of women's soccer's buzziest breakouts, and she will now have the chance to showcase her skills weekly in one of the world's most visible women's soccer leagues.
The 29-year-old is also the latest player to follow a newfound pathway to the NWSL, one in which players from talent-rich but less accessible leagues can move to the U.S. thanks to the league's additional international roster spots and new transfer fee mechanisms. The NWSL's push to internationalize its player pool has made the U.S. a destination for many of Portilho's Brazil teammates, with seven of her teammates on the silver medal winning team already playing for clubs in the league.
By signing Portilho, Gotham are diversifying the look of their super team that was almost exclusively built on domestic talent acquired by intra-league trades or as free agents. Those player acquisition methods are still quite useful, though – Gotham acquired a total of $470,000 by trading Williams and Ryan, as well as defensive midfielder Jaelin Howell from the Reign.
The 25-year-old Howell fills a gap left by Maitaine Lopez, who exited as a free agent, and might be on the hunt for a career renaissance of sorts. Howell has spent the majority of her NWSL career with Racing Louisville, but as the second overall pick in the 2022 draft and a youth international with five caps for the USWNT, it feels like the ceiling is still quite high on her prospects. Considering head coach Juan Carlos Amoros prefers to build his team with a strong defensive shape, Howell could be equally important as Portilho is for Gotham in 2025.
Are NWSL super teams made to last?
Until Portilho officially joined Gotham on Monday, the team's offseason was defined by the players who decided to move elsewhere, all for a variety of reasons. Williams, a California native, explicitly left because she wanted to finish her career on the west coast. The rest, in some ways, feels like the natural consequence of building a super team – there's more talent than there are minutes to hand out, and players will take note of that sooner or later.
Almost as soon as the offseason began, Lopez, midfielder Delanie Sheehan and defender Sam Hiatt departed Gotham as free agents. Lopez and Sheehan have already found landing spots with the Chicago Stars and Houston Dash, respectively, and seem likely to play big roles at their new teams. The trio's situations are not identical – Lopez's move is easy to explain after she played less than 500 minutes for Gotham, while Hiatt logged 1,000-plus minutes and Sheehan played more than 2,000 minutes in 2024. Hiatt and Sheehan, though, still felt like less crucial pieces to Gotham's puzzle, so their decisions to move elsewhere are not necessarily a surprise. The same can be said for goalkeeper Cassie Miller, who was included in Williams' trade to the Reign after playing just four NWSL games in 2024.
Their exits indicate that there are compelling arguments to be made for many teams across the league, and the same goes for Ryan's move to the Dash. Gotham seemed to understand that by trading Ryan, they could get a league record $400,000 in allocation money as well as an international roster spot that would help them land Portilho. From Ryan's perspective, though, she's now the face of the Dash's ambitious rebuild under new president of women's soccer Angela Hucles Mangano. Even if the NWSL is currently limited to just 14 teams, it still feels like there is a landing spot for any noteworthy player, depending on their exact needs.
As NWSL teams become more equipped to scout talent outside of the league, though, they can finally begin to tap into the seemingly infinite number of worthy players around the world. It will only make the competition for roster spots in the NWSL more competitive, as well as the race to build championship-winning rosters in a league where teams can almost transform overnight.
